“You idiot!  You numskull!  Have you not listened to one word I’ve said about proper worship?”

Jesus was beginning to think he had made a major mistake in picking Peter as a disciple.

Peter, feeling exhausted from helping with the feeding of the 5,000, had made a simple request:  “What you say we all sing ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’”?

Peter had forgotten what was important.  He had forgotten that God didn’t create Christmas songs to have them sung during Advent.    He had forgotten it was Advent, not Christmas.  If Peter was going to be a part of Jesus’ worship elite he was going to have to shape up.

Jesus sighed, thinking, “The next thing you know Peter is going to want us to clap during worship.  I wish Peter would spend less time and energy on feeding the hungry and more on doing worship the right way.”

John 75:15-17 (Goofed-Up Bible)

Now, to Him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy…Jude 24

Continuing to think about worship and why and how we ought to be doing it in the Church, I am struck by how easy it is to fall away from God.  Oh no, not if you truly belong to God, some would say.  But look at the disciples at the crucifixion.  The “Shepherd was struck and the sheep scattered.”  Everybody ran away at the Cross because of the Cross – except for some women and the disciple John – and this was Jesus’ inner circle!!!

But the Book of Acts describes a whole different set of characters – same people, but totally different in demeanor and behavior.  Now, after Pentecost, the disciples are full of fire and holy boldness.  The difference – they prayed and waited reverently on God per Jesus’ instruction.  He filled them with His Spirit.  Now, they could look any danger in the eye and not blink.  There is that wonderful verse that talks about Peter and John after they had been much intimidated and bullied by the powers in Jerusalem: “When they (the Jewish leaders) saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.“ (Acts 4:13)   It is through what God did in them – changing their hearts, giving them the gift of His Spirit – it is through these adjustments that God made in them, that they could live in the face of danger and challenge without fear and without abandoning their faith.

I am so appreciative of two books that God has put in my path in recent days – both by  John Bevere.  They are The Fear of the Lord and Breaking Intimidation.  Both have to do with coming to a right relationship with God and people, so that we can be unchangeable and godly no matter what’s going on.  When we find this place of loyalty to God, nothing can shake us and our hearts become totally captivated and cooperative with what Christ is doing in the world now!  Worship keeps us in this place as we experience God and reorient our attitudes, understanding, and perceptions.

Worship is meant to exorcise the casualness out of us – its intention is that in the presence of God,  our hearts are captured and we’re cleansed of wrong motives – not for God’s sake, but for ours.  Changed by constant worship, we will not fall apart under pressure out in the world.   Transformed, we remain His, remain clearly, sincerely, solidly, through and through, His children, loving Him above all else and doing the assignments He gives us in humility.

Dear God, my prayer is that You would make us sincere worshippers whose one desire is to gaze upon Your beauty and to seek You in Your sanctuary. (Psalm 27:4) Create in us a pure heart.  Renew a steadfast spirit within us.  (Psalm 51:10)

I was raised Lutheran, educated Baptist, attended a non-denominational megachurch for 10 years, served in a small Methodist church, organized a missional (emerging style) youth movement that met in my living room and currently serve at a moderate sized Evangelical Covenant church that feels like a mix of all of these some days. I have experienced all worship styles — liturgical and non-liturgical, organs and electric guitars, pews and theater seats, sanctuaries and auditoriums, pastors in robes and Hawaiian shirts.  Just call me a denominational mutt with convictions.   

I liked this video.  It was good for me to watch — lest I look down on my more traditional styled worship experience of my Lutheran upbringing. What do you think of this church’s style?  What are your impressions?   

Tuesday Re-mix: This is a popular post from last year, updated and resubmitted for your consideration and comments.

Gathered worship is about approaching the throne of grace together. That’s what makes it a very different experience from personal worship. In gathered worship, the Spirit of the very God I come to worship lives in my co-worshiper. That makes relationships critical to gathered worship. When I look across the congregation and see my dear friend profoundly expressing his love for the Lord, it doesn’t matter so much whether I’m loving the music, because my dear friend clearly is. I worship because he is worshiping. All that matters at that point in time is how I feel about God and how I feel about my friend. That is enough.

