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Korean/American Perspectives of Cell Group (02)
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Paul Jang
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2008-03-24 16:03:00, hit : 3,851 |
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Korean/American Perspectives of Cell Group (02)
There is a good example that the home cell group strategy can succeed in the back ground of Western culture like America. It is the case of New Hope Community Church in Portland, Oregon, the United States of America, the church members of which have been 6,000 (Morris 1993, 152). Linus J. Morris pointed out that Dale E. Galloway, the church planting pastor has adapted from Paul Cho,s community home cell group strategy as follows:
Before launching New Hope, Galloway had a clear-cut vision that the new church could attract unchurched thousands in the city of Portland. Today, the church has grown to more than 6,000 members in "Tender Loving Care" groups adapted from Cho's community home cell group strategy (Morris 1993, 152).
Galloway says, When he was asked to describe how cell ministry works in his church, he responded, "Cells are not another ministry of our church, cells are the church" (Towns 1990, 78). His church has been systemized by the home cell groups (Shin 1993, 131).
Carl F. George, director of the Charles E. Fuller Institute of Evangelism and Church Growth and adjunct professor of church growth at Fuller Seminary insisted that the home cell group strategy can succeed in America too as follows:
Many North American churches have acknowledged the importance of small group, need-meeting intimacy and accountability, from John Wesley's class meetings, to the nineteenth-twentieth-century Sunday school movement, to the cell-church and small-group groundswell evident today (George 1993, 185).
In the light of the above arguements, the Yoido Full Gospel Central Church in Seoul, Korea and the New Hope Community church in Portland, Oregon, America prove that the home cell group strategy is not unique to any cultural situation or geographical location both in Korea and America. Thus this community penetrating home cell group strategy can be successful in both Korea and America. According to some cases this home cell group strategy may fail. John N. Vaughan has observed the cases which has failed in the home cell group strategy both in Kotrean churches and American churches, pointed out the causes of the failure as follows:
Many Korean churches have nongrowing home cell groups, just as we in America have many churches with nongrowing Sunday schools...and home cell groups. The problem is not only with the proper purpose and design of Sunday school or home cell groups, by whatever name we call them, but rather in their proper use in our churches. Churches split and fail to grow in Korea just as in the United States (Vaughan 1993, 37).
Home cell groups are absolutely essential to the high-impact church beyond culture and geography.
What then about the home cell group strategy for the growth of Korean immigration church in Amreica? As researched above on the home cell group strategy, it could have succeeded in both Korean and American churches. Therefore the home cell group strategy for church growth may be fully possible to succeed even in the Korean immigration churches.
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Introduction
Ch Growth 