Speaking of ethnically diverse SBC congregations...

[Sandy]

My wife and I were in Washington, DC over the weekend, and visited Montrose Baptist Church in Rockville. It's definitely a suburban area, middle class, homes built in the late 60's, early 70's, but apparently quite diverse from an ethnic perspective. There are a lot of middle class African Americans and Asians in the area, lots of Koreans in particular, and a mix of Hispanics and South Asians--Indian mostly. The congregation was, by far, the most diverse church of any kind that I've ever been in, with no particular racial group dominating. There appeared to be equal numbers of African Americans and Caucasians, though they also have a Korean language service which appeared to have about the same number of people in attendance. I'd guess, though it might be hard to identify, that you could have easily found two dozen other nationalities among the rest of the congregation. The leadership represented the diversity of the congregation. The pastor, who is African American, was on vacation, and one of the associates, also an African American, preached the message. The worship team consisted of a Korean man who sang and accompanied on acoustic guitar, two African American ladies who sang, and a drummer who I would guess was Caucasian.

I heard it's a church recovering from a former pastor disaster. It was one of the best worship services I've been in for a long time.

[Haruo]

Good report.

[Tim Bonney]

Sounds like an interesting church!

[Sandy]

It was interesting. I'd be interested in finding out what kind of struggles they've had with that kind of diversity, whether it's been a factor in the growth or in the problems that the church has experienced, and how they've arrived where they are. They are relocating a couple of miles to the west, I gather because of their school, they are landlocked, access is difficult in and out and there's no room for growth, because of the parking situation, which was tight.

It wasn't particularly different in terms of worship style, contemporary music accompanied by acoustic guitar, keyboard and drums, with a hymn in the medley. The preaching was expository. But there's just something about a group of people from so many different backgrounds worshiping together that creates an atmosphere in the room that you can't manufacture. And unlike most churches, the empty seats were in the back, not the front.