So here is a bottom line: if relationships among worshipers are everything God wants them to be, worship style will not be an issue. If relationships among worshipers are broken or non-existent, it will not matter what worship style you choose. It will be wrong.

A word to my worship leader friends: spend less time worrying about whether to program hymns or choruses and more time invested in creating Biblical relationships among your worshipers.

© Blake Coffee

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When one is seeking a pastor’s position or other ministry job, one responds to advertisements that pastor-seeking churches have placed in a variety of publications. The average ad is somewhere between 50-100 words or so, but the vast majority make it a point to include what type of worship style they like.

Worship style in Baptist churches has been a strong topic of debate over the last 10-15 years or so. I do the matter an injustice when I say there are three main styles of worship in Baptist churches today (for there are certainly more than that) but in the hundreds of ads I have read I find three worship styles that are repeatedly mentioned:

1. Traditional
2. Contemporary
3. Blended

Personally, I have found each style has something to offer the believer who seeks to praise the Lord.

Traditional songs remind me that we come from a long line of believers who went before us, and “connects” our experience in worship with past generations. These songs are tried-and-true hymns, have been used and quoted for many years, and are often connected with significant events in people’s lives like weddings and funerals. Many times the lyrics are rich with good theology, and they sometimes force me into self-examination of my relationship with the Lord. The musical forms are quite different than the popular forms today, and that difference reminds me that I am in a special setting, one that is dedicated to focusing mind and spirit on praising God.

Contemporary songs are normally set to beats and rhythms that are similar to what I would hear on a modern music station, and that setting in our popular present-day musical forms reminds me that the Lord is with me in the here and now after I leave the church building. The repetitive nature of many praise songs is sometimes just what I need to hear to drive the lyrical points home – hearing the words multiple times breaks through the matters of the day and I truly understand and embrace the message contained therein.

While I am not and have no calling to be a worship leader in song (for which every congregation I have served should be truly thankful), I can only imagine that attempting to lead a Blended service must be the most challenging of the three. A Blended service style seeks to use both traditional and contemporary praise music in the same service. The challenge is, some people have decided to “pick a side” if you will, and they will never be satisfied when a song that does not fit into their preference group is used in worship… the worship leader using a Blended style always has critics, regardless of how well he prepares and leads the congregation in praise.

A great article (here) from December 2006 in ethicsdaily.com by Pamela R. Durso, Associate Executive Director of the Baptist History and Heritage Society in Brentwood, TN discusses some of the history of Baptist worship. Baptist arguments over musical styles or “worship wars” (as she calls them) go back as far as the 1600’s. She discusses some of the earliest “worship wars” in our denomination’s history. One argument, which may seem strange today, was whether or not people in churches should sing at all. Other arguments revolved around mixing male and female singers together on the same song. It makes for a fascinating read, and I hope you can take some time today to check out the article.

Near the end of the article, Durso wrote a sentence that captures my thoughts on the subject:
“I would, however, like to suggest from a perspective of Baptist history that such disagreements about worship practices are neither new nor should they become catastrophic controversies within a church.”

- end -

In the latest issue of U.S. News & World Report, reporter Jay Tolson writes about the return to tradition in the religious world.  

Something curious is happening in the wide world of faith, something that defies easy explanation or quantification. More substantial than a trend but less organized than a movement, it has to do more with how people practice their religion than with what they believe, though people caught up in this change often find that their beliefs are influenced, if not subtly altered, by the changes in their practice.   

Put simply, the development is a return to tradition and orthodoxy, to past practices, observances, and customary ways of worshiping. But it is not simply a return to the past—at least not in all cases. Even while drawing on deep traditional resources, many participants are creating something new within the old forms. They are engaging in what Penn State sociologist of religion Roger Finke calls “innovative returns to tradition.” 

