Tim Miller--church visit #3

Church name: Lawndale Community Christian Church

Church address: 3827 W. Ogden  Chicago, Illinois 60623   

Date attended: 1, November 2014

Church category: Significantly lower socioeconomic demographic  

Describe Worship Service:

Worship at Lawndale was one of the most thought provoking services I have ever attended. After driving into Lawndale, I and the 4 other students with me joined the church congregation, walking into the auditorium area in the Lawndale Community Center. From the first moment we entered I was struck with the way the atmosphere was highly energetic—and contagious. We filed past rows of African American brothers and sisters and sat in the seats closest to the band (an electric pianist, drum kit and electric bass).

The key features of the service to me were 1. the huge emphasis on community; the congregation was small, maybe a little under 100 (this also could be because we attended the latter, 11 o'clock service) and it seemed as if many people knew each other. 2. an emphasis on prayer and petition on behalf of the saints, especially those in the Lawndale community.

Interesting, appealing:

I loved worshiping to the Gospel music. One of my favorite parts of the service was the physical engagement of the congregation, singing, clapping, swaying—I could not help but clap, sway and smile to the rhythm of the bass and the gospel piano.

I was especially struck with and challenged by the high value the church places on community celebration and petition. We spent a good 10 or 15 minutes in “prayer and praise” time where members of the body queued up, one after another, to share the hardships they were encountering this week, and to praise the Lord for the many blessings that they saw given from him. I thought it was such a sweet time where members in the church shared life together, rejoicing and mourning with each other, and hearing about the Lord's work in each others' lives.

Disorienting, challenging:

As always with attending a congregation that I don't normally attend, trying to pay attention to order of service, take in all my surroundings and also participate in worshiping was a challenge for me. It was, I confess, odd to me to be one of maybe 10 white people in the whole congregation of primarily black people. Throughout the service I had a remarkable feeling: a profound consciousness of my race, of my whiteness (wow, that's not something I encounter very often within 10 miles of Wheaton). Still, I felt welcomed to participate in worship with my brothers and sisters in Lawdale.

Aspects of Scripture or theology the worship service illuminated that I had not perceived as clearly in my regular context:

The words of the pastor, “Coach Gordon,” about God's grace spoke to me deeply. In the first 2 minutes of his sermon, Coach brought up the oppression of white people towards black, both in the Lawdale community and throughout history, in the American slave trade. He shared a profound quote from an African American brother who was being beaten by white police officers: “It was in that moment when I realized what evil racism has done to white men.” Coach went on to explain how the sin of one race of people to another harms both; “you cannot sin without being affected by it.”

Coach went on to passionately proclaim the Amazing Grace of God that saves us and redeems us from our sin, using Ephesians 2 and the story of John Newton, the repentant slave-trader and author of the hymn, “Amazing Grace.” When we ended the service singing the beloved words of this hymn, I was brought to tears with the reality of the Lord's grace in saving us, sustaining and working peace for the people of Lawdale, and in the world.