Sarang Church

The reason for closure of SaRang Church’s Gangnam campus era and opening the Seocho campus is simple. Gangnam campus worship spaces were no longer safe and functionally adequate for the SaRang congregation. Waiting lines to get into worship spaces were too long as the main sanctuary only accommodated about 2,000 people. When the weather was bad on Sunday the church became terribly cluttered.

On weekends and during weekdays, traffic around the church was severely jamming. Despite of every cautions and campaigns of using public traffics, frequent traffic related civil complaints had made obstacles to the normal and regular church ministries, emotionally exhausting the entire church.

The major reason to consider moving or new building of the church was not the distribution of ministries that gives inconveniences and inefficiency and the managerial difficulties owing to rent the buildings around the church for worship or meeting places, but the safety issues of the Sunday School children. Spaces for education was insufficient and too many flocked at peak times and caused severe safety problems.

People say, “a landscape is an outcome of the characteristics of the culture that it reflects.” We are most thankful for the location of the SaRang Church, as it is placed adjacent to the subway. SaRang Church is located across the street from the Supreme Court of Korea and the Prosecutor’s Office.

The location of SaRang Church reflects some of the meanings of Psalm 85:10, which states, “love and faithfulness meet together; righteousness and peace kiss each other,” as it neighbors the justice system of Korea.

SaRang Church’s main sanctuary has been certified as the world’s largest underground chapel by the Guinness Book (http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/407388-largest-underground-chapel) of World Records in 2015. The congregation can easily access the SGMC via the train and other public transportation. The SGMC was constructed with the intent to facilitate the youths of the next generation as the South Tower is exclusively dedicated to the children to the young adult ministries. The SGMC was designed with the intent to bring various Christian values into the construction of the building. Although the church facilities start 8 floors below ground level, the architecture design included both natural light and artificial lights to illuminate the space as well as bring forth the structural beauty of the building. The underground facilities were intentionally designed to make the congregation feel as if they are above ground through the usage of both natural and artificial lights from various sources. The stained glasses in the main worship sanctuary illuminates Biblical stories in symbols, giving an artistic touch to the building. The air flow system was designed to give the maximum comfort to the congregation while worshipping in the underground main sanctuary.

The SGMC is located in the midst of the Seoul metropolitan area. We believe that God has placed our worship in the midst of the Seoul metropolitan area to share the love of Jesus Christ with our local communities as well as open our space to both believers and non-believers. We believe that by opening our SGMC to various public functions, the local communities will have various opportunities to come into the place where the worship takes place every Sunday. This will provide an opportunity for the community members to have an open mind about Christianity and open various evangelical opportunities.