READ MORE 

HT: Justin Taylor

Pensacola Christian College Magazine, The Update, Fall 2007

“‘Sugar-coated, MTV-style youth ministry is over,’ Time Magazine reported. The current trend that is now packing teens in the pews: bible-based worship. Youth ministers have tried to engage teens in the Church with a message wrapped in pop-culture packaging, to initially attract the young crowd. The approach has successfully drawn large number of youth to the pews, but it has failed to keep them there. The sugar-caoted Christianity that was popular in the past few decades, was found to be causing growing numbers of kids to turn away from youth fellowship activities and the Christian faith altogether, according to Time magazine. They compromised their values and capitulated to what the kids want. What they wanted was entertainment, a good time, fun and games, rock music, no work, no demand, and certainly no standards. Youth groups that are entertainment based are destined to fail. One thing is certain; now certified by this research, the entertainment, ‘give’m what they want’ youth ministries are woefully, tragically, deficient failures.”

As one who supports, approves and appreciates the use of liturgy in worship, my experience confirms a potential weakness in the liturgy identified by Doug Wilson:    

“For those who want to do it, one of the best devices for hiding from God is something called liturgy. I say this as one advocating liturgical reform in the Church, and as one who has taught repeatedly that liturgy is inescapable. 

But developed liturgy, researched liturgy, biblical liturgy, remains a snare. A certain kind of sinful heart gravitates toward it, seeing—not a wonderful way to praise and honor God—but rather a way of decorating a self-centered life, seeming to be religious while denying the power of it. 

“Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols. But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream” (Amos 5:23-24). 

Throughout the Old Testament, this sin is addressed repeatedly, almost as though God thought it might be a problem for us. And nowhere are we encouraged to believe that the temptations facing the Israelites would evaporate in the New Covenant—quite the reverse. 

So then, if you have a developed sense of liturgy, and pride in it, or satisfaction with it, or a sense of superiority because of it, and at the same time are cutting yourself a great deal of slack in the personal holiness department, then God wants you to find a little community church in the country with a liturgy that looks like it was developed by the Kiwanis, and learn how to worship there. 

A liturgical reformation is occurring, and it is a good thing. At the same time, I have seen numerous examples of people carving out a little space for their personal autonomy in this reformation, ignoring the warnings of Scripture on this very point. 

There is not a causal relationship between developed liturgy, thought-through liturgy, and the sin, but there is a causal relationship between this kind of liturgy and the temptation. You can only ignore the reality of this temptation only by ignoring the Word. 

The developed liturgy that God receives is not offered up by those who ape the world, speak foul language, smoke cigarettes in the hope of becoming C.S. Lewis, watch degrading movies they shouldn’t, adopt the posture of faux-sophisticates—however much they might be adepts on the liturgical drill team.” 

Christians who are critical of all contemporary Christian music really ought to listen to what Brian Doerksen, a contemporary Christian singer and song writer, said in an interview in Christianity Today where he shared what he believed is wrong with some  modern worship music.  In response to the question, “Why make an album focused exclusively on God’s holiness?” he said:

Two reasons. The positive reason is, when I went to withdraw and seek God at the beginning of last year to learn what he wanted me to do, I had such a powerful encounter with him and his holiness. The more I meditated, the more it became the only thing I wanted to sing about. 

The negative reason would be simply my deep concern about some of what is going on in the modern worship explosion—the shallowness, the man-centeredness, the banality. I wanted to do something that was about God and his core attributes. A song like “Holy God” is a God song, not a song about our feelings toward God. It’s not our response to God. So this was my way of saying, “Think on these things.”

READ MORE  

HT:  Kevin Michael Cawley

I believe the actions of Pope Benedict XVI to restore the Latin Mass is significant on a number of levels.   

You can read a non-official English language translation of the Apostolic Letter of Pope Benedict XVI, and Benedict XVI’s Letter to all the bishops of the world HERE. 

You can read how Patrick J. Buchanan calls Benedict’s decision A Triumph for Traditionalists. 

That some reforms were long overdue has been documented by Catholic columnist Matt Abbott who has photos and commentary on a really weird liturgy recently held at Sisters of St. Francis of Mary Immaculate.

Although I strongly disagree to his understanding of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, I absolutely agree with Dr. Ray Van Neste  on the four reasons he suggests for the neglect of the ordinances (what we would call “sacraments”) in our churches:

(1) the Church bought the cultural assumption that ritual is bad; (2) our culture has lost its ability to appreciate symbolism; (3) there has been a serious downgrade in substantive biblical teaching in the Church; (4) our entertainment-driven worship services cause us to view baptism and communion as things that take up too much time and get in the way.

