“The
King will reply: ‘I tell you the
truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did
for me.’”
(Matthew
25:40)
The
Rev. Kyewoon Choi has served as Embury’s pastor since 1997.
He centers his ministry around three main goals:
serving others, pursuing a strong prayer life, and bringing the word of
God to people through his preaching.
Serving Others: Pastor
Choi focuses on a person-to-person ministry whenever possible.
Whether through counseling, visiting the sick, comforting those who
grieve, or participating in various church activities, his personal interaction
with others is a primary goal of his ministry.
Rev. Choi also reaches out to people who don’t have the support of
nearby friends or family and welcomes them warmly to the Embury family. In the
fall of 2010, Pastor Choi joined the United Methodist Volunteers in Mission on a
trip to Haiti, where he worked for a week with others to rebuild and serve the
people devastated by the earthquake in January 2010.
Prayer: Rev. Choi
encourages everyone to pray faithfully and regularly.
Using the church directory of members and friends, he prays for everyone
listed in the directory and asks that members also pray for each other.
Once a month, he leads a special prayer service in the church sanctuary,
and during the Lenten season, also leads a morning prayer and Bible reading
session.
Preaching: Pastor Choi
delivers sermons that are Bible-based and attempts to make the scripture message
relevant to modern, everyday life. He
encourages listeners to put into practice the word of God.
He also challenges everyone to read the whole Bible, and provides a
day-to-day plan for reading both the Old and New Testaments within a calendar
year. Those who meet this challenge
are recognized as members of the Bible Book Club.
To date, 28 members have met this challenge.
In
addition to his participation in the Haiti mission trip in November 2010, Pastor
Choi serves on the Sessions Team of the Greater New Jersey Annual Conference and
is also a board member of the United Methodist Foundation.
He is a member of the Embury United Methodist Church choir, and is
regularly seen at all church activities, including Vacation Bible School, pie
makes, youth group activities, summer youth workcamp, and women’s Bible study.
Pastor Choi came to the United States in 1985 from Korea to continue his studies in a Ph. D. program in Economics at Michigan State University. He studied there for two years. In 1987 he responded to God’s call to ministry and moved to NJ. He graduated with an M. Div. degree from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1990 and became an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church in 1992. Prior to coming to Embury, he served a congregation in Michigan for seven years. He has five siblings who still live in Korea, as does his mother. He and his wife, Sunwoo, are the parents of one daughter.