The challenge of diversity

One of the joys of arriving for our Sunday morning service is seeing who is on the welcome team. It is, I think, a feeling which reflects the growing cultural and ethnic diversity in our churches; for sure, there will be a mix, but where might the welcomers be from? Hong Kong? The UK? Nigeria? Iran? India?

Firstly, this growing diversity means we have the potential to reach a wider variety of people unfamiliar with the church or the Christian faith. This is reflected in my own experience when, a few years back, some Hong Kong Christians invited a neighbour – who was not a Christian – to a Chinese New Year party organised by my church. Though not a believer, he was an excellent calligrapher and kindly made decorations for the party – red banners of Bible verses in Chinese characters. Many others have found a warm welcome which has been instrumental in their wanting to know about Christ.

Yet the growing diversity in our churches leads us to a second question. Could we be doing more to encourage not only cross-cultural outreach but also deeper communion between believers from an expanding range of cultures and ethnicities? The apostle Paul pointed out to the church in Ephesus that Jews and Gentiles were "no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of His household… being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit" (Ephesians 2v19–22). As we are being built together, maybe God wants to do some moulding, some chiselling of all of us, so that we can please and glorify Him even more. Or, using another metaphor, are Christians from other nations like the missing pieces in the jigsaw puzzle who can help us and our churches to become more complete and grow a deeper knowledge and love of God?