John Sheehy - Church visit #3

John Sheehy -  Church visit #3

Broadview Missionary Baptist Church

2100 S. 25^th avenue Broadview IL

10-26-14

Different racial or ethnic demographic

Similarities and differences

For my church of a different racial demographic, I chose to attend a predominantly African American service. The service consisted of praise and worship, followed by announcements, the introduction of visitors, bible trivia, an interpretive dance, an altar call, the gospel choir’s performance and a mid-service greeting, where the congregation left their seats to mingle with one another. The whole service was different from my typical Sunday service. The basic similarities were the announcements and worship, although even those were different. The rest was a foreign experience. One of the differences that I found entertaining was the pastor’s summary. During this time, he would say a sentence in an animated fashion, and the organ and drums would punctuate it with a chord. Over a period of a few minutes, the pastor crescendoed into a culminating summary, where the congregation offered him a standing ovation of praise. I found this type of summary to be very different however; I thoroughly enjoyed my time at the church.

Most interesting

The part of the service that I found most appealing was the worship. They had two segments where the praise leaders sang, accompanied by the congregation. During this time, the people sang loudly, while we clapped our hands and swayed our hips. This portion was followed by two songs sang by the choir. The gospel choir was a treat to listen to!

Most challenging

The aspects of the service that I found most difficult and challenging were some of the pastor’s analogies. He used the analogy of Facebook users who simply visit the site, in order to see what their friends are up to, yet rarely post their own content. He compared this to people who visit church yet, cease to participate through service and care. While the simile was creative and not wrong, I found it distracting. This is a general problem that I have had with a lot of different pastors that I have heard recently. They all try so hard to be hip and relevant, with their analogies, that I find them to be a little distracting. I prefer the basic teaching, with analogies through stories, rather than Facebook, social media, and technology.

Illuminated scripture

The pastor gave his sermon on Hebrews 10:19-25, focusing mainly on verse 25, where it talks about persevering in the congregating of the church. Typically this segment of scripture is an opportunity to pastors to discuss the Law and how it relates to our lives today. I have not been a part of a sermon where that latter segment of the verses is highlighted. While I found this truth to be important, I tend to be more comfortable with expositional preaching, where a pastor preaches what the word says, rather than manipulating the word to fit his agenda. It was weird to not have the entire scripture segment reached about.