Why worship together

We have consciously or subconsciously conditioned our congregations to approach the worship service in a particular way. And these different ways of approaching a church service have root systems in different church traditions or movements.

All three paradigms can be found in the New Testament church and justified theologically. Yet when one is privileged over the others, the music becomes dissonant, like bending one note of a chord too far on the neck of a guitar. First, there is the mission paradigm. In this view, the goal of a church service is to reach the lost. This paradigm has its roots in the Great Awakenings in the US.

The frontier revivals turned hearts back to the Lord so effectively that churches began to mimic the structure of its services. The impulse to be mission-oriented is right. The church exists in the world for the sake of the world. The Spirit of God empowers the people of God to continue the mission of God. Yet when it is over-emphasized, the services become a sales pitch and church a showroom floor.

The staff become performers, and the congregants become the salesforce. The temptation arises to justify ungodly or simply foolish means for godly ends. We can all think of examples of this. The second paradigm is that of formation. According to this model, the church service is meant to make disciples. Proponents of this view can be found in the Reformed traditions, from Anglicans to Presbyterians to Baptists. Each in different yet overlapping ways have persuasively argued that worship should have a narrative shape, re-enacting the drama of salvation in order to serve as a kind of counter-formation to the pressures in the world.

Worship is resistance to the formative secular liturgies of consumerism, individualism, and more. For many who ascribe to this model, sermons are paramount and the pulpit is central. For others, the service looks like adherence to historic liturgies, or it has an intentionally-crafted shape. This too is good and right and true. But taken too far, Sundays become pure catechism, aimed at the believer or insider only.

The services are laden with jargon and technical terms, and the staff become teachers and facilitators. The congregants are merely students. And the temptation is to believe that formation is automatic—that if we could only get the service and its liturgy and preaching right, then we would have disciples. Something for everyone. Free Songs. Resurrender Hillsong Worship. Never Run Dry Influence Music. Miracle Of Love Chris Tomlin. O Holy Night Passion, Crowder. New Songs. Everlasting Arms Mac Powell.

Coming Out Fighting Rend Collective. Good Love Chris McClarney. The Lord's Prayer Citipointe Worship. Won't Stop Chris McClarney. Popular Songs. My Jesus Anne Wilson. King Of Kings Hillsong Worship. Promises Maverick City Music. Recently Added Songs. Cares Chorus Steffany Gretzinger. Advent Song Kirby Kaple. Emmanuel Has Come Kirby Kaple.

All To Him Hillsong Worship. Secret Place Hillsong Worship. Freedom Hillsong Worship. Surrounds Me Hillsong Worship. Some of us whispered with neighbors throughout the service, while others of us preferred silence to any form of reading or singing together.

Some of us walked in and out during the service, apparently finding it difficult to sit still for the whole service, while others moved only when they were invited to do so by the priest. As I listen to the sermon and witness to the baptism of a child of God, on one side of me sits Mr.

On the other side, Debbie shares a prayer book with me and follows with me as best she can. But when the sermon feels long, she seems to register the restlessness in the congregation, stands up, and begins to sing a solo during the sermon as she might during noonday prayer. Someone from the back rushes up to quiet her.

Debbie is not the only restless one; in front of us four small children, guests of the church, crowd into three seats. One of them covers all the words in the bulletin with a purple crayon making it impossible to read the order of service.

They whisper to one another; they arrange their toys over the seats and on the floor. Eventually, because they cannot see the front of the sanctuary, they spill out into the aisle to get a better look at the baby; they are then invited to the front so that they can witness the baptism up close. I look at those who surround me, Mr. Davis, Debbie, and the children, and acknowledge that we have no direct access to the sermon, the baptism, and the Holy Eucharist except with and through the border of those who help to constitute the liturgy with us.