What else would you do?

For: The Institute Of Contemporary And Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt.

Now, I have to say I love singing. It’s always been something I’ve enjoyed. Pushing air out through your diaphragm and projecting it far away is a great experience. Some very profound things have happened to me as I’ve focused this on Jesus. So may it just be said that any comment I make in regard to songs, music and worship carries no undertone in rejecting any of that.

But I suppose what I’m trying to work towards is asking the question: how does a community of faith express worship in a wholistic way? Does our style misrepresent what it means to live a life of worship?

If there were an art exhibition you’d imagine someone organising it, curating how the pieces were to flow, taking you on some kind of journey through the gallery. There’d be a thought behind it all (possibly chronological, or phases, or issues the artist had to wrestle with). You’d enter the exhibition, and start to look around taking in the the various pieces as you went. Then (if the curator has understood the artist) you’d probably get to the end and be like:

“Oh! Now I get it. I didn’t realise they…”

“So that’s why they always seemed to…”

Essentially you’d leave that space with a greater understanding of the one who created the work, the one who even made the exhibition possible.

So is it fair to assume a gathered (or curtated) expression of worship could be the same? And are the spaces we design to exhibit this creative work sufficient, or do they restrict the work on display?

What if worship came from a place that wasn’t fixed around a set of songs, but a passionate body that didn’t know what else to do than express the beauty of the one who made them? Imagine what would happen if you channeled creativity in that space.

You’d probably see something quite special.

Week 1 Media

For: The Institute Of Contemporary And Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt.

So if you’ve spent anytime with a shovel in your hand, there’s this initial moment of deciding where to dig. Now once you made your choice, you then throw all your energy into driving the shovel into the ground, and removing the dirt to make your hole. After some time you get a bit tired and eventually start contemplating when it’s a good time to take a break.

I’m having a cup of tea.

The digging we’ve done so far is great and the content is mostly quite familiar in my neck of the woods. However I do wonder quite what’s going on with the undercurrent of the term ‘worship’. In making use of a variety of phrases like ‘artisan’, ‘creative influencer’, ’spiritual influencer’, I’m interested to see how these thing will be fleshed out a bit.

Using language that helps the process of a working definition is fantastic. Wright discusses the idea of sacraments (see video clip on Dan Wilt’s blog) suggesting we remember to explain the act to prevent the meaning being lost. I wonder if we should be expanding on what we mean by the term ‘worship’.

My observation so far is we’re predominantly all talking about music. So these new descriptions are being used, but it seems like they haven’t as of yet taken on any meat (become incarnate) until they become more than just a new phrase. If we’re discussing a route based on influencing creativity, then perhaps let’s talk about what forms of creativity exist and how they play a role in the life of a worship community.

In one of the resource video clips Brenton Brown (Theology And The Worship Leader) suggests that music is the strongest influence in how we learn our theology. But why is that?

Of course the songs we sing should contain deep, profound lyrics which align closely with the narrative (as Don Williams suggests from the video clip ‘Why Theology’). I mean it’s fair to say some things are so true that if you try and talk about them in very factual language it just doesn’t seem to work. It ruins it.

It’s like some things are so true only poetry can capture them. However it’s worth bearing in mind Davids point that we should be mindful the imagery is not ‘misleading’ (Davids, The Importance Of Scripture Study For Modern Worship Leaders, IW Master All, p.65)

But the idea that songs are the dominant learning tool is perhaps more to do with cultural or style issues. For us the question should be: Are we ok with that, or should we make some changes?

How we gather as a church and the format we choose will, to a great extent, influence how we learn. If teaching is focused, learning is no longer a byproduct, but an intentional outcome. If the style of sermons has largely been influenced by a monologue or didactic approach, then perhaps it’s time for the creatives to step up and retell the story of God in enganging and profound ways to ignite a movement of people.

Making use of Wright’s book Simply Christian is such a help in begining to open up this can of worms. Yet rather than simply take the “echos of a voice” Wright speaks about as as yet one more filter to gauge whether this song or that one ‘works’ for us right now, it seems more appropraite to let them influence who we are. Then in all humilty and in honset response to the echos of Justice, Spiritual Quest, Delight in Beauty and the Hunger for relationship perhaps we wouldn’t be able to sing anything but that which reflected back to God who he already is – the triune person who calls us to identify with the forgoten, the weak, the poor and lay our lives down in true worship, regardless of song choice or music style.

Maybe that’s a story in which we can live.

 

Voices (ICEWS, eb 08)

For: The Institute Of Contemporary And Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt.

Have you ever been invited over to someone’s house for dinner? It’s a great thing to spend time eating and laughing and checking out someone’s CD collection, maybe you’ll discover they really do like Dolly Parton. But when you go, do you ever ask the question or at least think “Is there anything I should bring?” I mean what kind of person are you if you turn up empty handed?

Who does that kind of thing?

So here’s the thing, is it right to turn up with something, or is it expected? Are you simply obliged, so you just do it – perhaps a bit reluctantly (“oh let’s get that bottle it’s not as expensive as that one, and after all we don’t know them that well anyway”).

If a body of people were to gather, or invited to gather, then what would they bring? This amongst many others is a question I keep returning to.

When we even mention the word ‘church’ it’s probably fair to say that there are a number of different conclusions people will come to – I see church as this thing, you see it as something else. But both of these opinions are based on some sort of experience. Either directly by being involved, or from observing or hearing about someone’s take on the message of Jesus.

When we use the word ‘worship’ in a church what are we getting at?

When using the term ‘worship leader’ what are we actually saying? 

Do we come at this from a particular mindset? How have you ended up where you are? To put it another way: What are the voices of influence that led you here? For some it would seem the default place is songs, which of course is very true. But what about different traditions or streams of church? Do they all say the same thing about this activity we call worship?

RGB – essential colours*

For: The Institute Of Contemporary And Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt.

*Red, Green & Blue – Without these colours you don’t get the full light spectrum, so the image you’re looking at on this screen wouldn’t appear as it was meant to. This course I’m doing at The Institute Of Contemporary And Emerging Worship Studies is sort of like that.

So what happens if you haven’t been seeing Blue? Is the intended design misunderstood? What happens if you’re colour blind?

essentials*blue
Studies In Worship Theology and Biblical Worldview

 

I’ll be asking questions as I go.