READ MORE 

HT:  Justin Taylor

This interview by Art Rogers with Sam Storms reveals that the Southern Baptists face many of the same issues as The Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod.     

For example, Baptists, like Lutherans, can’t agree with each other about what to disagree about.  Lutherans and Baptists both struggle with the question of exactly what is permitted and what is forbidden in Scripture:   

The issues are much the same as they’ve been for generations. The things Christians disagree and argue about are fairly constant: the sovereignty of God and human responsibility, especially as it relates to evangelism and missions; the role of the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts in particular; the role of women in ministry and leadership; eschatology, spontaneity vs. liturgy in worship, etc. These and a few other issues are almost always at the center of debate, not just among Baptists but across denominational lines. 

The one thing these issues have in common is that none of them is central to the gospel itself. They are all, at best, secondary doctrines, or doctrines on which Christ-exalting, Bible-believing Christians can and often do disagree. Sadly, some question the evangelical credentials of anyone who might dare to differ with their view on Calvinism or whether miraculous gifts occur today or the timing of the rapture or the nature of the millennium. 

But there is something else that is even more disturbing, and that is the angry and divisive dogmatism that is emerging over behavioral issues on which the Bible is either silent or leaves one’s decision in the realm of Christian freedom. Perhaps the greatest threat to unity and acceptance in the Church is the tendency to treat particular life-style and cultural preferences as though they were divine law.

To be even more specific, it’s the tendency to constrict or reduce or narrow the boundaries of what is acceptable to God, either by demanding what the Bible doesn’t require or forbidding what the Bible clearly permits.

We also find that Lutherans are not the only ones to be endangered by rituals and traditions: 

My primary concern for the Traditional church is that its customs, rituals (yes, even Southern Baptist’s have rituals; they just don’t call them that), habits, and accepted patterns for ministry and worship are so deeply entrenched in the spiritual psyche of a people that the Bible itself is not allowed to critique what is done or provide direction for new expressions of life as the body of Christ. 

There is also the potential threat of a Traditional church losing touch with the surrounding culture. They can often create a “fortress” mentality, circle the wagons, hunker down so to speak, and rarely engage with the developments in society or the unsaved who populate it. Too often, in the name of tradition, freedom in worship is stifled, the power of the Spirit is suppressed, age old “doctrines” are immune from biblical scrutiny, and what makes people “feel comfortable” is the decisive factor in evaluating fresh proposals or efforts to reach the lost and more effectively communicate with the saved.

READ WHOLE INTERVIEW 

HT:  Justin Taylor

Those who think worship must be casual might consider THESE observations on the difference between the casual actions of a pastor at a funeral and the actions of the Marines at that same event.   

HT:  Jim Hamilton

HT: Ray Van Neste

You may watch John Piper interview Matt Chandler HERE. 

Who is Matt Chandler?  God used him to take a congregation from 160 to over 2,500 in 4 years.  Just to give you a clue about what God is doing at The Village – on their web site it shows they have six services on a weekend, and then it has this little note: “Please arrive 30 minutes early to ensure yourself a seat.”

Do you have that problem at your church?

You can learn more about Matt Chandler by going HERE or you can watch clips of him by going to youtube and plugging in his name. 

Mark Driscoll suggests some ways you can help your church to become a community of grace:

1. Make the connections

We need to teach, speak, sing, and pray grace. But we also need to make connections for people. We can believe in justification by faith for the final day, but doubt justification by faith for the next day. On a Monday morning in the workplace we are still trying to prove ourselves, to find identity in our achievements.

2. Welcome the mess

Welcome messy people. Don’t suppress conflict. Don’t hide problems.

3. Stop pretending

Don’t hide your own problems. You’ll need to exercise some discretion: let everyone know you struggle and let some people know what you struggle with.

4. Stop performing

Don’t put on a show. Don’t push people to perform, to produce results, to get it right all the time. Give people permission to fail. We’ve realized, for example, that polished Bible studies and articulate prayers disenfranchise semi-literate people.

