Sunday, April 15, 2012

My Experience at an Eastern Orthodox Easter Service

It is about 3:00 in the morning, and I just got back from a most wonderful experience: a candle light Easter vigil at a Greek Orthodox church. Yes, I just got back. At this point, many people would be ready to judge me as crazy for enduring a "long and boring, emotionless cermony-ridden service". And, having grown up in a very "low church" environment, I probably would have thought the same myself a couple years ago. But this is most certainly not the case. It was absolutely beautiful and inspiring. 

The candle lit darkness filled with the melodious chanting of hymns such as "Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those within the tomb bestowing life", and the accompanying Greek translations is a scene I will not soon forget. The mood of the room was contemplative, prayerful, and everything was full of tremendous symbolism. It was extremely different than the highly emotional worship I am used to, but no less powerful- in some ways more, in fact. There is something profoundly impacting about an experience that has a great deal of background and tradition. And what especially struck me was that it truly felt like a place of prayer- and it smelled like it too, with the scents of incense and beeswax candles.

This experience was very profound for me. One of the main reasons, I think, is that recently my faith has come to a place where emotion has taken a backseat to intellect and practicality. God uses my mind to communicate with and guide me much more than He uses my emotions. This has even come to a point where emotionally driven corporate worship does not resonate with me, and does very little to help me worship God. I clearly see God move in many other ways, but this is not one of them. The Eastern Orthodox service gave me a refreshing opportunity to engage in a worship experience that was not emotionally driven, and as a result inspired me tremendously. And it gave me a deeper understanding of what it means for God to "inhabit the praises of His people"; even though this was a radically different environment and tradition from what I am used to, I could tell God was there.

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