Christian Century:
An intellectually compelling look at our faith
subscribe to the Century
worship
Prodigal
Mon, 06/21/2010 - 14:20 — Kelvin WrightI was back at St. John's Roslyn on Sunday morning. It was my first episcopal duty; that is, the first time I was doing something that only a bishop can do. I was confirming 7 people, all of whom I knew and some of whom I knew very well indeed. Two of them I had baptised and several of them I had companioned for some years as they walked the narrow path. I entered that familiar physical space, where everything was so familiar: the way the morning sun plays through the glass, the shapes of doors and candlesticks, which pews were in the church when I arrived in 1999 and which ones I brought back over the hill from Mosgiel on Alan Dunbar's trailer. I entered an emotional space as well, and one which was paradoxical.... READ MORE.
The Eucharist and me: A journey of discovery
Tue, 06/01/2010 - 10:11 — Christopher KeelOur family recently returned to the United Methodist Church. My wife and I were both raised in Pentecostal churches but left it ten years ago and made our home in the UMC. A year ago, for various reasons, Shery and I made a deliberate decision to return to the Pentecostal church in an attempt to reconnect with our former heritage. While it was a wonderful experience in many respects, it was largely unsuccessful and in many ways, a defining one. While all churches participate in some form of liturgy, the formal and sacred quality of mainline liturgy has become an irreducible part of our worship expectations.
Yesterday, we experienced Communion for the first time since our return to the UMC.... READ MORE.
Fixing the order of Pentecost
Tue, 05/11/2010 - 11:04 — Angela Shier-JonesGood morning God,
There's no doubt about it - having to prepare worship for a Church does steal some of the spontaneity of worship. I mean - here I am worrying about Pentecost and the coming of your Spirit and trying to figure out how to pin you down to an order of service...
What an odd expression that is - 'Order of Service.'
It reads like an honour of some sort about to be bestowed - like the Order of the Garter.
Yes... it is an honour to serve you by participating in worship...but I'm not sure that is what most of the congregation think they are doing.
'Nice service', 'good service this morning', or my personal favourite 'I really enjoyed the service'...all wonderful compliments which suggest that the 'service' is something that the congregation thinks it has just received rather what it has just given to you!
But that's an issue for another blog - back to my main concern...scripting your holy Spirit...
You do know don't you God, that according to my current order of service you are due to make a personal appearance at 28 minutes to 11? ... READ MORE.
What matters
Fri, 04/30/2010 - 10:58 — Tom Cheatham“By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35).
“Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?” (Isaiah 55:2a)
“When in our music God is glorified, and adoration leaves no room for pride, it is as though the whole creation cried: ‘Alleluia!’” (Fred Pratt Green, 1972)
Scott Hill is a student at Columbia Theological Seminary, my doctoral alma mater. In a marvelous article in a recent school publication, Mr. Hill, a forest ranger turned pastor, tells about his internship in two rural yoked field churches in South Carolina.
His first Sunday, he stammered and sweated through the liturgy, forgetting a great deal of it. He says he was “painfully bad.”
Besides worrying about how he did in worship, he wondered “what else am I supposed to be doing?” as he worked down the visitation list assigned by the pastor. He came to the important insight that simply being with the folks in the church was “what else he was supposed to be doing.”... READ MORE.
April 1: A remnant of fools
Thu, 04/01/2010 - 11:12 — AnonymousIn his memoir A Dresser of Sycamore Trees, lay Episcopal minister Garret Keizer describes a Holy Saturday vigil held in his tiny Vermont parish. When Keizer arrived at the church, he found that only two other people, a husband and wife, had come for the service. As the three of them huddled together in the old church, Keizer lit the Paschal candle and extinguished the other lights, a symbol of hearing God’s great promise of hope “in darkness, longing to hear it in the light of day.” ... READ MORE.
