RETHINK WORSHIP - NOSTALGIA VERSUS POPULAR

I am unsure whether I am being realistic. Perhaps you can tell me. Worship and church have been synonymous but what we have been doing with worship deserves examination. First, we have lately presumed music is equated with worship and this has led to silly tags like worship CDs, worship leaders, worship bands, and worship teams, effectively omitting scripture reading, recitations, preaching, prayer, offering, testimonies and silence from a definition for 'worship.' As composers have produced creative and fresh hymns and spiritual songs there have also been attempts to accommodate the range of reactions. Many churches have provided options, that is, dissimilar worship services. Traditional versus contemporary is the pitched tension. Old versus new is a dichotomy that I view as needless and unhappy. Nostalgia versus popular? Baloney.

Who wants this? Pastoral staff members do not want additional preps and toil. Medium sized churches agonize from splintered relationships when trying to imitate the professed success of wealthier and grander churches. Segregation by age breaks the spirit of the Body. An older generation does not need to worship alone. Seniors don't need only music composed before or during their own youth. They must participate and witness the enthusiasm and involvement of younger generations. Children, youth and young adults need to experience worship together with elders to understand the corporate identity of this people that Jesus has redeemed. We should consistently be incorporating new songs into the best songs of previous generations. What is indispensable is a theological filter within each congregation to insure that the theologies do not differ between newer and older material. 

And then there is this peculiarity. When an expectation is provided that people deserve choices of worship styles, they are offended when their selection is altered or removed, so they leave. Of course an individual can worship privately, but that is not to say worship is about the individual. We are not a community of consumers. God also calls his new covenant people to worship together with others as a distinct group of those who share a salvation story. Am I being realistic or sticking my head in the sand?

THEOLOGICAL BANKRUPTCY in church should be a concern to us.

Across the spectrum of church affiliations and denominations the church population is becoming theologically bankrupt. That's my assessment and also the result of surveys. It concerns me.  Several observations leave me disturbed for Christ's church and the believers who comprise His Bride.

Church and Christian life disassociated from theology for many people.

Today I heard a pastor assert that over the past 14 years at his church, 20 couples who were married there, have divorced. It breaks his heart. There can be numerous factors is such staggering dissolution but try this one on. Theology is often considered to be academic and intellectual and unrelated to the 'more important' church activities and weekday programs. This assumption means theology is meaningless to so much of life. The life of God is road blocked. If a relationship with God (theology) is foundational and drives a life and service and other relationships, surely the word about God is relevant and needs to be well-defined and understood. Theology and the average person should be synonymous and not relegated to seminaries. Truly daily linking to, yielding to and loving God in his sovereignty, sanctity, purity, holiness and power will affect all of life inside and outside church.

Eisegetical preaching and teaching (application) is trumping truth.

It is troubling that pastors, Bible class teachers, and spokespersons often lack training and gifting needed to let the Bible speak. It is the difference between eisegetical and exegetical interpretations of scripture. Eisegesis reads into the text whereas exegesis extracts and draws out from the text. What does it mean to you rather than what does it say? A text is not understood solely by answering what it means to me. We may force God's word to say something unintended when we seek to make it meaningful rather than to disclose what it means. That's why Christians are struggling and divided over the acceptability of gay and lesbian lifestyles and living together before marriage, and so many other controversial issues.

Exclusive association of worship with music.

One's life should be worship, the whole of it. It is concerning enough when Christians believe that worship applies only to one hour on Sundays. A step further and theological reduction is demonstrated by our terminology when worship is equated with only the music portion of that hour. We begin with a time of 'worship,' that musical portion led by a 'worship' leader or pastor. Followers of Jesus who are not fully devoted 24/7 may result from compartmentalizing something as basic as worship.  

Christians unfamiliar with their Bibles.

We have all witnessed the shift from text-based learning to image-based learning at home, in school, and now in church. Beginning with acetate projections and then PowerPoint, the technology has an unfortunate unintentional outcome of dissuading people from knowing where in the Bible the projected texts can be found. People do not know their Bibles very well. Shallow Bible knowledge, and thin preaching leads to superficial faith.  Less than 20% of professing Christians have a biblical worldview, according to a Barna survey. Less than 50% of them believe Satan is real, or believe in absolute moral truth. Only 62% believe Jesus was sinless.

What do you think can be done about this? What needs to take place in homes? What shifts must occur in churches? What disciplines must individual Christians adopt?