Cross-Cultural

On Sunday our church hosted the circuit induction service. While the induction itself was obviously important, what's stuck with me more is the genuine and natural cross-cultural aspect of the service, particularly in the worship.

The worship was opened by our worship team, with some loud, awesome Hillsong-type songs (I guess about half of them were actually Hillsong songs). There were prayers in English and also a prayer in Zulu. That was nice.

What was great, was that the Woman's Manyano members who were there for the induction spontaneously began singing the traditional (?) African hymns during the offering and the greeting of the new ministers. It made me realise how much I enjoy those songs, even though I hadn't sung them for years. It was fun to pound on my bible and try to figure out the words (well, it would've been better if I'd actually known them, but still)!

The sad thing is that we're still fighting it to some extent. My friends weren't quite sure why I was thumping my bible so enthusiastically, and the Manyano lady in front of me seemed to have to explain to her friends why she was dancing so much with the worship team's songs.

The two of us, though, experienced a truly cross-cultural service, as I see it, rather than one that's trying to look that way. And nobody was unhappy about it or anything!