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Four Congregations Share Portland Covenant Facility
PORTLAND, OR (May 25, 2001) - "After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could
count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages,
standing before the throne and before the Lamb." - Revelation 7:9
Sunset Covenant Church in Portland has taken ecumenical ministry to heart in recent years and the result is four congregations sharing the church's 4,000-square-foot facility.
Glory Church, an Assemblies of God congregation, worships every Sunday at 2 p.m. under the leadership of Pastor Woon Young Kim. The Worldwide Church of God, led by Pastor Dan Fricke and Elder Morgan Tovey, worships at 1 p.m. on Saturdays while Nuevo Dia, an Hispanic church
pastored by Raul Gimenez, worships at 5 p.m. on Saturdays. The Sunset congregation worships Sunday mornings with Pastor Jason Knudeson.
The four churches recently gathered to jointly observe Ash Wednesday - the sixth such event at Sunset Covenant Church. Knudeson says he has enjoyed the relationships being built between
congregations and believes the experience is helping stretch his congregation.
"We're basically an Anglo congregation, but we believe God's calling us to be more multi-ethnic and cross-cultural in ministry," he said. "We feel like God has brought these groups to our doorstep. The challenge is to find ways to minister to them."
Sunset Covenant, which has an average worship attendance of 75, is located in west Portland near a handful of Intel computer plants. There are some 25,000 Koreans living in nearby Beaverton. And there is a large population of Hispanics living in another nearby city, Hillsboro.
Sunset Covenant draws people from within a 10-mile radius of the church. He hopes that worship services at Sunset will reflect the ethnic diversity of the neighborhood and that the relationships with the other congregations will continue to help the congregation better understand their neighbors.
Six years ago, Knudeson received a call from a local Korean seminary student who had previously served an area church. Sung-Chool Moon asked Knudeson about the Evangelical Covenant Church which developed into a close friendship and a joint Bible study.
"Initially he wanted to start using the church for services after he began gathering a group of people," said Knudeson. "But eventually we began to start seeing him as more of a staff member planting another church. And in a couple of years we were able to provide some financial support."
Sunset Korean Church and Sunset Covenant Church made attempts to combine Sunday school and children's services. Moon occasionally preached during the Sunset Covenant worship services. Moon provided pastoral care for some Sunset Covenant parishioners at Knudeson's request. Knudeson sought to network with Sunset Korean Church, occasionally eating a meal with the congregation following the worship service. Knudeson and Moon still keep in touch - Moon now serves a Korean Presbyterian church near Seattle, Washington.
"One of our goals (during Bible study) was that we wanted to do things the biblical way and take off our cultural glasses," Knudeson said. "I tried to look beyond my cultural experiences, not limiting my look at scripture to my American lenses. "He (Moon) enjoyed the familial relationship I had with my congregation and he enjoyed relating to our congregation on a
personal level. He developed some special relationships, some who keep in contact with him even today.
"For me, one of the best lessons we learned from Moon's church was their emphasis on prayer," Knudeson said. "Sometimes, his church would come for prayer before the workday started and pastor Moon and his wife would come and stay in the church overnight and pray."
Moon's congregation, named Sunset Korean Church, disbanded in October 1999, but by then The Worldwide Church of God had networked with Sunset Covenant Church after they outgrew the church it had used for worship services.
Recently Nuevo Dia became a new tenant as the congregation is using Sunset Covenant while it begins to plant a church in the Portland area. Sunset Covenant hopes to aid Nuevo Dia's children's ministry by providing transportation for children's activities each Saturday. Sunset
hopes to combine worship teams in praise services in the future.
"One of the biggest blessings is seeing Sunset Covenant embrace some of these things," said Knudeson. "Sometimes our calendar is a nightmare and sometimes other congregations are using our facilities. But watching this congregation grow through this, their flexibility and generosity, has been a pleasant surprise."
For more information about Sunset Covenant Church, contact Knudeson by telephone at 503-645-1196 or by email at The-Rev@juno.com.
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