My church, your church, our church.

[TigerShadow]

but I also want to see more unity for those of us who believe that God created the world, sent His only son to be fully human while remaining fully God and to die out of love for us, and that we have the Holy Spirit as our helper. In the spirit of unity I was hoping we could all share something about our church that we see as being especially beautiful or helpful to us. I don't want this to be a debate about which type of church is more true or more good, but a place to share things we find beautiful about our churches.

(Emphasis mine)

[Miss Friendship]

Ahem, it appears I owe you an apology, ragtag. I will ignore Eleventh on this thread. There will be no more disagreement.

[aragtaghooligan]

It's fine like I said I like discussion, I just think we need to be careful with it

[DredgeAmazing]

I can see your point with different learning styles but I don't think it holds up. I don't see different styles of worship available in the Old Testament, there is one style. In the examples we have of worship in the NT and of worship in Heaven in Revelation we don't see multiple styles.

But something from my tradition I find especially beautiful. The thing that was most different from the traditions that I grew up in that I had trouble adjusting to at first were icons, icons are two dimensional religious art portraying Christ, scenes from His life, Mary, and the other Saints. We also use them as focuses for worship, reminding ourselves of the stories depicted in them and reminders of the reality that God and the Saints, the cloud of witnesses, are always present with us. Here are some of my favorite icons.

But... what about worshipping the icons instead of what they represent?

[Spoon]

Funny, it would appear that has already been addressed in this very topic. Let me save you the hassle of looking for it.

Do I believe Jesus can ever be fully described in a picture? No, I don't and we don't worship the icons. As I said they are physical reminders of the reality of Christ being everywhere present. As for the use of images in worship, the OT is full of God commanded images being used in Tabernacle and Temple worship.

[The Old Judge]

The topic is about "unity," in the context of we get to share what is our favorite part of all of our churches. It is supposed to unify us in the belief that all of us actually have feelings such as compassion and are not out just to tear people down through cynicism, sarcasm, and degradation.

Okay, ragtag, one of my favorite things about my church is our bus ministry. We have 15-18 workers that run 5 routes around the county (4 buses and 1 van) every Sunday morning. On Saturday morning, we eat breakfast together, and then we go out and visit our routes. It's always wonderful to visit the kids (and some adults), talk to them, give out candy, and let them know we care. Watching them run out when we pull up is incredible. You develop a bond with these children. They latch onto you, as some of them really have no one else. Seeing them learn the songs and the Bible stories is wonderful, but nothing beats when one of our kids accepts Jesus Christ as their Saviour.