Last week I shared a snapshot of the new monastics. This week I will look at the mosaics. God is doing something new through a new generation of multicultural church planters.
Efrem Smith, who coauthored The Hip-Hop Church, will be keynoting our conference on the theme of Dr. Martin King's vision of "The Beloved Community." By 2060 the United States will become the first Western country in which Europeans will no longer be the dominant demographic group. We will become a richly multicultural society, and Smith will explain how the church can help us welcome this future.
Smith has planted Sanctuary Covenant Church, compelling evidence that God is doing something new through young people from different races and cultures. They are experiencing something of the richness of God's kingdom not only in their worship but in their life together across race and class.
The emerging church movement tends to be very white and male. But Tommy Kyllonen, a multicultural church planter in Florida, states in Un.orthodox: Church. Hip-Hop. Culture that the emerging church is also the young black male in the hood. It is the second-generation Mexican in L.A. and the child of the Chinese immigrant in Houston. The emerging church is the Puerto Rican female on Wall Street.
Smith tells me that urban hip-hop culture isn't just postmodern but also post-institutional, post-soul, and post-civil rights too. I find that multicultural churches, like the best of emerging and missional churches, tend to be more outwardly focused in mission. For example, Smith's church invests more than 50% of their giving in local and global mission.
As we race into an increasingly multicultural future, all of our largely monocultural churches are going to need to build bridges to the growing numbers of multicultural immigrant and ethnic congregations sharing life and mission. Read more at www.thenewconspirators.com
Tom Sine founded Mustard Seed Associates in 1989. He has worked as a consultant in futures research and planning for numerous nonprofit organizations and speaks at gatherings all over the world with his wife, Christine. His newest book, The New Conspirators: Creating the Future One Mustard Seed at a Time, comes out next month. Discover what God is doing through a new generation of risk takers, innovators, and prophets February 28-March 1 in Seattle. Visit: www.thenewconspirators.wordpress.com
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