Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Psalm 29:2
Now, did I dream this, or did it really happen?... A church cancelled one of its regular services because there was nobody available to man the tech desk.
Whatever, I certainly had a conversation after a service recently with the young woman who had been carrying out that duty. “Nearly everybody’s away next Sunday,” she lamented, “and I really don’t know what we’re going to do.” (This in a small church, and in the middle of the holiday period.)
Her anxiety triggered two thoughts. First, a mini-explosion of (friendly) exasperation - “Oh, for goodness’ sake, the church has existed for two thousand years without all this techy stuff! Is this really such a crisis?” Second, and more seriously, a question; what exactly does a church need in order to share in an act of worship?
Thinking about that question, a little list began to form itself in my mind...
Not all the techy stuff, that’s for sure, if only for the reason I’ve just mentioned. Well, what about a printed notice sheet? Or a printed order of service? Ditto, surely. A musician? Well, that’s certainly helpful - but is it absolutely essential? No, not really - though hopefully there’ll be somebody around who can pitch a tune. A dedicated building? No, of course not - more and more churches are meeting in schools and other secular buildings (hey, if we’re not careful we’ll start to resemble the New Testament church!).
A recognised preacher? Mmm... I do think the church needs properly trained, qualified and gifted speakers; but I’m not sure that the absence of one on any given occasion necessarily renders a time of worship impossible.
I decided in the end that in fact precious little is required - though it is important that the church should be part of some nationally recognised denomination or movement, for otherwise it is accountable to nobody and likely to go off the rails (and, anyway, pop-up churches have a tendency to very quickly pop down again).
But given that, is anything more needed than a group of people who love and trust Jesus, who believe in the Bible as the word of God, and who want to worship and pray together and to enjoy the presence of God?
Please don’t get me wrong. I’m certainly not against any of those things that I put on my list, including the technology - they can be very helpful, that’s for sure. But helpful is one thing - essential is quite another.
Allowing my mind to follow this track, I found myself thinking about the atmosphere in which we come together for our main worship services.
Many years ago - and still, no doubt, in some churches - Christians used to gather with what C S Lewis described as “all that regimen of tiptoe tread and lowered voice”. And that is not to be despised; the Bible does encourage us, after all, to approach him with awe and reverence. But for many of us those days are long gone, and I think on balance that’s a good thing.
But I find that today our worship services are often prefaced by what I can only call bustle - activity, noise and lots of moving around.
And I have come to the conclusion that there are two types of bustle...
First, there is holy bustle.
Ideally, this means the happy sound of friends in Christ greeting one another, catching up on news and enjoying the pleasure of being together. There are children skittering around; there are babies, some crying, some not; there are teenagers, some moody, some not; there’s quite a bit of hugging going on; there’s banter and friendly insults being exchanged (with or without the coffee and doughnuts). We are, after all, family, brothers and sisters.
But... there is also unholy bustle - and this brings me back to that woman on the tech desk.
Musicians busily setting up their instruments... plugs being shoved in or pulled out... last minute songs being added to the stuff that’s going to go on the screen... furrowed brows and anxious face... whispered conversations between the leaders.
The atmosphere, in a word, is “not conducive to worship”.
The psalmist tells us, with lovely, profound simplicity, to “worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness” (Psalm 29:2), and that is something we should constantly remind ourselves of.
There are in our world churches where the worshippers don’t even have Bibles - they are dependent on memorised passages plus perhaps tattered pages torn out of Bibles that have had to be divided between many people. No buildings. No written songs. Just a love of God and his word and a dependence on the presence of the Holy Spirit.
Perhaps churches like that have something to teach us in our technology-fixated world.
What do you think?
Lord God, help me to worship you very simply in the beauty of holiness - whether in the privacy of my home or gathered with others. Help me to safeguard the essentials and to sit light to the rest. Amen.
Now, did I dream this, or did it really happen?... A church cancelled one of its regular services because there was nobody available to man the tech desk.
Whatever, I certainly had a conversation after a service recently with the young woman who had been carrying out that duty. “Nearly everybody’s away next Sunday,” she lamented, “and I really don’t know what we’re going to do.” (This in a small church, and in the middle of the holiday period.)
Her anxiety triggered two thoughts. First, a mini-explosion of (friendly) exasperation - “Oh, for goodness’ sake, the church has existed for two thousand years without all this techy stuff! Is this really such a crisis?” Second, and more seriously, a question; what exactly does a church need in order to share in an act of worship?
Thinking about that question, a little list began to form itself in my mind...
Not all the techy stuff, that’s for sure, if only for the reason I’ve just mentioned. Well, what about a printed notice sheet? Or a printed order of service? Ditto, surely. A musician? Well, that’s certainly helpful - but is it absolutely essential? No, not really - though hopefully there’ll be somebody around who can pitch a tune. A dedicated building? No, of course not - more and more churches are meeting in schools and other secular buildings (hey, if we’re not careful we’ll start to resemble the New Testament church!).
A recognised preacher? Mmm... I do think the church needs properly trained, qualified and gifted speakers; but I’m not sure that the absence of one on any given occasion necessarily renders a time of worship impossible.
I decided in the end that in fact precious little is required - though it is important that the church should be part of some nationally recognised denomination or movement, for otherwise it is accountable to nobody and likely to go off the rails (and, anyway, pop-up churches have a tendency to very quickly pop down again).
But given that, is anything more needed than a group of people who love and trust Jesus, who believe in the Bible as the word of God, and who want to worship and pray together and to enjoy the presence of God?
Please don’t get me wrong. I’m certainly not against any of those things that I put on my list, including the technology - they can be very helpful, that’s for sure. But helpful is one thing - essential is quite another.
Allowing my mind to follow this track, I found myself thinking about the atmosphere in which we come together for our main worship services.
Many years ago - and still, no doubt, in some churches - Christians used to gather with what C S Lewis described as “all that regimen of tiptoe tread and lowered voice”. And that is not to be despised; the Bible does encourage us, after all, to approach him with awe and reverence. But for many of us those days are long gone, and I think on balance that’s a good thing.
But I find that today our worship services are often prefaced by what I can only call bustle - activity, noise and lots of moving around.
And I have come to the conclusion that there are two types of bustle...
First, there is holy bustle.
Ideally, this means the happy sound of friends in Christ greeting one another, catching up on news and enjoying the pleasure of being together. There are children skittering around; there are babies, some crying, some not; there are teenagers, some moody, some not; there’s quite a bit of hugging going on; there’s banter and friendly insults being exchanged (with or without the coffee and doughnuts). We are, after all, family, brothers and sisters.
But... there is also unholy bustle - and this brings me back to that woman on the tech desk.
Musicians busily setting up their instruments... plugs being shoved in or pulled out... last minute songs being added to the stuff that’s going to go on the screen... furrowed brows and anxious face... whispered conversations between the leaders.
The atmosphere, in a word, is “not conducive to worship”.
The psalmist tells us, with lovely, profound simplicity, to “worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness” (Psalm 29:2), and that is something we should constantly remind ourselves of.
There are in our world churches where the worshippers don’t even have Bibles - they are dependent on memorised passages plus perhaps tattered pages torn out of Bibles that have had to be divided between many people. No buildings. No written songs. Just a love of God and his word and a dependence on the presence of the Holy Spirit.
Perhaps churches like that have something to teach us in our technology-fixated world.
What do you think?
Lord God, help me to worship you very simply in the beauty of holiness - whether in the privacy of my home or gathered with others. Help me to safeguard the essentials and to sit light to the rest. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment