[Worship] forms

[Shileen Karnes <shileen@employees.org>]

Ok
here's how I see this
Say there are two secular artists standing in our church parking lot. They 
are both considering coming to church. One is a musician the other an 
artist. They are both hesitant and scared for they have never been to 
church before. They come in and the musician is welcomed and is 
told(eventually of course) that his gifts are welcome in church. The artist 
is told - your gifts aren't welcome here- there's no room for you. Who's 
gonna get saved here? Isn't our mission and calling to seek and save the 
lost? How can we do this without welcoming God's creation as they are. If 
praise painting is going on in the back of the room on certain services and 
is NOT TAKING AWAY FROM ANYONE ELSE"S TIME WITH GOD, why shouldn't he be 
able to worship the way the band does. We used to have a worship
leader that would get on to the band for not singing on Sunday mornings 
while they were playing. Actually I think they said "not worshipping". This 
really offended the band because the way they worship is through their 
instruments. Singing may be how others worship, but these guys PLAYED 
before The Lord. It's true, you could see it in their closed eyes and their 
passion with every note. They were worshipping more than half the 
congregation who were just standing there singing along (with no passion) 
possibly because they themselves were artists but were being stifled 
because it wasn't one of the "acceptable" forms of worship.

	This is a very passionate topic for me. I want to see my generation saved, 
and typical church services just aren't doing it.
I am now reminded of the age old story of the young man who walked into a 
church full of suits and ties and people with their nose up and their eyes 
glaring down at him who was dressed in torn old blue jeans and a tshirt. He 
walks in and starts walking down the center aisle toward the altar. 
Everyone gasps in disbelief and gives warning looks to the ushers "as if to 
say - do something!" the young man sits down on the floor right in front of 
the preacher and listens intently. Then an elder in the church - close to 
100 years old gets up and starts walking towards the man. The congregation 
thinks" well it's about time someone says something to him". The old man 
walks up to the young man and sits down right next to him; and stays there.


This just gets to me every time. An older generation wrapping their arms 
around the younger and saying Jesus loves you with their actions.
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