Worship

Here at St. Andrews, there is only one Christian organization. That means that there is no disunity among Christians. There is no competition for new members. They love each other and support each other, no matter their denomination. And they don't just sweep difficult theological issues under the rug, but they also don't allow those issues to get in the way of worship or their relationships with one another.

I went to the first main meeting of the Christian Union last week. We packed out a pretty large venue (St. Andrews-wise at least). It is a time for Christians to gather to worship, pray, and hear teaching from a number of university and locally affiliated pastors. I was expecting that. I was expecting normal.

But guess what?

I cried. I love singing, but I don't usually cry. We sang "Prince of Peace," a song I've known for many years. True, it is a powerful song in its own right, but it isn't just a song for me anymore. In Greece this summer, Tyler noticed the worship band at Kamp Kalamos practicing it. He went over to help them with the key. Being the wonderful servant that he is, he also wrote out the lyrics for me (side note: we would often sing songs in Greece with tunes that were very familiar to me but the lyrics would be just out of reach). That day in Greece, I fully experienced worshipping God in the presence of Christians from around the world. It was so blatantly obvious that we serve the same God for the same reasons. The team was singing as loud as we could in English, but that had no chance of covering up the sound of voices singing the same lyrics to the same melody in another tongue.

Well, the other night, here in Scotland, we sang "Prince of Peace". This time, all of the voices were praising the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ in English. This time, only the accents were different. This time, I was surrounded by people I didn't know, in a place I'd only just arrived. Once again, God was pressing into my heart that there are Christians all over world. They struggle with the same things I do. They have the same hopes and fears. I am not alone here. No Christian is ever alone, for we are all connected to one another around the world in a very intimate way. We may not always sing the same songs. We don't all speak the same language. But we worship. And our voices rise up together. If only in this, we are one body--unified, whole.


P.S. We also sang a song to which I didn't know the English words. But I did know the music. We sang it in Greek this summer :)