Church address: 4543 S. Princeton Ave. Chicago, IL 60609
Date attended: March 30th, 2014
Church Category: different racial demographic
Describe.
The worship service was a lot of music and singing. There's really not a whole lot more to say about it. We started off singing, there was a moment where they had a group of people come out and do a dance to a pre-recorded song, which was nice. Then we sang more. Eventually the preacher got up and delivered a message. He was great. The friend I was with told me that he is a Grammy winner and a Moody grad (which is an alarming combination) and it made for a wonderful message, infused with sound scriptural doctrine with everyday applications, singing, and my favorite, pop culture references. As different as it was from my home church, Pastor Charles Jenkins actually reminded me in some way of the pastor of my church back home. Obviously a big difference was that I was the only white person at Fellowship that I could see, and it was significantly bigger than my home church, and in an urban setting.
Most appealing.
The most appealing part of the service was definitely Pastor Charles Jenkins. He has a remarkable gift of being able to speak in a way that reaches many different types of people--old, young, black, white, rich, poor. If this church wasn't as far away as it is, I would go there on a regular basis just to hear him. He had so much energy and was visibly passionate about the message he was giving. What I appreciated was that it wasn't dumbed down. He didn't avoid getting deep and talking about serious theological things, but he did avoid all of the superfluous language that is so often used to make the speaker seemed more enlightened or the subject material more important. He was able to use the valuable things he had learned from Moody and I'm assuming seminary and communicate them in a safe way. He really connected with me and I think with many of the people there. Also helps that he had an amazing singing voice that we occasionally got to hear.
Most challenging.
The most challenging part of the service was the amount of body movement that was present in the congregation. It's not that I was uncomfortable that they were doing it but rather I was uncomfortable because I felt that since everyone else was worshiping with their entire body that I was supposed to too. I am not used to this kind of thing so again, it wasn't that I was for some reason opposed to it, I just don't normally do it and therefore feel pretty awkward when I try to. I think this is something that I could probably use a little more of in my life--using my body in worship other than just my voice. I think this goes beyond just raising a hand or clapping, because those kind of things annoy me a lot but nothing about the way the people at this church were worshiping was annoying to me.
Illuminated.
I think what was illuminated here for me was the freedom we have in Christ. There is such a variety of expression in terms of how we chose to worship God. The people at Fellowship were really into dancing and singing and shouting and clapping. The people at St. John's are really into liturgy. I think both are fine and both are necessary. It's amazing to me that we are all praising the same God in such vastly different ways, and he loves it no matter what. And I also don't think that we have to chose one of these styles of worship and stick to it forever. Yes obviously you eventually have to chose a church community to be apart of and contribute to, but it seems pretty important to me to occasionally get out of your bubble and remember all the diversity and freedom of the body of Christ.
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