Karis Barker - Church Visit #2

Church name: Wheaton Chinese Alliance Church
Church Address: 1748 S Blanchard St, Wheaton, IL 60189
Date attended: 9/13/15
Church category: Different ethnic or racial demographic

Describe the worship service you attended. How was it similar to or different from your regular context?
The largest difference between my home church and the Wheaton Chinese Alliance Church was definitely the size, both in terms of the congregation and the sanctuary space. Each of the three worship services at my home church draws about 600 attenders, though the space can hold about 1,000 easily whereas the WCAC service that I attended had about 70 people in sanctuary that could seat about 150. I found the size difference refreshing: its easy to feel like more of a number than a brother or sister in Christ at a really large church.

To be honest, I was quite surprised at the amount of Caucasians at WCAC. I realize now that attending the English worship service probably had something to do with that. I would say that the ratio of Asians to Caucasians was about 50:50. In that respect, the demographic was similar to my home church. The Cantonese and Mandarin services, I assume, have many more Asian attendees.

Another aspect of the service that contrasted my home church experience was the modest worship ensemble. My home church has a large worship team with a hired worship leader and a fancy tech. booth (drums, guitars, multiple singers, piano/keyboards, etc.) whereas the WCAC had a few student/volunteer musicians with basic equipment. While I'd admit that it's nice to sing along with professional-sounding worship music, I think there is a fine line between worship and concert that my home church has occasionally come close to crossing.

What did you find most interesting or appealing about the worship service?
The size of WCAC was appealing to me, but also the sermon topic of creation care. As a biology major, this subject is particularly meaningful to me. I don't think many Christians realize that being stewards of creation is not just the job of tree-huggers and the Environmental Protection Agency. It is something that all Christians can participate in, even if that means just decreasing shower time by two minutes or using cloth grocery bags.

Though it wasn't actually a part of the worship service, an announcement was made for small group meetings after the service to discuss creation care over lunch or coffee. I wish my home church was better at promoting fellowship opportunities like this; I suppose it's easier with a smaller congregation.

What did you find most disorienting or challenging about the worship service?
Overall, the worship service wasn't too far out of my comfort zone. If I had to choose something, I would say that the most disorienting or challenging thing about the experience was probably the technical difficulties that occurred when the church leaders tried to project a brief video presentation as well as the modest sound of the musicians.

What aspects of Scripture or theology did the worship service illuminate for you that you had not perceived as clearly in your regular context?
Ben Lowe was the guest speaker for the service that I attended and he spoke on Creation Care. I remember hearing a similar message from him when he spoke at Wheaton College chapel a while back so nothing was brand new but the following quote was an interest nuance to his message from this WCAC service that has stuck with me:"worry more about genetically modified church, not genetically modified food". I don't remember exactly the context of this quote, but it is an interesting point. Sometimes we are more (or less) concerned about things than we should be. And creation is indeed something the body of Christ should be concerned about.