Looking Back, Living Forward: 8/1/2011 10:15pm Sunday Service at the Dongan Church in Seoul

So, yesterday was the most free time I’ve had in a while. My host family got up to go to church and left me behind. CK (my host family dad) said he’d come get me at 1:15, so I could do whatever until then. I ended up ironing and spent the rest of my time trying to catch up on my blogging.

All Korean churches have full cafeterias in them to serve food... Makes sense, as they all have people that will be there all day. They also generally have little cafes, too. The above meal cost $1!

1:15 rolled around, and it was time for church. This church has a congregation of about 8000, which is considered a medium, typical-size church for Korea. At 2pm, there is an English service, which is just one out of five main services. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like they get that much support from the rest of the church. There were about 30 people altogether, and just from the announcements, it was clear that many people come and go from the English ministry. There were some ESL teachers, who I’d meet later, and a bunch of Africans. Very diverse. It was really weird hearing so much English. And the people were all very different… One of the white guys I met seemed like a tombstone (I was wondering if he were Mormon) when he came up and introduced himself. But, some of the other Asians seemed like typical 2^nd geners, though they were actually the opposite. The sound during worship really bothered me, even though it looked like they had decent equipment (sound guy woes again, ugh). No bass to speak of, the highs on the singers were nutty loud, and the piano wasn’t mixed in much. Despite having a full mic set for the drums, it wasn’t used very well… Plus technical difficulties during the sermon and some switching here and there. I was anxious and annoyed, and suddenly I thought maybe I should stay and teach English so I could help these guys out with sound and their setup. :P Ehhh… Hahaha… No… They’ve managed this far, I don’t know. Regardless, I had a hard time engaging, and the sermon was super-short.

I wanted to take more pics during worship, but since there weren't that many people, everyone would have been staring at me. :P

Oh, did I mention I was reading my testimony to the 7pm service? The others were saying it’d be to like, 3000 people.

DEW Fellowship... Making an introduction! I was the only one from our group that went there.

Well, after the English worship service, they had a little fellowship in another room. I went and I met a good handful of people (well, got to talk to them more after brief introductions at service)… Two of which would end up being our translators for the DMZ trip, and one of them would be my translator (Jonathan) for my testimony later that night. One of the guys who was from Ghana (I think?) brought several guests from several places in Africa. I had a hard time understanding what any of them were saying because their accents were so thick, but it seemed they were here to study and for some business. Anyways, everyone was really nice, and people were trying to talk me into doing a one-year teaching-English program. I really would like to… But, I have to see what happens with things back home. At this point, I’d feel really irresponsible if I did that.

After fellowship, everyone broke up into small groups. I went with Jonathan to his, which would be led by Joseph, a guy from somewhere in Africa. It was a nice, little small group, held at Jonathan’s place about three minutes walking distance from the church. We went through some book that seemed to focus on Paul’s life. It was seemingly basic, but we got a little into sharing our testimonies. Joseph was telling us how his turn to salvation was pretty dramatic, like Paul’s. He said that there was this guy in his village who had a lot of money, but was into the dark arts. He said he had all sorts of powers… Like, he could change his height. One day he’d be six feet tall and another day he’d be 5’5”. He could also physically disappear, and some other creepy things. He would lure children into his house and then kill them for rituals. One day, a whole bunch of cops got together and arrested him, and his house was opened up. The house itself was underground, but the top leading into it was a big maze so he could trap and kill people who tried to get in and so victims couldn’t escape if they tried. Joseph was telling us how some people actually went inside to look around, but when they came out, they could not speak. If you touched them, they would shudder and shake their heads… What they saw inside had been that traumatizing. Definitely some demonic things happening there... Joseph was about to go in and look, but something prevented him from doing that. After he saw what happened to some of the people that came out, he promised he’d go to church (for real) every Sunday after that.

Kevin dropped in, and turns out he’s from Australia and likes cameras. We prayed and stuff, and prayed especially that my testimony would go over well and that both Jonathan and I would do well.

Joseph, Kevin and Jonathan... Nice, devoted little small group. :) Good guys, all of them.

After that, Jonathan and I went back to the church and got to work on my testimony. Things went pretty well, and Youngchai went out and got us kimbap for dinner. We finished up just in time.

Then it was time for service… The sanctuary was realllllly nice, and they had a pretty sick audio setup. It sounded pretty good, though the guitarist was inaudible. Still, it made me feel bad for the English ministry, again. There was some conflict in scheduling, so Pastor Park wasn’t giving the message that night, but he was still given some time to introduce himself and us. The message was given by another pastor, and since Jonathan sat next to me, I actually got a translation. Once again, a seemingly obscure verse was picked to preach out of (story of Hagar), but the message was pretty well put together. He finished up and Pastor Park got up and gave his introduction… Then he had us line up and introduce ourselves.

Entering... It got much, much more full as service time got closer. Everyone's on time for church, here!!

After looking at these pics, I made more of an effort to get everyone to smile while doing our intros... We always look like we're at a funeral! Who knows... Maybe it helped create some sympathy for Pastor Park's program... Hahaha... Really, we were all just nervous. :P

Right after, Jonathan and I gave my testimony.

I really don't know how many people were out there, watching. The front looked kinda empty, but there was a steady gradient of people as you went back... It looked like more people than at Grace Retreat (~800 ppl)... I'm glad I couldn't see the big projector displays and stuff while on-stage... I'd have been so nervous!!

It seemed to have gone over pretty well because lots of people came up to me after and complimented me on it. I’m really grateful for Jonathan and the care that he put into translating. He had a word-for-word translation all ready before we met up, and then had his questions all ready to ask and possible correct translations for me to choose from. This was really awesome because I really wanted to preserve the content of my testimony so that I could show the difference that the church's support of Pastor Park makes.

Errrybody and their host families, and Pastor Park, Elder Kim, etc, etc... :)

Time for some nerd shots. :P No, the drum cage didn't have a rear shield, but it didn't really need it. The pit looked pretty cramped, but the layout still looked pretty functional.