A twinge of discomfort
Mon, 02/08/2010 - 10:53 — Don ScroobyRecently I was in a communion service diligently following the words and responses of the liturgy. The phrase, “Have mercy on us O God” was constantly repeated in a litany of sins confessed. Touched by a twinge of discomfort, I looked around at the expressions of my fellow worshippers to see if I was alone in this sentiment. It seemed I was. Most people were responding almost mechanically with the phrase and I couldn’t help but wonder what was actually going on in that unconscious realm where our perceptions are shaped and forged, especially when certain phrases carry certain meanings which have been infused over years of repetitive and almost hypnotic announcement.
If we were able to have entered that unconscious realm, I would have staked my life on the fact that the dominant perception in the minds of most worshippers there that day, was one of trying to wring out mercy and forgiveness from a God they were not sure would actually give it. Many are absolutely saturated with this way of believing, and persistently saying these words, just re-enforces the belief.
“Have mercy on us O God” is not an attempt to try and get the Divine to do what the Divine may or may not do... READ MORE.
A good word to end worship
Tue, 01/19/2010 - 13:33 — Adam CopelandWhen I lead worship, I try to stay out of the way. Sure, I say plenty of words and all, but if they are led correctly they point to something greater than myself. So, here’s my conundrum: whether the charge and benediction at the close of the service should be my words, as in reflecting the crux of the sermon. Or, whether the charge and benediction should be one common to the tradition and unchanged each week.... READ MORE.
The church as the woman at the well
Thu, 01/14/2010 - 10:51 — Rachel HackenbergI've been pondering what makes any given congregation feel vital and vibrant, a living and active part of the Body of Christ. Now, an abundance of programs and professionals currently thrive on the business of shaping & encouraging life within congregations---my home congregation participates in one such program, with valuable insights gained and wonderful results seen. Although I am a church professional, I am not one of these Church Professionals, so I offer these observations primarily as a church goer and church lover (though my "pastor voice" is never far behind!).
On occasion, I have the opportunity to worship outside of my own congregation. Although I'm prone to extreme academic analysis (during worship, naturally) of a congregation's homiletic and liturgical traditions, I also pay close attention to my personal, emotional & spiritual experience of worship and the church's environment. How do I feel in this space? How do the words and hymns settle in my spirit? What resonates, and what does not? How do I experience the interactions with people here?... READ MORE.
Morning thanks: the old psalms
Mon, 01/11/2010 - 10:36 — James C. SchaapTen years ago maybe, my in-laws, then in their seventies, told us that they told the pastor that once in awhile they'd like to sing the old songs, too. They're not pushy people, believe me. The church had gone wholesale to the new and fresh "praise 'n worship" genre, and they simply got a little tired of being left out.
The pastor's patronizing response to the old folks was that, well, sometimes it was simply necessary to change with the times.
I'm sure my father-in-law never spit right there--after all the pastor was the dominie--but when we came around the next time, he unloaded. "Change?" he said. "I started farming with horses, didn't have indoor plumbing until the late 50s. He's telling me about change?"... READ MORE.
Rethinking the sermon part 1
Tue, 07/28/2009 - 14:58 — Thom Turner"I wish we could just get rid of the sermon."
That's what one friend said to me at Starbucks recently. For us that view worship as holistic and not as song and sermon, both music and preaching seem to take precedence over other forms of worship: prayer, silence, meditation, Scripture reading. Inlieu of these things we instead sing and preach about them. How many sermons have you heard mention silence as important to worship? How many times has your own church been silent? How many times have pastors preached the necessity of Scripture reading? How many times has your own church read Scripture at any great length (more than a whole chapter)? Preaching far outweighs doing in most Protestant churches.
Using the motto lex orandi, lex credendi (what one prays is what one believes) as our measuring stick, we should look at the worship service as a microcosm of how we want the local church to worship. The goal of every church is to have a congregation that reads Scripture, prays, meditates, spends time in fasting, in silence, in wonder, sings, preaches, teaches, and fellowships with one another. Yet we don't model the right way of worship in our own worship services. We are not modeling what you pray is what you believe. We are really showing our congregations that true worship is active only in song and passive in everything else. We have taught our congregations that beyond singing and talking around a cup of coffee we are to let others do all the heavy lifting of Scripture reading, preaching, prayer, and silence.... READ MORE.
