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Worship and our Lost Story
It happened again this week. No matter where I go to speak in the context of a worship service I get an email like this.
J.D., we need to know your themes so we can get that to the band so they can choose songs for the worship sets. Are you looking for something soft and intimate or loud and celebrative? (i.e. the youth pastor version of this question: do you want them up or down?) "What kind of response are you looking for? Any particular response songs come to mind?
I experience it almost universally in worship services I attend, and to be sure, I have done it plenty of times myself. I can often tell what kind of "key word" search the worship leader utilized to select the songs. Pastor to Worship Leader: "I'm preaching on the holiness of God this week. I need some good songs." Worship set: 'Holy Holy Holy,' 'Holy is the Lord,' 'God of Wonders,' and (choose your favorite song that uses the word 'holy.') I'm still waiting on this one. Youth Pastor to Worship Leader: I'm preaching on the perils of masturbation this week. I need some good songs." Worship Leader to Pastor: "uuuuuhhhhhhh." Worship set: 'Give us clean hands,' .................... 'Oops! I did it again!' .........
What if we moved away from this sermon-centric model of worship? What if we agreed that worship can be tied to no other agenda; no matter how relevant-- not our sermon series, not the altar call, not the stewardship campaign, not the 'idol gives back' routine, not the Super Bowl for crying out loud. What if the musical portion of our worship ceased to be a 'platform' for the speaking portion? What if we ceased forcing our worship services to motivate, or worse, shame our people into applying our three points to their already over-applied lives?
What if our worship, week after week after week, became a moving story (more like '24' or 'Lost' which inspire a religious-like following). What if our worship, including the sermon, (which is an act of worship) became "Story-centric," cohering around the mighty acts of God and particularly around the pre-existence, conception, birth, life, death, resurrection, appearances, ascension and reign of Jesus Christ; and all of this constantly bathed in the Spirit empowered reality of Pentecost? What if 'going to church' re-oriented us to (situated us inside of) the real story going on in the Universe, reminding us of who we are and why we're here?
What if we poured all our creativity into that kind of worship design and leadership? What might happen?
Labels: story, What if worship
posted by John David Walt | at 1/19/2009 05:33:00 PM | 18 comments
Today...