Becoming a Missional Church

So this semester around, our Pastor Shawn wanted to do group study on the book The Shaping of Things to Come by Michael Frost. In it, he talks about what it means to being missional church and how we must adapt to reach out to the communities surrounding us.

It’s funny we should start that book. You see, back in July or so, out of the blue appeared these two Korean guys. Dae Hyun and Jung Seop, the two unlikely guy and brother-in-law came to our church after watching a movie nearby. You see, they came to US from Korea to learn English on an accelerated program. None of us really thought much of it. However, with Dae Hyun being such a social person reaching out and befriending others, the number quickly doubled and is now almost tripled!

For us, a rather small church of 60 or so, having 12 international students is pretty significant. Soon enough, we invited them over to the book study on the very book mentioned above. The book talks about being flexible and adapting to mold the church around the people in need. Again, funny that came up in the first few weeks as we started on it. The book, as great as it is, is by no means meant for those that are learning the English language, let alone surrounded by lots of non-believers.

So needless to say, our Pastor Shawn suggested that we change the book to something more tangible and meaningful, as well as easier to understand, for the international students. So he suggested we do Purpose Driven Life for the group, especially filled with quite a few seekers. I am so glad that he was so flexible and trying to be a missional church in existence!

On top of that, Joanna also jumped and caught onto the missional concept, and she’s been very engaged in reaching out to these international students. It’s amazing to see how God can make wonders happen out of nowhere! Being a second-generation Asian-American church, we didn’t expect anything like this to happen, but now that God has given the opportunity to us, we are taking it thankfully! 😀