12 Crucial Passages about the very First Missionary…God
Worship
After this I saw a vast crowd, too great to count, from every nation and tribe and people and language, standing in front of the throne and before the Lamb. They were clothed in white robes and held palm branches in their hands. And they were shouting with a mighty shout, “Salvation comes from our God who sits on the throne and from the Lamb!”
Revelation 7:9-10
And let the peace that comes from Christ rule in your hearts. For as members of one body you are called to live in peace. And always be thankful. Let the message about Christ, in all its richness, fill your lives.
Teach and counsel each other with all the wisdom he gives. Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to God with thankful hearts. And whatever you do or say, do it as a representative of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through him to God the Father.
Colossians 3:15-17
Mission
I will cause your descendants to become as numerous as the stars of the sky, and I will give them all these lands. And through your descendants all the nations of the earth will be blessed.
Genesis 26:4
So when the apostles were with Jesus, they kept asking him, “Lord, has the time come for you to free Israel and restore our kingdom?” He replied, “The Father alone has the authority to set those dates and times, and they are not for you to know.
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Acts 1:6-8
Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Matthew 28:19
Kingdom
The whole earth will acknowledge the Lord and return to him. All the families of the nations will bow down before him.
Psalm 22:27
“Be still, and know that I am God! I will be honored by every nation. I will be honored throughout the world.”
Psalm 46:10
“I will also bless the foreigners who commit themselves to the Lord, who serve him and love his name, who worship him and do not desecrate the Sabbath day of rest, and who hold fast to my covenant. I will bring them to my holy mountain of Jerusalem and will fill them with joy in my house of prayer.
I will accept their burnt offerings and sacrifices, because my Temple will be called a house of prayer for all nations. For the Sovereign Lord, who brings back the outcasts of Israel, says: I will bring others, too, besides my people Israel.”
Isaiah 56:6-8
Then the nations will tremble before the Lord. The kings of the earth will tremble before his glory.
Psalm 102:15
Community
There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.
Galatians 3:28
For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you have been called to one glorious hope for the future.
Ephesians 4:4
Judgment
But when the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit upon his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered in his presence, and he will separate the people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.
Matthew 25:31-32
© 2011, Peter Park. All rights reserved.
Metro Community Church “Beautifully Broken”
© 2012 – 2011, Peter Park. All rights reserved.
Is multicultural worship another form of racial reconciliation?
This is a tough question, but I believe the answer is yes. But that “yes” answer comes along with a lot of expectations.
Play skillfully
(I’m going to primarily talk about music and multicultural worship in this case, but it’s certainly not limited to just music.)
A lot of work needs to go into doing multicultural worship. I don’t necessarily mean that the goal is to do multicultural “right“, but I do mean that hard work needs to honor the people where the music comes from, the people in the congregation, and God.
Needs means several things for the worship leader: digging in the Word, praying for intentional cross cultural relationships, doing research on the stories behind a song through the internet and with people, making sure the team is well prepared to pull off a new style/song, listening to different kinds of music, taking time to build your own skills in leadership and music, etc.
If I don’t put the hard work in those areas, then the music that we play and sing will seem fake, inauthentic, or patronizing. And that doesn’t glorify God.
Subcategory
I would also like to say that whether it’s multicultural worship or racial reconciliation it’s all part of God’s main purpose to bring the nations together to give Him glory. Reconciliation is something that God is encouraging and initiated Himself. When Christ died on the cross He reconciled us to Him, but He also reconciled us with one another.
Colossians 1:19-20 says:
For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ, and through him God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ’s blood on the cross.
Questions for you
What kinds of things do you do to prepare well for a multicultural worship service? Is multicultural worship another form of reconciliation? Or is there a bigger overarching theme?
Blog post by Peter Kihyun Park
© 2012 – 2011, Peter Park. All rights reserved.
Is the multicultural church unintentionally promoting assimilation?
Cultural assimilation: the process whereby a minority group gradually adapts to the customs and attitudes of the predominant culture and customs.
I think we can all agree that assimilation is not a good thing in that some of the wonderful things about a culture, which can be God honoring, is lost.
But I think even a well intentioned church desiring the call to be multicultural can unintentionally ask assimilate into their way of doing things. This can especially true in churches where there isn’t a lot of diversity in the church or the people in the congregation don’t really understand why it’s important to be multicultural.
However, a good pastor friend of mine said that when there isn’t a dominant ethnic culture, it’s much easier, in some ways, to not have it be about the dominant culture’s preferences. I think that can certainly help, but there may be two more important factors to recognize.
Love and Honor
Romans 12:10 says:
Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other.
I think in practical terms if people in the church are willing to learn from one another and fight for one another’s “preferences” we are at least in a better position to live out this passage of Scripture.
I’m not saying that we need to eradicate church leadership and submitting to leaders of our church if they sense a different direction than we do. But I am saying that we need to make an intentional effort to build a bridge to one another.
I think the most fun I’ve had so far at my time at Aldrich Presbyterian is the process in which the song “Come by Here” came to our church. The short version of the story is that an African American woman on our team and I spend a lot of time talking through the tragic history of the song. We wanted to invite the congregation to let this new version that we’ve been doing as a song of reconciliation, confession, and forgiveness.
I believe we were able to do that in a church that isn’t necessarily ethnically diverse at this point. But God helped us build a bridge to the people in our congregation to reflect God’s heart for redemption.
Blog post by Peter Kihyun Park
© 2012 – 2011, Peter Park. All rights reserved.