A Tale of Two Churches

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times. It was the age of wisdom; it was the age of foolishness. It was the season of light; it was the season of darkness. There was a church which had a traditional service and contemporary thinking in one town. In the next town there was a church which had a contemporary service and traditional thinking.
The white church with a steeple that probably held a real bell has been around for at least 150 years, and the organ takes up a notable portion of the worship space. When the congregation gathers, they sing traditional hymns to the organ and then listen to an uplifting sermon by a talented preacher on Sunday morning.
The reality is this congregation practices religion. They get to go to an event filled with show and ceremony and aesthetics because that is what Christianity is all about to them. They try to preserve that bubble as much as possible.
In that church, I have been told not to put anything on the communion table and to refrain from wearing hats in the sanctuary. Rules of respect. Yes, it is a sanctuary, but when I am in it, it is not a worship service I am attending—it is usually my violin practice. They show respect for the space because that is all they have to their Christian experience. For some Christians, they hold tightly to the rules and aesthetics because that is the only thing they have left after deluding Jesus and the Gospel.
Contrast our church, or any other modern Evangelical church building. The electric guitar sits in the corner—not a traditional church music maker for sure. The space is informal, and the stained glass is usually vacant on the building. The walls are sheet-rocked. The building aesthetics don’t matter much because when it comes down to it, the building, the songs, the preacher and the people don’t matter. Jesus does.
Am I advocating wearing hat and being generally rude in Church? No. these rules are unwritten in some churches because we seek respect and honor for a person—Jesus—and not a place. It is actions which grow from a spontaneous honor for God, because we did not delude the gospel.