Unexpected Insights from Planting a Micro-church: Part 1

Just about few months ago, we closed down our beloved micro-church, Ka:ll Community. Ka:ll Community was a dinner church with the mission of enjoying Asian food, exposing and healing from AAPI invisibility, and reclaiming our faith with our unique lived experiences as Asian Americans living in the States. This dinner church grew out of some visceral experiences I have had as an immigrant Asian American. I grew up in immigrant churches almost all my life. Nowadays, with the advent of technology and Zoom, it takes just a few clicks from our fingertips to connect with those who are on the other side of the globe. Not so much back in my day when I was growing up. Immigrant churches were an oasis for homesick immigrants, anchors for many families struggling to continue their traditions and honoring their heritage from their home country, and a community where they could be just who they were/are without being worried about racism.

Alongside many who are children of immigrants, I share this unique experience of being both/and, and both/neither. Immigrant churches often cater to those whose home culture is strongly rooted in their home country, and many children of immigrants struggle to live out their faith in ways that are relevant to their American experiences that might not quite reflect their parents’. Hence the reason why my husband David and I started to dream of planting a church that proclaims the good news to our unique lived experiences as Asian Americans. David and I prayed for a church like this for a long time, and with a gentle nudge from the conference church developer (thanks, Owen!) and a grant, we set out to plant a church! While I just wanted to plant a church, we quickly learned that our church is not really “a church,” but rather “a fresh expression,” “micro-church,” or “New Faces/New Spaces” as our neck of the woods would call it. Our goal was simple: we wanted to start something quick, “fail” quick, and learn from it to dream up something bigger. We did exactly what we set out to do, and Ka:ll Community was born. We engaged in some fantastic ministries for the last year and half: 

• We enjoyed 45 gatherings,

• We shared the table with over 50 unique individuals in our community,

• We hosted 3 Together We Dine events with three different congregations, 

• We became part of 2 different AAPI celebration worship services with two annual conferences in Texas, 

• We became part of 3 vigils and rallies in the community,

• We had 4 “sermon” series, 

• We celebrated 18 Holy Communions,

• We had 8 leaders serving,

• We had close to $500 Asian groceries delivered to the UNT students at Denton Wesley, 

• We had 12 collaborations with local churches, businesses, and organizations, 

• We raised well over five digits from various grants and donors from the community. 

After engaging in a vibrant ministry for one and a half years, we decided to sunset this ministry as we discerned that the ministry had run its course and we had achieved our initial goal of starting something quick and “failing” quick. 

Here are a total of 13 reflections I offer to you from my experience of planting a micro-church for the last (almost) two years. Part 1 in this blog post, I will talk about what I loved about our ministry. Part 2, I will share what I have wished I have done differently and the three major takeaways for me during this experience. If you want the tl;dr version, go to part 2 where I talk about my 3 takeaways I've learned from successfully failing quickly. So here it is! 

This delicious dish was cooked by one of our community partners, Hello Dumpling. We enjoyed many delicious Asian foods like this! Sharing together food that we love and relate to was a core part of what this community was about.

1. I loved that we planted our church with the nones and dones.

We had over 50 unique persons walking through our doors to share the table with us. Over 80% of our community members were what we call “nones” and “dones.” Having predominantly nones and dones as part of our community was incredibly fulfilling. In our community, we practiced the open table, not only in celebrating the Communion, but also in the ways that we embodied being a community with one another. We firmly held on to this essential principle as a community: belong first and work out our beliefs later. Their unique search for God strengthened our Christian faith, and we often experienced our belonging to one another, overcoming the differences in our theology and faith. 

This was one of the social media posts reflecting our reading of Scripture through Asian American perspectives.

2. I loved that we intentionally read Scripture through Asian American perspectives, all the while affirming our queer friends and a progressive stance on many social justice topics.