5. Eat and drink with broken people

Jesus eats and drinks with sinners. It’s a powerful expression of community. We think we’re enacting grace if we run projects for the poor, but we’re only halfway there. We still act from a position of superiority, proclaiming that we are able and they are unable. The dynamic is totally different when we eat together. We meet as equals, share together, affirm one another, enjoy one another.

6. Give people time to change

How long did it take for you to become perfectly like Jesus? Of course, you’re still changing. There seem to be some sins we’re prepared to work on over a lifetime, but others where we demand instant change. Why is this? The answer, of course, is that we want people to be respectable. We don’t want a messy community.

7. Focus on the heart

All too often we focus on the behaviors we would like someone to stop or start. But Jesus says our behavior comes from the heart (Mark 7:20-23). Our focus needs to be on the heart. Our job is help people find joy in Christ.

I feel drawn to talk about St. Francis again.

Francis had a profound spiritual friendship with a woman named Clare, who under his influence, also renounced all and took up the monastic life.

There are many stories about Francis in The Little Flowers of St. Francis – one of them that concerns Clare goes like this:

Clare begged to come and spend some time with Francis, her “father in the faith.”  Francis was always very careful about the potential fires coming from male and female mingling!  But, he agreed that a small meal together wasn’t too much to ask.

He prepared a meal and spread it on the ground at the Portiuncula.  Clare with some sisters and Francis with some brothers sat down.  The story goes that Francis began to speak of God and “he did so with such eloquence that all were rapt in God by the overabundance of divine grace that descended upon them.” (from Mark Galli’s Francis of Assisi and His World) p. 113

Well, the story goes that they forgot to eat and the nearby citizens of Assisi thought they saw a fire burning near the church of St. Mary of the Angels.  They rushed to put the fire out only to find the brothers and sisters in a mystic trance.  They concluded that it was fire from heaven because of the divine love in the hearts of these gathered people.

After a while, Clare, Francis, and the others “came back to themselves,” and never touched the food, having been fed in a much deeper way.  Imagine sighting a fire, getting up close, and discovering it was from people loving God!  Pretty cool!

I’m thinking about this because I was thinking of what my friend David said once about worship – “shouldn’t the Word of God be enough to keep us enthralled?  Why do we even need all the other stuff?”  Now, there’s a man who loves his Bible!  But, he’s got a point.  I have been thinking about how the crowds stood and listened to Josiah and Ezra read the Word of God for several hours and their responses to the reading…

I’ve been thinking about it because I find myself  listless in so many worship services these days.  I find bands too loud, sermons too much like audible self-help books delivered by a preacher (with the obligatory countryman mic on) who tacks to his words an occasional scripture, everyone too hip with the gelled hair thing and shirttails out.  I love contemporary worship music…don’t get me wrong.  And I have seen how “high worship” can be just as humanistic and more so – and filled with the flesh.

Hmmm, Lord, I’m looking for your Spirit, whether the worship is old or new in style – and myself, I’d prefer it to be a little of both.  I love a praise band, but there’s nothing like an ancient prayer or a reading from the psalter to punctuate all our upbeat modernity.  Something that says, “I didn’t get here on my own.”

Jeremiah put it this way, “Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls…”  Jeremiah 6:16

And yet, we’re also frequently reminded, “Sing to the Lord a new song.” (e.g. Psalm 96:1)  But if we don’t do whatever we’re doing under the leading of the Spirit – worshiping in spirit and truth – “Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain…” (Psalm 127:1), we might as well be doing something else.

As Matt Redman wrote, “I’m coming back to the heart of worship and it’s all about You…all about You, Jesus.”

Seems fitting to close with words from Francis.  When another monk was struggling with the temptations of the world, Francis wrote down 34 descriptions of God and said simply dwell (worship) on these.  Here’s an excerpt:

• You are love
• You are wisdom.
• You are humility,
• You are endurance.
• You are rest,
• You are peace.
• You are joy and gladness.
• You are justice and moderation.
• You are all our riches,
• and You suffice for us.

Yes, it’s all about You, Jesus. <><

P.S.  To all my hmmm “Irish” friends, I suppose I should have been talking about Patrick today!

Yesterday at church I shared a message that was challenging to the whole church.  I know that because it was hard for me, too.  I talked about how if our doctrine is un-checked that dangerous teachings can slide into the church and give us the wrong view of the whole Gospel story.

