"Why bother crossing the ocean?"
The gospel cry in Brooklyn, New York’s Chinatown⋯⋯
In fact, not everyone has the opportunity to go to mainland China for missionary work, but people who live in the greater New York metropolitan area or northern New Jersey can easily come to Brooklyn, which is a big harvest field.
Do you know how big Brooklyn is? Brooklyn is one of the five major boroughs of New York City. It includes nine counties, 15 towns, and a population of 2.6 million. Brooklyn exceeds 30 of the 50 states in the United States in terms of population and area. In 2004, when New York City Mayor Bloomberg presided over the opening ceremony of the Eighth Avenue Chinese Clinic affiliated to Lutheran Hospital, he announced that Brooklyn is now the city with the fastest growing Chinese population in the United States.
The wave of immigration is like a rolling heat wave
According to statistics in the summer of 2004, there were 263,000 Chinese here, not including those without legal residence status, which was double the number ten years ago. This new wave of immigrants is unstoppable, and Mexicans speaking Spanish or Chinese speaking Mandarin and Fuzhou can be seen everywhere on the streets. Therefore, the Lutheran Hospital, which has been serving the community for more than 120 years, has redesigned all signage in response to the situation, with English, Spanish, Chinese, Russian and Arabic written simultaneously. Of course, these five languages only represent the majority ethnic groups in Sunset Park and Berry Ridge, and the languages of other minority groups are not yet fully indicated.
Pastoral Challenges and Breakthroughs
I was called by God to be a pastor here, serving in a traditional Lutheran church founded by German immigrants. This 117-year-old church is facing challenges such as the loss of core members, demographic changes, and population aging. But the most significant challenge is "how to persist in preaching the gospel." In fact, the main focus of missionary work here is to find, introduce and use resources to provide practical help to new immigrants in all aspects of their bodies, minds and souls.
Like other churches, we have Sunday school, Taoism classes, new member classes, etc. In response to the changes in social demographic structure, we have updated the worship rituals and music, changed it to bilingual worship in Chinese and English, and printed out the lyrics. Imagine preaching in English, Cantonese, and Mandarin every Sunday. I have been preaching like this for six years. Just like a missionary sent from a distant place, I must struggle and adapt. Thank you Lord for leading me to try the following ways to preach the Lord’s love and pastor the church in the past six years:
(1) Serving as a hospital chaplain: Serving as a chaplain in emergency rooms and hospitals provides many opportunities to serve patients and their families in emergencies, and opens the door to community service.
(2) Actively promote bilingual ministry and worship: Since people of different ethnicities and social backgrounds are welcome to the church, we must learn the very difficult lesson of "accepting each other." May God bless us to continue to learn and grow.
(3) Use creativity to preach the gospel to young people: I organized a basketball team and led a group of nine to sixteen-year-olds from different ethnic groups, cultural levels, and family backgrounds to play basketball every Saturday. The pastor also served as a ball partner and as a team player. peacemaker. When you're done, take them to lunch or a burger, take the time to preach the gospel for five minutes, and then drive them home. A year and a half later, one of the children brought her grandmother to church. This was the fruit of six years of dating, and finally they were baptized and became Christians.
(4) Organize concerts to comfort people: In January 2002, four months after the September 11th incident, regular "free" concerts were established, allowing St. James Church in Southwest Brooklyn to use music to heal many sad people. soul. Thank you to the Lord for using my personal musical gifts to launch this ministry and to raise up talented fellow musicians who are willing to share and serve the neighborhood. For four years, this concert, held once a month on the second Sunday at 4 p.m., has never stopped. Seeing that God continues to favor us and move forward step by step, let us truly understand that trusting, obeying and looking to the Lord to open up wasteland will not be lacking. !
(5) Youth summer outreach: "The church does not have enough manpower, what kind of outreach can we do?" Thank the Lord, through faith, courage, and enthusiasm, we use our own human and material resources, plus other external aid, to organize holiday Bibles Classes, free Chinese tutoring, picnics, etc., an average of 150 people participate in youth activities every year; in addition, chamber music is promoted and music talents are cultivated. We receive training and promotion from professional musicians, and 30 people have benefited in two years. .
