ROAD TRIP!!

This past weekend, 14 people from my church headed down to Kentucky for the weekend. As in, we left Friday morning and got back Sunday night. It was kind of a whirlwind trip. Here are the highlights: 

ARK ENCOUNTER: 



Wow! The ark was huge and I was pretty impressed. Mostly with Noah and not as much with the crew of construction workers that put this one together. I mean, he built (by himself, by hand) what it took a modern construction crew a year to do! Plus it's not like Minnesota where there's snow half the year. It took them a year in Kentucky, with only a little tiny bit of snow here and there. I know this because I watched a time lapse ;)



Here's a perspective picture. The thing is HUGE! I definitely had a lot of fun going inside and touring the ark. I enjoyed seeing how they might have stored all of the animals, and also how their living quarters might have looked. 

CREATION MUSEUM: 

Raptors are my LIFE.

The Creation Musuem (45 minutes from the Ark) was more informative than impressive, and I thoroughly enjoyed going through it and reading up on fossil records, seeing the bug and dino rooms,  and walking through the 7 C's of History.

There was one part of the creation museum that oddly made me super emotional. You know the feeling where your heart feels heavy and your chest constricts? I got that as I walked through the "corruption" C of History. The Fall into Sin. It showed some sins of today and it made me internalize how sinful we all are and how we desperately needed a Savior. Our world is so corrupt. More than that, our hearts, MY heart is corrupt. The heart felt SO heavy as I walked through here, and as I exited this section into a gloriously lit chamber with pictures of God's creation and glorious pictures of the sky, my emotions changed into happiness and thankfulness for God!! He is good :)

CHURCH: 

In lieu of my church stacking operation which would have been a little hard to complete, being that I was in a different state, I enjoyed great fellowship with my road trip companions and attended a Baptist church in Illinois.

I liked it! And I've decided to rate this one as well for several reasons. First, I think it's important to line it up with other churches to get a picture of what I'm looking for and not looking for. Second, I did have a couple of requests and people wondering what I thought about the church.

The sermon at this church was really good. The pastor focused on the Bible the whole way through and it was about loving God. The music was more praise-and-worshippy, than I'm used to, but weirdly so. Usually praise songs are pretty easy to get the melody and even harmonize, but these had some weird melodies and I could just not get the hang of it, so I kept making errors. Mostly they had good words though, although a few were a little weak. I really liked one of them that I had never heard before. I wish I remembered what it was called so I could look it up and post a link to the lyrics here.

At any rate, here's what I'd give this church, using my 3 scores.
Doctrine: 10
Music: 6
At home-ness 7.5

THE FELLOWSHIP: 

So I wasn't 100% a fan of spending all that time in the van, but uncomfortable seats, late nights (ahem, rolling into the hotel at 3am) and boring roads aside, I had fun. We had fun. The girls and I in my van laughed and laughed and laughed. I am coming out of this experience knowing them so much more than I did when we started the trip. 20+ hours of sitting next to someone will do that to you.

Photo Credit: Analisa (The one with the longest arms) ;)

Would I do this trip again? Absolutely.
No questions asked. :)

Church Stacking: Background & Explanation

Church Stacking? What....is church stacking? 

I'm back in Mankato, and I'm searching for a home church. To find it, I have to "church shop". But that's a term most conservative Christians don't like for some reason.....so we'll go with church stacking instead. And by stacking, I mean fitting in as MANY churches as I can into one weekend. Like, 3 or 4.

Wait a second, Madelaine. You were in Mankato for four years, and you still don't have a "home church?? What've you been doing???

Well, uh. You're right. That is sad. Let me explain.

My first 2 years at Bethany, I was staunchly Baptist. I went to a spattering of Lutheran churches, because I could walk to them, but I was pretty opposed to becoming a member of, or regularly attending a Lutheran church at that time. Especially one that was *gasp* ELS. A synod that for some reason, I felt was just a little too Lutheran for me.

However, I was in luck because I had a good friend who was also Baptist/non-denominational AND she had a car! What luck! We tried out a couple different churches- a few Lutheran ones, a non-denominational one, and 2 Baptist ones. We settled for a church that was perhaps less than perfect in our minds, but hey! It was Baptist! So, we attended, and it became "our church".

Looking back, I'm pretty sad that we went to that church all of those Sundays. Doctrinally, it was alright, but there were a quite few errors that our Lutheran friends were quick to point out the Sunday that we brought them to church. They played a little game of "spot the heresy!" much to our chagrin. We had to concede, that yes, the pastor or the hymn really had said that, and yes, that wasn't really doctrinal.

Enter junior year at Bethany and my friend was hired to be the choir director at a Presbyterian church. Being that she was my ride to church, I went with her. It turned out to be a blessing in disguise because they actually gave me a scholarship for singing in the choir, and the next year, they even hired me as the children's choir director. We went to this church for the better part of 2 years, and this one was even less doctrinal than the Baptist one, but the people were nice and occasionally the sermon would be good. Then sometimes there would be this:

I don't even remember the analogy he was making...

Anyhow, now that I have graduated, some things are different: 

1. I have a car
2. I'm not tied down to any particular church! (except for 1 Sunday/month at my school's church)
3. The church I settle into by no means has to be Baptist, but it to be a place that preaches the Gospel and is true to the Word of God. Sound doctrine is #1 on my priority list. 

