altJERUSALEM – Heads of Churches from around the Holy Land, as well as the Jerusalem community, visitors from around the world, and local clergy, visited the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Redeemer on Tuesday, January 28th, 2014, the 4th day of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity in Jerusalem. The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity is a yearly ecumenical week of prayer observed internationally, started in the early 1900s and supported by the World Council of Churches.

The service was conducted in Arabic, German, and English and featured pastors visiting Jerusalem from around the world. The prayers were done in Swedish, English, German, Finnish, and Arabic and the Gospel was done in both German and Sign Language.

The theme for 2014 came from 1 Corinthians 1:1-17 and was “Has Christ Been Divided?”

Bishop Munib Younan focused on spiritual gifts and how each person, and each church, has its own spiritual gift: “Without every one of our churches, no Christian mission will succeed. Without every one of our churches, no ecumenism will flourish. The Holy Spirit has divided these spiritual gifts between each of us in order that we may be a unified common witness.”

By:  Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land