What kind of church did you grow up in? A high (formal) Church like Lutheran, Episcopal, or Catholic; or a low (informal) Church like Baptist or Bible Church?
Here is an excerpt from my Book describing when we changed from the Lutheran Church to a little GARB Baptist church. Please share your experience. Which one do you prefer, or do you think it doesn't matter?
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It didn’t take a genius to see that our new church was very different from the Lutheran churches I had grown up in. Too young to appreciate the theological nuances or glaring differences the clues I did pick up on were more subtle, but equally powerful. The lack of padded pews was the first clue and may have contributed to me pondering this more than I normally would. Those hard pews kept me awake during the much longer sermons that were common in our little Baptist church.
Churches even smell different. You know what I mean; they have a kind of smell, unlike any other building. Why they smell is a mystery, they just do. The more “other-worldly” they smell the more formal they are. At least I think so.
Our Lutheran church smelled of candles and red wine served with soft bread at the Eucharist. From a very early age I thought that all churches smelled like what stain glass windows would smell like if you could smell colors – rich, complex and vibrant. A Sunday morning at the Lutheran Church
The arrangement at the front of the church, although not as complex as a Catholic Church, was robust and full of symbolism and mystery. There were two pulpits, one on the left and one on the right of the platform, where the scriptures would be read and we would be led to speak prayers and creeds in unison. In the middle was a big table on which sat a very big Bible. Banners often hung from the walls celebrating Easter or some other event on the Christian church calendar. Somewhere up front was the Christ Candle, a constant reminder that Christ was the focus. Sunday morning felt sacred, hushed and holy. The order, predictability, and majesty of the service awed and comforted me. The Lutheran church was a delight for the senses.
As rich, ornate and symbolic as the Lutheran church was, our little Baptist church was bleak and plain. The difference was like a Japanese Geisha girl in colorful silk robes standing next to an Amish school girl in button-less black and white. Plain was obviously a good thing here. Following that logic the walls inside our church were not painted any special color, and there were no stained glass windows. No banners, no decorations of any kind graced the sanctuary. The only splash of color was the red Baptist Hymnals. There were no candles, no long formal reading of the scriptures from both the Old and New Testaments, no creeds said in unison and few responsive readings. Like the building, the smell was completely different, as plain and simple as the walls enclosing us.
We dressed different too matching the plain and simple décor of our church. Modern fashion was kept at a distance in our new church. No hippies or long haired men with earrings and tattoos were allowed. Women wore their dresses to the middle of their knees and the men wore ties. No bell bottom or hip hugger pants, no shorts on women, no halter tops. Makeup was kept to a minimum with the admonition, “If the barn needs painting, then paint it.”
The focus of our service was not the Bible up front, or the Christ candle, or the readings from the Old and New Testaments. It was not stained glass, the altar or the baptistery. Instead, the focus was clearly on the preacher. In fact, everything in this little church emphasized an obsession with the preacher and his sermon. The pulpit was smack dab in the center, with a communion table in front. Nothing was allowed that would distract from the preacher and the sermon; except of course for the attendance board that informed us how many were in attendance last week. We obviously needed to know who was there or not. Christianity at our new church was stark; four walls and a sermon.
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