Reflections on Onnuri Community Church in Seoul

This is a picture of Seoul that I took from where I sat every morning while having breakfast. Right now I'm sitting in the Incheon International Airport waiting for my flight back to Chicago.  It has been a great trip. I hope I was a positive influence on the thousands of church leaders that gathered here from all over the world.  But I know that being at Onnuri Community Church has been a tremendously positive influence on me. Here are a couple things that I will take away from this trip about this amazing church:

1. They work hard and they pray hard.  After my first trip I kind of dismissed the daily early prayer meetings as a reason for their huge impact.  Why?  Because they work so hard that I came away thinking that the real reason for their remarkable growth is that every staff person literally works over 12 hours a day and never takes a full-day off. And while the work ethic is remarkable (and unhealthy), this time I couldn't help but take note that they started this year with 40 days of prayer.  And prayer is integral to everything they do.  And of course there are the daily early prayer meetings that thousands of people attend.  So, I'm taking back that we need to keep working hard (but still take time off!) and we need to start praying even harder.
2. The vision is big and broad.  It is astounding the breadth of arenas this church is involved:  church planting, community betterment, publishing, broadcasting, crusades, artist development, outreach to influential leaders and personalities, ministry to all ages and multiple languages.  Just when you think you have a lot going on, you run into somebody who has ten times as much going on.  When Pastor Ha was asked about how does he lead and provide vision to so many different causes and organizations he said, "When I'm with the publishing group I turn off all the other switches and turn on only the publishing group switch...which ever ministry I working with, I think only about that one."  Interesting.  I'm not sure how this will play out at CCC / NewThing, but it is inspiring.

Comments

[Shelley]

I feel that God has been calling us as a church to pray more.
On that note, I pray you return safely home.

[Desiree]

Hey Dave,

It's exciting to hear about how you are both learning from and sharing with church leaders from all over the world. Pretty cool! The body of Christ is so big! Thanks for reminding us.

[Dave Ferguson]

Thanks Desiree! You would have really enjoyed seeing this church in action.