I created a list of churches and service times so that I can start my "Church Stacking" Endeavor. When I told my friends what I was doing, they earnestly asked me, "what do you hope to gain from this, and what are you looking for in a church?" 

This question made me seriously think. My first impulse was to say, "to find a church that feels like home!" But I quickly realized that what I really needed was correct doctrine. Of course, also the music is important (contemporary vs. traditional. I prefer traditional hymns) and I do need to feel at home, but I think to an extent, feeling at home will come when I attend a church that preaches and teaches the Word of God without distortion. And one that preaches the entire Word--not just law, and not just Gospel, but both, in a balance.

This weekend, I attended 3 different churches. I'm going to write about them in a different post, because this one's already pretty long. My feelings about these churches may surprise you! They certainly surprised me :)

How Gray is our Ga

Modern Worship.
Aaaaaand I digress.

But not really, because I'm choosing to write a whole blog post on this.

Because, honestly? How hard is it to write a worship song these days? I mean, here's a tutorial on how to write one in less than 5 minutes:

Being Sunday, I thought it fitting to post about worship. Here in Mankato I attend a Baptist church that has multiple services. Two with contemporary songs, and one with traditional, which is the one I go to. Unfortunately, they stuck the Bible fellowship/Sunday school hour right over the traditional. Hmph.

The traditional service includes a lot of hymn singing, but the other two all use modern worship songs: the kind that can be heard on the radio.

Half the time I hear a modern worship song on the radio, I've got no idea if it's talking about God or a girlfriend. I mean for goodness sake, have you heard the Christian Mingle theme-song? "I want to fall in love with you" etc.? Well, guess what! It's actually about God. Not your future spouse. Call me crazy for thinking this, but a song about God should be completely different from one about significant other. It's a different kind of love, ya know?

Let's compare some lyrics...

"Hold Me" by Jamie Grace

I've had a long day, I just wanna relax

Don't have time for my friends, no time to chit-chat
Problems at my job, wonderin' what to do
I know I should be working but I'm thinking of you and
Just when I feel this crazy world is gonna bring me down
That's when your smile comes around

(Rest of the lyrics here)

Ok. I get it. So God is our friend...but this song mentions ONE God thing the entire song. There is ONE mention of "Lord". Take that out, replace it with a guy's name, and voila! Totally new song.  I mean, heck. Look at these lyrics:

How Deep Is Your Love 

I believe in you
You know the door to my very soul
You're the light in my deepest darkest hour
You're my saviour when I fall
And you may not think
I care for you
When you know down inside
That I really do
And it's me you need to show
How Deep Is Your Love

How deep is your love, How deep is your love
I really need to learn
'Cause we're living in a world of fools
Breaking us down

About God? Nope. This song by the Bee Gees was #1 for three weeks in 1971.

Why do we do this? Are we afraid that people are going to hear our worship music and judge us so we just keep it as un-God as possible? Do people write these songs because they're rebelling against anything that sounds remotely similar to the hymn generation of their parents? Who knows.

And then there's the songs that I can't even tell what the words are.  Listen to "How Great Is Our God" THERE ARE NO T'S. EVAR. (hence the title of this post) (although, great song, lyrics-wise).

Here's the thing though. Some songs are actually really scriptural and really convicting. I'm not at all against all of today's worship songs. I do occasionally enjoy singing a "modern worship" song (ya know, one of those hand-raising ones!) There's something really nice about singing "Hallelujah" or "I'm lost without you" over and over again. Hymns have a lot of great doctrine, but often times they're missing the worship portion--and shouldn't part of a church service be worshiping the one who created us?

"God of Wonders"

Early in the morning

I will celebrate the light

And as I stumble through the darkness

I will call Your name by night

God of wonders, beyond our galaxy

You are holy, holy

The universe declares Your majesty

You are holy, holy

Hallelujah to the Lord of Heaven and Earth! 

Yeah, it's not the same as a hymn....but the times change. It's possible to have just as much doctrine in a contemporary song as there is in a hymn. I've also had people condemn my newer (hymn) music because it's newer, so it obviously can't be as right as the hymns of old. I'm sorry. But I'm just going to leave this here.

My Jesus fair, was pierced by thorns,

By thorns grown from the fall.

thus He who gave the curse was torn

To end that curse for all.

Chorus: O love divine, O matchless grace -

That God should die for men!

With joyful grief I lift my praise,

Abhorring all my sin,

Adoring only Him.

My Jesus meek, was scorned by men,

By men in blasphemy,

"Father, forgive their senseless sin!" 

He prayed, for them, for me.

(Chorus)

My Jesus kind, was torn by nails, 

By nails of cruel men.

And to His cross, as grace prevailed, 

God pinned my wretched sin.

(Chorus)

My Jesus pure, was crushed by God,

By God, in judgment just.

The Father grieved, yet turned His rod

On Christ, made sin for us.

(Chorus)

My Jesus strong, shall come to reign,

To reign in majesty - 

The Lamb arose, and death is slain,

Lord, come in victory!

(Chorus)

So please. Don't condemn my music just because it's in the "praise and worship" category. Certainly don't condemn all praise and worship music. There's some undoctrinal stuff, but there's also some really great songs! Look at the lyrics first...

And I'm gonna go out on a limb here (and probably get shot by everyone at this school) and say that sometimes, it's okay to throw a contemporary song into a church service. GASP.