multicultural church by accident

My church, Abundant Life, started as a black church, and nothing was really done explicitly to get it to be a multi-cultural church. God just made it that way as the years went by.

ePastor >> when “they” say “they” did nothing, they actually had such a heart for people who were different from themselves, that they evangelized them, discipled them, ate with them, lived with them, socialized with them, and worshipped with them [break the Sunday morning statistic that it’s the most segregation hour in America]. So it isn’t accurate to say we should “do nothing” or “it just happened”. I’m seeing a number of churches that are slapping on the multiethnic label, but in name only. When people who don’t fit in visit the church, they aren’t engaged in dialogue long enough nor warmly enough nor repeatedly enough [read: unfriendly & clique’ish] that “nothing” [read: same-o-same-o status quo] is exactly what happens. An multicultural community is where the Spirit really gets manifest, b/c the fullness and diversity of the Body of Christ is there. Without the full diversity in the local church reflecting the local neighboring community, the Body isn’t all there. So the power isn’t all there. To say it another way, we have to be intentional about building cross-cultural relationships… BUT, one doesn’t have to programmatically be showy about it, you can’t force it to happen. It has to be a voluntary Spirit-motivated effort for everyone involved.