Rating: 
(Nashville: Broadman Holman Publishers, 2009)
267 pgs
Having grown up in Canada, I was pretty oblivious to the racial tensions churches experienced south of the border. When churches sent their youth groups on mission trips to assist us in our pioneer work, few of the teenagers were of any color or race other than white American. As I became aware of the tensions between races and people of color in America, I wondered how the church would ever overcome the race barriers that seem to still plague their country. Rodney Woo’s book, “The Color of church” seems to have an answer to my question.
Coming to Wilcrest Baptist Church in a changing neighborhood in Houston, Texas, 1992, Woo intended to change a declining “white” church into a true reflection of his understanding of what church was meant to look like. Though the congregation was a victim of “white flight”, they hesitantly voted to allow their new pastor to begin the transformation of a race-based church (homogenous unit principle) into a cross-cultural and inter-racial congregation. They had no idea just what that would mean to them as a congregation nor did they truly understand the impact is would have on them individually as they faced their own personal prejudices honestly.
Woo states, “My contention is that it is God’s will that all churches move toward reaching across whatever racial and ethnic lines that have been established in their immediate community. At the bare minimum, the local church should reflect the racial make-up of the neighborhood and do whatever it takes to embrace and integrate all the nations. Many churches have done well in going to all the nations, but the increasing dilemma occurs when the nations come to us.”(7)
“The fact that as humans we perceive and treat each other with a dignity commensurate with this truth. To interact with someone who has been created in His image, regardless of skin color, affords us the opportunity to see the face of God as we gaze into the face of another created being. (8)
Woo’ father worked for the SBC Home Mission Board which meant growing up in challenging places. Being half Asian was challenging enough, but growing up in an all-black community taught him a great deal about the challenges he would face. Woo begins his book with a theological framework for his rationale, then Woo outlines his strategy and his progression through the challenges, both the successes and the failures. He challenges the commonly held assumptions that language groups prefer to worship in their own language, and that people of color prefer to worship with those of like color. Woo’s book peels back the reasons/excuses many churches hold for why they are not reaching people of color and navigates the challenges his church faced with principled determination.
His church had more than 500 prior to the “white flight” to the suburbs, declined to below 200, and through perseverance and determination brought it back to over 500. His efforts and success gained him notoriety and a place as a speaker at the Southern Baptist Convention’s pastor’s conference a few years ago.
I didn’t expect to learn a great deal because of my background growing up in Canada and having ministered in more than 40 countries, but I was mistaken. I learned how deep seated racism can be even among believers. I learned how there is resistance to integrate among people of color as well. I learned that some of my own understandings of “mission churches” and “language works” were not necessarily biblical models. I also learned there is a price to pay for doing the right thing, and sometimes the most resistance comes from those who should be supporting rather than hindering.
Woo’s story is one story of helping a church move from a homogeneous model to an integrated, cross-cultural model. No doubt there are others who have done this successfully as well. But his honesty, his deliberate planning and constant re-focusing of his church is a great model to study. The one question I had was regarding language. I wondered if his model would work just as well in China, France, Thailand or Norway using their national language, or if it would necessarily have to be English as the common language. Doing this in America necessitated the common language to be English, but could it have been Spanish?
I did note that Woo acknowledges the impact that Henry Blackaby’s book, Experiencing God had on his church as they journeyed down this road together. It gave his church a common language to speak and helped them to watch where God was at work among them and learn how to join Him in what He wanted to do in their midst. I recommend this book to anyone who has come to the conclusion that races worshipping together in harmony is preferable to races worshipped separately in their own buildings and wants a model for how to transition their church.
by Tom Blackaby