Weaving a Tapestry in Vancouver

In mainland China, life for Benjamin Shen was all about making money. Having a good job — in his case, selling garments to companies in North America — and being able to provide for his family came before everything else.

Hoping to become even more successful, Benjamin moved with his wife, Nerini, to Vancouver, B.C., several years ago. They joined thousands of Chinese and other Asian families who in recent years have settled in Vancouver.

“We uprooted from one culture and went to a different place. At first, we went through a honeymoon period, but then I lost my job and my wife got pregnant. I had to find a different road for myself,” said Shen.

That road eventually led he and his wife to Tapestry Church, a multisite, Christian Reformed congregation based in Richmond, a suburb of Vancouver.

“Over time, the Holy Spirit moved our hearts and started me thinking about what I had experienced in the past. I’ve learned that there is a God — and it isn’t money.”

At the same time, he added, he has had many questions about spiritual things. In China, he was a skeptic. Even though his skepticism has lessened, he is encouraged to freely ask questions as a member of Tapestry Church . “I’m very curious about the history of Christianity and to learn more about the mystery of God — and I can do that here,” said Shen, who now works as a medical equipment salesman.

As he spoke, Shen sat with his wife in an office near the sanctuary of Tapestry, located in the former First Christian Reformed Church of Richmond. The morning service would start in a few minutes at this church that has grown and expanded over the past 15 years by welcoming new immigrants such as Shen — and many others.

Under the leadership of Pastor Albert Chu, the Tapestry has sought to weave together people from many cultures and walks of life by offering a gospel message that is both about eternal things and yet also is accessible to people such as Benjamin Shen and his wife, who came to the church as new Christians.

The Tapestry also has an active outreach ministry, supporting churches overseas and working with residents of a senior care facility across the parking lot from the church.

Resonate Global Mission helped to support the founding of Tapestry, as well as helped support its church plants.

“God has been so good to us,” said Nerini. “We’ve learned that being a Christian is not [mainly] about God’s blessings. It is about providing community and facing challenges together.”

Meeting in Marpole

After giving the sermon that morning at Tapestry’s main campus in Richmond, Chu hopped in his car and headed for the nearly three-year-old Tapestry church plant meeting in a movie theater in nearby Marpole.

As he does once a month, he was leading worship at one of Tapestry’s church plants in addition to the service at the main congregation.

Located near the Vancouver International Airport, Marpole is one of the oldest communities in Vancouver. Historic neighborhoods here mix with towering high-rise apartment buildings and businesses. Abject poverty also sits side-by-side with affluence.

On this day, the new Avengers: Endgame movie was premiering at one of the theaters onsite, so Chu had to circumvent a long line to make it into the theater where the worship service was taking place.

While no popular film was showing in the worship space, more than 200 people — many young families with children — filled the seats. The praise band had played a few songs to open worship, and many people had stood, raising their arms and swaying their bodies to the upbeat music.

Soon after Chu arrived, Linwood and Winnie Siu brought their child, Kassia, forward for baptism. Winnie spoke of how her pregnancy had been a struggle and how grateful they were to have a healthy baby. “God was always watching over us,” she said.

Standing by the baptismal font, Chu asked the parents: “Do you confess Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior and profess the Christian faith as proclaimed in the Bible? And do you promise to do all in your power with the help of the Holy Spirit to help Kassia be Christ’s disciple?”

They both nodded and, pouring water on Kassia, the pastor said, “Water is cleansing . . . God’s Spirit is reaching down and blessing Kassia.”

Repeating the sermon he gave earlier that morning in Richmond, based on 1 Corinthians 15, Chu recounted how his father lay on his deathbed in 2014. Instead of focusing on his own condition, he kept thanking the doctors for all they had done for him and asking the nurses and others about their families. “You can tell a lot about a person’s life by the way they die,” he said. “My father died well because he had a steadfast faith. The resurrection gave him — and it gives us — comfort and peace, the hope of heaven and future eternity with God.”

‘Time to find my feet again’

After the service, Shelaine Chu, an elder at Marpole, sat at a table by the refreshment counter of the cineplex and spoke of growing up in a Pentecostal church. All of her family, including 16 cousins, attended there. Her father was on the church board. For several years, she immersed herself in the life of that church and in working with youth.

A decade or so ago, she got burned out and decided she wanted a break from church. But soon she decided to try worshiping somewhere else. Visiting the Tapestry in Richmond, Chu was drawn in by the dynamic music. It spoke to her and enlivened her spirit.

