•  After this Catholic funeral in Treme-an impoverished African American neighborhood devastated by Katrina and now a ghost town-the mourners take to the streets in procession in an urban setting with drizzle, stark skies, few trees, and little or dried grass.

•  Will we ever find a similar intersection of worship and place at this very spot on a sliver of New Orleans that was flooded and destroyed? Will the African Americans who inhabited this spot return from places where they evacuated including Stone Mountain, Georgia?

•  What is the meaning of place at churches across the country where many evacuees found temporary and others permanent sanctuary?

•  How can this preliminary study of Berean Christian Church in Stone Mountain, Georgia begin to illuminate this first and broader question?

•  What is the next step beyond this case study?

Examples of Place:

•  Buildings

•  Interior of Buildings including the sanctuary and pulpit

•  Parking Lots

•  Nature or the Environment

•  Virtual, i.e. the internet, television, or radio

•  Perceptions/Imagination

Overvew of Berean Church

•  "The name Berean comes from the word Berea . . . a city in Macedonia where the Apostle Paul established a church on his second missionary journey."

•  Mission: "The Berean Christian Church exists to bring glory and honor to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ cultivating committed Christians to minister through Worship, the Word, and Witnessing to its community, city, country and other continents."

•  More at: http://www.bereanchristianchurch.org

Worship at Berean

•  Praise and Worship

•  Prayer

•  Bible Study

•  Music

•  Teaching Including Preaching and Discipleship

•  Tithes and Offering

•  Fellowship

•  Service

Elements of Place at Berean

•  2201 Young Road in Stone Mountain, Georgia

•  Church building comprised of sanctuary, administrative offices, and classrooms

•  Property dotted with landscaping including flowers and shrubs with maple trees planted in squares of grass immediately surrounding the church

•  Parking Lots

•  Community Center about 1/8th of a mile up the street

•  Local events, fieldtrips, and church visits off-site from the main campus

•  Community Outreach

•  Local, State, and National

•  International

•  Internet at bereanchristianchurch.org and Television at Comcast Cable Channel 5 (AIB) at 6:30p and Channel 2 at 6:30p in Stone Mountain

•  Biblical references to place during service, on their website, and in their literature

Music:

•  Vanessa Bell Armstrong

•  R&B style contemporary gospel since the 1980s

•  "Peace be Still" from "Greatest Hits" CD, 1991

•  Scripture where Jesus Stills the Waters of the Sea of Galilee: Mark 4:35-41

The tempest is raging

The billows are tall seem high

The sky is an ocean with blackness

No shelter is nigh . . .

. . . The waves shall obey thy will

Peace be still

Sermon:

•  "What Some Believers Will Never Repent Of"

•  Acts 8:17-22 (NKJV) with reference to other scripture

•  Pastor Kerwin B. Lee

•  Sunday October 9, 2005

•  12pm Sermon

•  "Understand the context of the text. Phillip has been traveling all throughout Samaria preaching preaching preaching. And he's reaching people by the multitude. The church had gone under much persecution. As a matter a fact at the end of (Acts) chapter 7, Stephen had just got stoned. And as a result of Stephen getting stoned, some of the believers said look I got to get out of Jerusalem because they killing you in Jerusalem for loving Jesus, they killing you in Jerusalem for they saying they mad while pastor preaching at the 9:30 service."
"They killing you in Jerusalem for loving the Lord. So I got to get up out of here. So the Bible says they go as far as Judea to Samaria. And Phillip goes to Samaria and he's preaching he's preaching he's preaching he's preaching. And we run across his encounter with Simon. Hey, let's start with (Acts 8) verse 9. Look at his grandeur. Look at verse #9. But there was a certain man named Simon which before time in the same city used sorcery. Which means he used magic he used voodoo he used dirt. All that kind of stuff. And he bewitched the people of Samaria. Giving out that he himself was a great one. You see his grandeur. He's telling people how great he is."

•  Excerpt from the sermon serves as subtext for the migration experiences of blacks which have profound environmental meaning of displacement

•  Biblical

•  Hebrews escaping the Egyptians for the Promised Land, a recurring metaphor as African Americans escaped slavery to the South to live in the North

•  Movement among Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria in the New Testament another migration albeit shorter

•  African/Black Diasporas

•  Middle Passage Diaspora was a large scale migration from Africa to the Americas for the purposes of enslavement by whites

•  Great Black Migration

•  Katrina and Rita

Hurricane references:

•  As the lead-in to the altar call, Pastor Lee references migration as natural disaster-invoking black power in the face of racism, the fractured family, and nature:

•  "But you gotta have power. You may not like me but you can't stop me. And don't you ever put your hands on me. Power to keep on smiling in the face of racism. Power to be sitting at the divorce table knowing that the kids are going separate ways. All the furniture you invested into is gone. Power to go through a hurricane and see your whole city washed out. But still be able to say this too shall pass. So in order to get that power sometimes I gotta change my ways." (53:38-54:50)

Expanding the research?

•  Using Berean as a template for research at other churches

•  For me, that would be other African American churches at the center with reference to other ethnic groups

•  For others, a focus on other demographics ranging from age to diversity/ethnicity to gender

Thanks to:

•  Janel Curry in the Geography Department who invited me to Calvin College for this presentation

•  Dawn Crook and Laura who were kind enough to organize the details of my trip to Grand Rapids

•  Calvin Institute of Christian Worship, particularly John D. Witvliet, the director, and Kristen Verhulst, along with the Lilly Endowment for supporting my research at Berean Christian Church

•  Pastor Kerwin Lee, senior pastor, Peggy Walker, his administrative assistant, and Bobby Harris, pastor of media at Berean Christian Church