Sanctifying Worship Saturday Silliness

Good to know that the Anglicans have the same traffic problems that we do most of the time...

(Thanks to cartoonist Dave Walker at CartoonChurch.com for the chuckles and use of his art.)

Worshiping God, or Ourselves? Or, Why We Need a Liturgy

I am in charge of the worship in a church whose worship "style" is decisively "contemporary."  Congregational singing is accompanied by a guitar-driven "praise band" (drums, bass, guitars, piano/keyboard) and augmented by a choir and praise team (3-4 vocalists on individual mics).  At the front of the sanctuary we have two large screens on which we digitally project lyrics, scripture readings, videos (for announcements and illustrations), images and graphics intended to reinforce the sermon theme or other elements of the service. The majority of the songs we sing have been published within the past decade.

Yet, our services incorporate aspects of fairly traditional/historical or even liturgical worship, although the congregation would not recognize them as such.  While they may not flow in precisely the same order each week, we have identified some "essential elements" of worship which appear in every service: call to worship, welcome (including a few key announcements) and invocation, passing the peace, congregational singing (the so-called "worship set"), a time of prayer ("open altar") and communion led by the pastor, an offering, the sermon (including scripture reading), some type of response, the benediction and dismissal.

Distinctively Nazarene

Last week I felt like a little kid on the first day of school. I had the unique joy of going back to school. I am working on a DMin at Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry. They bill themselves as "An Evangelical Seminary in the Anglican Tradition." Having spent the week immersed in the world of Anglicanism, I found myself reflecting quite a lot about the Anglican tradition and the Nazarene tradition.

At TSM, each day begins with Morning Prayer at 8:30 and Evening Prayer at 4:30. Eucharist is on Wednesday. This place is clearly Anglican. You can see it. You can feel it. You can hear it. The liturgy is unique. The vestments are unique. The whole thing is unique. It is a whole other world with a whole other ethos. From the Prayer that begins and ends the day, to the lectures throughout the day, the place oozes Anglicanism. There is absolutely no way a person could spend any time in this community and not sense the Anglicanism.

Lord's Supper IOU

A friend of mine served a church in a rural area and was going to be gone on Christmas Eve. This created some problems, because for years this church had participated in a Christmas Eve Communion Service. With his absence, there were no ordained elders, district licensed pastors, or even local licensed pastors to stand in his place. Because of this, the churched struggled with what to do.

A. Not serve Communion

B. Serve communion but in violation of the manual and without the presence of clergy.

As he was sharing this, it got me thinking about our heritage. As a part of the camp meeting movement we inherited a lot of the frontier practices of early Methodism. We know that Wesley encouraged elders to celebrate the Lord’s Supper every Lord’s Day.

Does ecclesiology matter?

I found the following video and had to share it with you all. Ann Coulter describes her unique experience of growing up in the Church. Take a look:



All of that explanation and description of different experiences and traditions culminating in 'We don't have to go to church!' Hmmm. What does Coulter's experience reveal about what people may ultimately think about Church? It seems to me that she projects the idea that Church doesn't matter. What matters is that Jesus died for our sins.

Being a blog that is dedicated to worship and the Church, how do we respond to this? How do we respond to people who say, 'Church doesn't matter'?

Happy New Year!

Joseph

Marriage Supper of the Lamb

I was asked to lead our Communion service for yesterday. As I reflected on the lectionary readings, a passage kept popping up in my head: Revelation 19. It reads:

⁴ The twenty-four elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshiped God, who was seated on the throne. And they cried:

“Amen, Hallelujah!”

⁵ Then a voice came from the throne, saying:

“Praise our God,
all you his servants,
you who fear him,
both great and small!”

⁶ Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder, shouting:

“Hallelujah!
For our Lord God Almighty reigns.

"Pastor, forgive me, I've sinned."

I preface by saying that parts of the penance/reconciliation/confessional practices are skewed in some bodies of faith, however I pose the discussion that there could be benefits to encourage a more one-on-one pastor/parishioner relationship and accessibility when it comes to accountability and sin. While we may not consider this a ‘sacrament’ initially, is it not a ‘means of grace’?