Still, something was off inside her, she said. She came to church on Sundays, sat toward the back, and tried attending small groups, but nothing stuck. The faith she had held so close for so long seemed to be slipping away.

Finally she knew she had to make a decision. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could be a “bench warmer,” and that’s when she learned that Tapestry wanted to plant a church in Marpole.

“They needed 60 or 70 people to get it started. It was ‘all hands on deck.’ Placing myself in that situation was so good for my faith,” said Chu, a marketing specialist. “It was small, and I liked that. I got involved in the hospitality team, and now I’m an elder.”

She also found friends and has built strong relationships.

Looking back, she appreciates how Tapestry let her sit in the back of the church, not demanding of her more than she was ready to give. “Tapestry gave me time to find my feet again and to say ‘yes’ to everything God wants of me,” she said.

Reaching the neighborhood

Over lunch at a Thai restaurant, Jesse Pals, a pastor at Marpole, looked with us out the large window and pointed out all of the building going on in the local area.

“There is massive real-estate development in this area. There is almost a crane on every corner. We’re fortunate to have gotten a lease to meet in the theater, so we can meet in this neighborhood and break bread together,” he said.

Although they are located in a place of growing affluence, there are also homeless people living temporarily in a nearby facility built to meet their needs in small, efficiency apartments. “We are able to visit there and share meals with the people. We have the chance to get to know and love them,” said the pastor.

Regular prayer meetings have helped them develop a vision for the church. Many of the members have visited people in the nearby homes and apartments to ask what they like and don’t like about this changing community.

Many of those with whom they spoke said they feel lonely and cut off from the world around them, a world that seems to be moving too fast, that is growing higher and more distant as those cranes help to build floor after floor of new structures.

Being a historic community, Marpole is home to many seniors as well as people living on the margins — while at the same time young families are moving in.

“We want to get to know and be a part of this neighborhood. We don’t want to assume anything about what we can bring,” said Charlotte Au, a church member who works in real estate. “God has started us on a journey. There is excitement and fear. We hope to find a way to breathe new life into this community. We want our church to be more than a place of refuge and rest.”

9/11 opened her eyes

Not long after terrorists attacked the World Trade Center Towers on Sept. 11, 2001, Hennie Beeksma got a call at the bakery she owned with her husband, Gerben, asking if they could provide food for people who had been grounded at the Vancouver airport. Planes across North America were prohibited from flying until it was clear no other attacks were imminent.

The Beeksmas willingly provided bread and other items for travelers, but what troubled Hennie was to learn that a local Baptist church, but not her own congregation, had stepped forward to help people in need. The Beeksmas attended First CRC of Richmond at the time, a church that was facing declining membership.

“I thought, ‘If they could do it, why weren’t we?’ That triggered the thought that we didn’t have the ideas and vision for what a church could do,” said Hennie.

In the next couple of years, Hennie and her husband got behind the move to call Albert Chu to plant a church out of First CRC. They were among the former First CRC members who saw the need to break with tradition and support someone such as Chu, who is Chinese, beginning a ministry in the increasingly cosmopolitan city of Vancouver.

That began a process that led, after much discussion, to closing First CRC and eventually launching the Tapestry out of the same building.

But the transition took some getting used to.

“Once we started, I remember being asked to pray for the person next to me. It was very uncomfortable,” said Gerben. “But God used that to make me grow. When all you have is your tradition, you think your spiritual life is your own.”

Getting to know the others who were attending Tapestry opened his eyes. “I had been very judgmental. But being part of this new group of people of all ages, I found new friends. I was blown away by their struggles and the depth of their faith.”

Standing in the Fraser River

David Louie works as a pharmacist on Sunday mornings and often slips into Tapestry in Richmond a few minutes late. But he is alway greeted warmly at the door. Outside of Sundays, he and his wife are involved in a program mentoring young married couples.

He had attended churches in Toronto and elsewhere, but said he has never felt as comfortable as he does at Tapestry. “There is a sense of belonging that we have here. We are all broken, and we can all lay that out — and no one will judge us.”

One memory in particular sticks in his mind, he said. About a year ago, he stood in the nearby Fraser River with other church members. He held his son Nathan in his arms as Albert Chu conducted a baptism.

It was a deeply moving experience, holding Nathan while standing in the water and seeing members of the church gathered along the riverbank. He felt that he was part of a large family of people who came to the river for the same reason. “The theme of Tapestry is that we come from all walks of life and try to weave that all together and live it out,” said Louie.