Because we have a commitment to ethnic and cultural diversity, we have always been committed to offering a fairly diverse range of worship types. Part of the challenge in pursuing this value is that human beings can have such vastly different experiences and evaluations of the very same worship service, depending upon their cultural upbringing, their church background, their personality type and more.
Some people have wondered why we don’t do more traditional hymns, others wonder why we don’t sing more contemporary Christian praise style songs, and still others have asked why we don’t have more youth-oriented styles. So, even in our quest to have diversity or worship, we have found that it is impossible to have any single worship experience where everyone leaves feeling that they truly connected with God and that “the Spirit was there.” Different worship styles simply have different effects upon different people. Such is the challenge of doing worship in a diverse body of Christians!
But, with all that being said, we are all called to worship God with all of our hearts, souls and strength, and no matter what worship music or style is being experienced, the Spirit of God is ALWAYS there! The question is whether we can put aside our personal preferences and all choose to worship together regardless of what music is being used to do so.