Our immigrant churches quite successfully provide a safe space for the first generation immigrants and their lived experiences as Asian Americans. But they often miss out on approaching Scripture with the unique experiences of the diversity of Asian American experiences, including the ones from 1.5 and 2nd generation immigrants and their children. The struggles and challenges that the first generation immigrants face are quite often different from the ones experienced by their children. While the first generation immigrants often struggle with language barriers and more explicit forms of racism, 1.5 and second generation immigrants experience invisibility and more nuanced and subtle racism that still marginalize them even with their language or cultural proficiency. 1.5 and 2nd generation immigrants often face identity crisis in ways that the first generation immigrants do not. English-speaking 1.5 and 2nd generation immigrants also feel left out in non-immigrant churches, in that they are not provided with safe spaces to theologically reflect on their experiences and challenges they face. Many 1.5 and 2nd generation immigrants look for spaces that they can work out and advocate for their marginalized experiences here in the States, but our first generation immigrant churches are not empowered to be in the spaces of justice and advocacy. Moreover, many queer Asian Americans find no place to belong with their added layer of intersectionality, as many immigrant churches hold their homeland conservative values from decades ago when they immigrated. In endeavoring to plant this micro-church, we made it a goal to try to tackle these problems. We held spaces for conversations for what it means to faithfully live out the image of God within us as Asian Americans. We read Scripture with many immigrant Asian American perspectives, bringing many contextual theology and scholarship down to the grassroots experiences. 

For example, one of the storytelling series was “Invisible People in the Bible”, looking at various invisible people who were unnamed (like the neighboring women in the Book of Ruth) or the ones that are historically read with judgment (like Vashti in the Book of Esther, or Hagar in Genesis, or Orpah in the Book of Ruth). We reflected our experiences of invisibility as Asian Americans through the lens of these stories in the Bible, excavating the intersectional dynamics of racial, cultural, and gender identities. We, together, actively resisted reading Scripture in White-centric ways - how early missionaries taught our people - and we attempted reading Scripture with the wisdom and gifts that our heritages offer to us. This intentional work in reading Scripture helped us to process our experiences theologically, and we experienced God's grace of affirming the sacred image of God we hold, precisely with our lived experiences as Asian Americans.

The Ka:ll Community members have enjoyed meeting in a home setting, sharing meals, our stories, and the Holy Communion together.

3. I loved our proclamation model: Storytelling and the Holy Communion.

Instead of a traditional model of one person preaching at all times, we engaged in storytelling from our community members to share their lived experiences. Our liturgy for the Holy Communion was what weaved their stories into the beautiful message of the gospel - at the table we found our stories boldly proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ. For a person who experienced generational trauma of colonization, we found Jesus at the table, who subversively hosted his table with his 5000, resisted the colonization of the Roman Empire who abandoned the hungry and underserved ethnic minorities in their empire to fill their own stomach. For a person who struggled to find acceptance as a queer Christian and an Asian American, feeling orphaned in this world, we found Jesus at the table who embraced all who were challenged to find acceptance in their community like tax collectors. From the table we found God's sustaining grace that nurtures all who are gathered around the table, and empowering God who sends us out to now bear the image of God more faithfully. By engaging in storytelling and the Holy Communion as the primary means of proclamation, we genuinely sought for God’s presence in our lived experiences as Asian Americans and the empowerment to proclaim it from the grassroots, not just pastors. 

We join the community rallying for gun reform outside NRA Convention in Dallas in May 18th, 2024. 

4. I loved that we were at the public square in solidarity with diverse Asian American experiences.

We planted our church during one of the most unsettling times for Asian Americnas in the United States. With the rise of the pandemic, Anti-asian sentiment was hurting our community. There was a lot of gun violence in our community as well. There was the Lunar Year shooting in California, as well as Allen Mall Shooting the same year, with 6 of the 8 victims being Asian Americans. Our community was incredibly honored to show up in these places of healing and advocating for Asian American rights. We are extremely grateful for the ways that we were invited to be a presence of comfort and solidarity in such a troubling season. One of our leaders was also going through a challenging season because of their identity, being publicly targeted and wrongfully losing their employment. Our community was grateful to send our support and solidarity in these incredibly difficult circumstances and we served as a beacon of hope and grace. We were at the rallies, prayer meetings, and healing services, offering our mutual support and friendship to our wider Asian American community. We are extremely grateful for these opportunities, and I love that we were able to be a missional micro-church in this way. 

I was honored to have been given the opportunity to witness and offer prayers during the counter rally. 

And there were so many more parts about this ministry that I have absolutely loved. But we quickly realized that this ministry may not be sustainable for many reasons. If you are curious, check out part 2 to find out what I wish I had done differently.