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Josh wrote:In my fellowship, taking photos and videos of family gatherings is definitely preached against and would cause your spiritual well-being to be questioned.

Curious Josh - what is the sin considered in this ?

Not all things we leave are considered sins; many times we just feel we would be better able to live out our lives without some things and videos are one such item. When we consider the spirit of Gelassenheit; meekness, humility, resignation; video taping seems more like exercising a spirit of pride as we keep all those cute moments for the future. I guess if we wanted to connect some sin with videos, it would be the spirit of pride.

Sudsy wrote:

Josh wrote:In my fellowship, taking photos and videos of family gatherings is definitely preached against and would cause your spiritual well-being to be questioned.

Curious Josh - what is the sin considered in this ?

Pride and idolatry in taking “graven images” of a living thing God has made.

Hats Off wrote:Not all things we leave are considered sins; many times we just feel we would be better able to live out our lives without some things and videos are one such item. When we consider the spirit of Gelassenheit; meekness, humility, resignation; video taping seems more like exercising a spirit of pride as we keep all those cute moments for the future. I guess if we wanted to connect some sin with videos, it would be the spirit of pride.

Pride is an interesting sin and one God says He especially hates. I think I can consider some things I must guard against as manifesting pride and in other areas I don't see any guarding required. I can take pride in my perceived humility or piety or something else that may appear spiritual on the surface. Well God knows whatever we are taking pride in and I think that, imo, is what matters most.

I thought there might be a view here that some have from the OT that says - "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth" as I have heard of those who take this to say “no pictures” whatsoever. That sounds like it is a sin to have your picture taken, to put up family photos, and to snap pics of animals at the zoo. It is a 'shalt not'.

Regarding Josh statement, I guess our Anabaptist church teaching pastor's "spiritual well-being" would be questioned by some CAs as he begins most of his Sunday sermons with a short video clip from secular movie to generate focus on a spiritual truth. This is likely too 'of the world' in some Christians view. We also have a church directory with everyone's picture in it so we can put names and faces together. And cameras flashing at baptismals as reminders for those who want them. We are a "worldly bunch", I guess.

Oh, I see Josh has replied. Thanks Josh.

The general feeling of folks at my church is we would prefer not to question the spirituality of people at Sudsy’s church; part of this is that most (not all) of us would avoid going to a place like that.

Josh wrote:The general feeling of folks at my church is we would prefer not to question the spirituality of people at Sudsy’s church; part of this is that most (not all) of us would avoid going to a place like that.

Well, we are not too proud to invite you anyway. It is nice to have visitors that don't question our spirituality.

Sounds like posting a picture of yourself in the avatar space like lesterb and gcdonner and others would have their spirituality in question if they were in a COGC Holdeman church. Seems to me this OT command had to do with the worship of these things and not the images themselves. But there we go again on who rightly divides and applies the word of truth. I'm pretty convinced the one, true, error free, Spirit lead church is not anything man has assembled or will assemble until Jesus does it Himself when He returns.

Anyway, sorry Max, got side-tracked again.

Sudsy wrote:Sounds like posting a picture of yourself in the avatar space like lesterb and gcdonner and others would have their spirituality in question if they were in a COGC Holdeman church. Seems to me this OT command had to do with the worship of these things and not the images themselves. But there we go again on who rightly divides and applies the word of truth. I'm pretty convinced the one, true, error free, Spirit lead church is not anything man has assembled or will assemble until Jesus does it Himself when He returns.

Anyway, sorry Max, got side-tracked again.

A lot of people have profile pictures on their WhatsApp now. Having one of yourself would be questionable. The question would be "Why do you need to have that?"

Hats Off wrote:Not all things we leave are considered sins; many times we just feel we would be better able to live out our lives without some things and videos are one such item. When we consider the spirit of Gelassenheit; meekness, humility, resignation; video taping seems more like exercising a spirit of pride as we keep all those cute moments for the future. I guess if we wanted to connect some sin with videos, it would be the spirit of pride.

That certainly resonates with me.

Josh wrote:

Sudsy wrote:Sounds like posting a picture of yourself in the avatar space like lesterb and gcdonner and others would have their spirituality in question if they were in a COGC Holdeman church. Seems to me this OT command had to do with the worship of these things and not the images themselves. But there we go again on who rightly divides and applies the word of truth. I'm pretty convinced the one, true, error free, Spirit lead church is not anything man has assembled or will assemble until Jesus does it Himself when He returns.

Anyway, sorry Max, got side-tracked again.

A lot of people have profile pictures on their WhatsApp now. Having one of yourself would be questionable. The question would be "Why do you need to have that?"

I might want others to know that even a guy who looks as ugly as me, bald head and all, God still loves.

I think it possible to just put a face to a name and it doesn't need to have anything to do with being proud.

Curious further - is looking into a mirror 'questionable' ?