(6) Community activities and services: We participate in the summer "street stall exhibition" and hold "Friendship Sunday" to provide vaccinations and public health education. In addition, we regularly provide missionary services at two Lutheran senior centers. After 9/11, Luo Province Lutheran Life Church organized a Gospel Cantonese drama outreach with us. One hundred and fifty people attended the meeting, and their enthusiasm stirred our hearts. Invited by the New York Min'en Church Evangelistic Conference and with the help of our church, 3,000 people came to hear the gospel in 2004. All of this is testimony to the glory of God. Brooklyn is in great need of co-workers who can station, accept, feed, and constantly encourage and support to fight this gospel battle together! Even if the church here brings one person to the Lord every day, then more than ten or twenty churches can only bring more than ten or twenty people every day, which is only 20×365=7300 people every year. This is simply disproportionate to the total number of new immigrants. How long will we have to wait for God’s house to be desolate? I pray that we all have the same zeal, determination, and actions as Paul: “I have great sorrow and continual pain in my heart. For the sake of my brothers, my relatives of the same flesh and blood, I am willing to be cursed and separated from Christ. ” (Romans 9:2-3)
▲The first Cantonese gospel drama sermon after the 9/11 incident.
(7) Participate in the "Literature Work for Christ" procession: personally held three concerts, conducted one musical, and raised two thousand yuan to support the legal publication of "Luther's Selected Works" in mainland China, CLPC's "Five Thousand Copies Project" ( China Christian Word Ministry) uses words to increase the biblical and theological knowledge of believer leaders. This small book of more than 500 pages includes the three major creeds, the Ten Commandments, the Lord's Prayer, eight wonderful sermons, baptism, The basic essentials of the Eucharist and general theology. Each copy is worth US$3.50. If you are interested in subscribing or donating, please contact the author:
Mary Chang Literature for Christ c/o
St. Jacobi Evangelical Lutheran Church,
5406 Fourth Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11220
I sincerely pray that the Lord will allow us to “break boundaries” and win more people and do more work for the Lord. I warmly welcome you to pray for us and invite you to join this great procession. Although I am proficient in fourteen Chinese dialects, I am still insignificant in the entire holy work of developing the harvest fields of the Kingdom of God. May the Lord bless you and be gracious to you! If you have any questions, please feel free to write to:
Email: StJacobiLutheranBklyn@msn.com
marychang2002@yahoo.com
Or call: (718) 431-8978, or (917) 572-5181 (night)
Stay in Brooklyn—
Remembering the Norwegian skin. Pastor Nathan
(Pastor Per W. Larson)
I stopped the gurney being pushed to the morgue in the corridor on the fourth floor of the hospital, stood in awe before this beloved senior, and invited my co-workers to pray with me; to bear witness to the death of this faithful 82-year-old man. Past contributions to Brooklyn.
I longed to open the big plastic bag that wrapped his body and see him for the last time, but I gave up because of legal regulations. However, I am glad that I can capture his presence in my memory: his lively preaching, touching singing, welcoming greeting, and openness to accept all kinds of people. He is Pi. Pastor Nathan, a Norwegian immigrant. The day before his death, he also said: "Alas! I can't preach today. This is the first time in my life that I will be absent..." He was hospitalized due to an emergency. He once said that the church asked him if he was willing to go to China to preach the gospel, but he declined, saying, "My harvest field is right here!"
Pastor Nathan devoted his youth to the church—the American church and the Norwegian church. When he noticed that the number of immigrants from Norway was decreasing year by year and that Chinese people were pouring in like a tide, but he "could not speak Chinese" to preach the gospel, he immediately prayed and found a Chinese preacher. He invited this vegetarian in just one phone call. Strangers who had never met before crossed the bridge from Staten Island to open up wasteland. This invitation gave birth to the Chinese ministry of the Chinese Gospel Hall of the 59th Street Lutheran Brethren Church in New York.
The past twenty years of hard work in preaching to new immigrants have not only implemented Pastor Nathan’s vision, but also fulfilled the Lord’s “Great Commission.” To this day, the church is still growing. Willing to touch the skin. Pastor Nathan’s spirit also moved us to develop and support gospel outreach work in Brooklyn.
Author profile
Zhang Lingxi is the senior pastor of James Lutheran Church in the United States and the chaplain of New York Lutheran Hospital. Born in Mainland China, raised in Hong Kong, studied in Taiwan, and currently serving in New York. He has been engaged in education and music for many years. Her three children have all graduated from college.