Hannah Oury- Church visit #1

Church of the Beloved

375 E Chicago Ave Chicago, IL (right next to Navy Pier)

September 14, 2014

Less Conservative in Worship, multi-ethnic

I attended Pastor David Choi’s church, Chuch of the Beloved. I was really excited to go into Chicago and attend this COTB because I’ve always enjoyed David Choi’s chapel visits. The Church itself is identified as a "multi-ethnic church plant" on its Facebook page. My regular church, College Church in Wheaton, is different than Church of the Beloved in many ways. Ethnicity wise, there were far more Asians in attendance at Church of the Beloved. College Church is predominately white people. What surprised me a lot at COTB was the limited age group present. At College Church, there are senior citizens, children, families, young adults, middle aged adults, etc..  COTB was basically 90% student-aged (20’s and 30’s)  and many, many were Wheaton students (who travel the 55 mins each Sunday!). It is understandable that there aren’t many families since the service takes place in the Northwestern University's Law building classroom/auditorium. It is pretty low key in terms of organized small groups and Sunday school classes. The location I attended was actually a new location for the COTB. I was at the first Sunday in that building. There is a second location also in the city that meets Aatudays. I can't help but wonder why the Church doesn't move closer to Wheaton based on all the students in attendance.

I found the inviting atmosphere of COTB to be very appealing. Everyone in the service got name tags and were led to seats. Pastor Choi greeted long time attenders and even welcomed people stopping by who he "might not see at another service again".  There wasn’t a worship folder, but there were announcements on upcoming retreats (for Church members only) and membership classes. Offering was taken after the sermon rather than before. We were told to greet those around us. So, even though there was a large group of people, I felt like was already getting to talk to more people than I regularly do at College Church's main service. To celebrate the new building at the end of the service, hotdogs were served to each visitor.  Also, a bake sale was held outside of the auditorium to raise money for a Missions group. The whole atmosphere was very friendly.    

I found the musical worship to be semi disorienting but not necessarily bad. Unlike College Church with its organ music, hymns (always prescribed in the worship folder), and Nicene Creed, COTB had much more contemporary music. Four guitars, drums, violin, piano, clapping, projecting modern songs (Oh, how he loves us so). One (Korean?) man, sat in the front row with a tambourine and shook it along with the band's music. An African American woman bowed down, forehead flat to the floor during worship. Lots of hands were raised, the congregation clapped. At College Church, people stand, but there isn’t clapping or hand raising. Silence follows a song and it’s clear that the worship is not a performance but more of a focus on words and God and edification by musicians to the listeners. 

Pastor Choi was very conversational in his sermon. He incorporated humor all the time like “and then Abraham said ‘yo, man!’...That’s the original Hebrew.” He also brings in examples that are relevant to the audience. Since the age group is mostly young people, Pastor Choi’s sermon focused on relationships. He talked about his dating life and how time seemed to not be of importance when spending time with his date. He also talked about weddings and the groom’s face, and counseling he had given to couples who had fallen out. He brought the sermon back to Hosea and Gomer and then to God and man. One of his examples really struck me. How we tell God we love Him and never put him at the center of our lives. At times we even miss out talking to Him daily. This is where the date and losing track of time came in. He used another example of a man who says he only has eyes for his girlfriend and then goes into a party and makes out with every other woman there only to return to the girlfriend and promise her the same thing. This was an example of when we sing praises to God at Church and then turn or attention away from Him and His plan for us for the rest of the week.