Speaking of ethnically diverse SBC congregations...
Posted: Mon Jul 28, 2014 8:33 pm
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.
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.