I’ve been to confession. I’ve experienced the preparation of taking a good examination of my thoughts, words, deeds, and faith practices. I’ve experienced the anxiety of having to make the car ride to the church thirty minutes before service starts and wait to see that dreaded light turn green so that I can go in and make a contrite confession of my shortcomings, mess ups, sins, and struggles. I’ve also experienced the freedom that comes from a called minister of God listening carefully, without judgment, and express his/her sorrow with me and encourage me to pray a prayer of repentance to our God and go and sin no more. I’ve heard the words, ‘You are absolved from you sins, go in peace and penance to our Lord and your brother and sisters in the faith’. I’ve been reminded that my shortcomings, mess ups, sins, and struggles not only effect me, but they also effect the body. I’ve participated in the ‘sacrament of reconciliation’ both face-to-face and even behind those funny little screens. And it was wonderful! But why?

Advent Worship Music

Joseph beat me to the punch on my usual Thursday post! Ya snooze, ya lose, I guess (plus, he's 5 hours ahead of us in the UK!).  In the interest of consistency, I'm double-dipping a bit - this is a revision of a note I posted on facebook a week or two ago.  Many churches - especially those that use primarily contemporary worship music - struggle to know what to sing in congregational worship during the Advent season.

From my totally subjective perspective,** here is a list of 13 contemporary/popular worship songs that aren't traditional Christmas/Advent songs - they're mostly songs that are sung throughout the year - but that I think are particularly appropriate during the season of Advent (and brief annotations as to why)...and I leave it to you to let me know what I've left off, or what I am mistaken to include...Perhaps this list helps, or at least provokes some discussion and other (better!) ideas...

• Here I am to Worship - "light of the world, you stepped down into darkness...humbly you came to the earth you created / all for love's sake became poor" - skip the bridge during Advent, though ("...to see my sin upon that cross") - or maybe all the time...it just doesn't fit the rest of the song, thematically, as someone recently pointed out to me.
• Hosanna (Praise is Rising) - I think Palm Sunday songs are great for Advent. When we cry "Hosanna!" we are saying, literally "God save us!"
• Mighty to Save - "everyone needs...a Savior / the hope of nations...author of salvation" - I don't even mind changing "we're singing for the glory of the RISEN King" to "NEWBORN King" during Advent/Christmas...but that's your call. (That it's #1 on the CCLI charts might or might not speak to its merit, in your opinion...)
• Love Came Down - awesome new song by Brian Johnson - can be played acoustically (like we did today) or as a rock song. "Love came down and rescued me / Love came down and let me free."

Baptism and Ecclesiology

I ran across an excellent quote today and I thought I would share it. It seems poignant in light of our recent discussions about baptism/infant baptism and ecclesiology. The quote comes from an article titled, 'The Sacraments in Early American Methodism' and it refers to a possible explanation of how the sacraments lost their significance/meaning/importance (?) for the emerging American Methodists in particular, and 'evangelicals' or 'revivalists' in general. It states,

'How significant can the sacrament [of baptism] have been in the absence of any developed sense of church?'

This sentence was published in 1957 and it refers to a problem that existed in the early 1800s. And it could have been written about many churches today. When will we (remnants of Methodism and the revival movement of the 19th century) learn that ecclesiology is important?

Joseph

Fingernails On A Chalkboard

Before reading this entry please take a few seconds to watch this video clip, make sure to turn the sound up.

These next five words, this next phrase elicits the same "fingernail on a chalkboard" response from me every time I hear it. Are you ready? Here it is.

Helpful Inspiration of Social Worship--insert chalkboard sound at high volume

These five words come from the Manual of the Church of the Nazarene and can be found in our Membership Covenant. These five words make up the bulk of our theology of worship. When bringing people into the church, when inviting them to speak covenanting words of membership, the best we can come up with, as to the the purpose and priority of worship is, for its Helpful Inspiration.