One of the biggest dangers that I see today in the church is a vicious strain of consumer-driven Christianity, which is really no Christianity at all.  This kind of Christianity makes us believe that church is all about us.  You know what I mean, don’t you?  “That pastor better preach a good one today.”  “I HATE the songs that the worship guy plays.”  We’ve all said it or at least thought it, right?

We must not give into this type of selfish thinking.  Let’s put a little bit of this “passion” for ourselves and desires into something that really matters…reaching an unbelieving world with a Gospel that puts Jesus at the center…NOT us.

Peace,

Neil

For those who track their religious beliefs back to the survivors of this guy with an ark, Bill, God is an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent Being who, basically, is in charge of everything. God is also, according to these same people, unknowable. Which calls the “omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent” business into question, doesn’t it? I mean, how do we know?

What was that? That’s where priests, prophets, and messiahs come in? Riiight. Great work if you can get it. Though I’d recommend proceeding with caution in the vicinity of large rocks or crucifixes.

Anyway. You’d think that an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent Being who (according to priests, prophets, and messiahs, not to mention the occasional university professor) loves and cares for each one of us – even you, George – would know how to get that message across just the eeensiest bit more effectively. Instead … I really don’t have to go through the list, do I? Just the I’s should suffice, if we need that much. Iran. Iraq. Ireland. Israel …

Think a minute. How many times have you heard friends and acquaintances tell you about their search for the “right” church/synagogue/mosque/temple/coven? How often have you heard that line without benefit of any company but your own? You’d think that a universal message would be, well, universal. Wouldn’t have to be marketed like pickles.

But then again, maybe it does.

I know, and if you’ve been reading my stuff for any length of time you might have guessed, that I’m uncomfortable with, er, enthusiastic styles of worship. You know, where everybody’s jumping up and down, the pastor/worship leader is trying to get everyone to shout Amen! every ten seconds, all that. The stuff you mostly see on television these days. Complete with its production values.

Perhaps that’s ’cause I was raised a Yankee, in the cradle of Yankee Puritanism. Where everyone goes to church on a Sunday morning, plunks down in a pew and goes to sleep for an hour. OK, maybe not, but it might look that way. And sound that way, especially the way the reader reads the Bible passages. In a flat drone. Why? It’s not because Professor Jones can’t read. It’s because the Word of God (we won’t go into whether the Christian Bible is the Word of God right now, ‘kay?) is complete and sufficient by itself, it needs no help, no coloration, from puny humans, thank you. This is church, not Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, sir. Who are you, putting your ashes and dust ahead of the Word of God?

Want to put yourself on the outside at a funeral, in a church that traces its heritage to the Pilgrims? Shed a tear. That’s trouble, Jack. Vain glorification of the flesh. Aunt Mabel’s ashes and dust are with God, and soon so will yours be. Stand ye still and silent before God’s will.

Yankeedom did a lot of grumbling and sniping about people who engaged in pentecostal worship. Outsiders, they are. Slaves to the flesh. Damned by God, and don’t you go visiting with them either. At least the Puritans aren’t in charge of things in Massachusetts any more. Back when they were, this sort of trouble could get you killed.

Now, if some of these Puritan folk had actually bothered to read the “word of God”, particularly the book of Acts, they would have discovered (most likely to their horror) that the worship practices of the Christian apostles looked a whole lot more like pentecostal enthusiasm than their own brand of faith. Not a whole lot of sitting quietly in pews and reading scrolls in a monotone, but plenty of prophesying and speaking in tongues and general carrying on. To hear tell, these guys got emotional! And “emotional” packed the houses. Then and now, if the profits of the megachurches is any indication.

Only one problem with emotions. You get a bunch of people all riled up, they’re not altogether likely to sit back and ask, like Bill Cosby’s Noah, “how come you want me to do all these weird things?” Like, maybe, standing in church on a summer’s day and pretending to be fireworks shooting off into the sky.

Or maybe burning crosses in an Outsider’s yard.

Or maybe invading foreign nations on false pretexts.

Maybe colorless Bible readings aren’t so bad after all. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust …

   - O Ceallaigh
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All opinions are mine as a private citizen.