AN EVANGELICAL'S LAMENT AND JOURNEY, part five

THE CENTRAL ISSUE: Worship (lack thereof) Part Three

Today, we resume our discussion on worship by looking at some areas that evangelicals have traditionally devalued or disregarded.

Let me start by saying that, in general, liturgical worship is poetic while evangelical worship tends to be prosaic. The liturgical tradition values an aesthetic approach, while evangelicals are much more straightforward, plain and pragmatic. This has led to the stereotype that portrays "high church" worship as elitist, pretentious, and snobbish, while "low church" style is the domain of the common man—honest, direct, speaking straight to the heart.

The rest of the story...

The following quote from A.W. Tozer (fifty years ago!) represents a voice from within the nonliturgical community that shows the damage done to evangelical worship when we cling to that stereotype and promote the merely pragmatic:

We of the nonliturgical churches tend to look with some disdain upon those churches that follow a carefully prescribed form of service, and certainly there must be a good deal in such services that has little or no meaning for the average participant—this not because it is carefully prescribed but because the average participant is what he is. But I have observed that our familiar impromptu service, planned by the leader twenty minutes before, often tends to follow a ragged and tired order almost as standardized as the Mass. The liturgical service is at least beautiful; ours is often ugly. Theirs has been carefully worked out through the centuries to capture as much beauty as possible and to preserve a spirit of reverence among the worshipers.

...In the majority of our meetings there is scarcely a trace of reverent thought, no recognition of the unity of the body, little sense of the divine Presence, no moment of stillness, no solemnity, no wonder, no holy fear. But so often there is a dull or a breezy song leader full of awkward jokes, as well as a chairman announcing each "number" with the old radio continuity patter in an effort to make everything hang together.

A. W. Tozer, God Tells the Man Who Cares, p. 11f

An important element in my journey from evangelicalism to a liturgical tradition was a growing desire for less prose and more poetry in worship. I was looking for...

• A church with a worship space that puts God front and center, focusing attention on him. To put it bluntly, an altar not a stage.

• A worship space that communicates both God's transcendence and immanence, lifting our faces and hearts upward and gathering us as one family together around the God to whom we look.

• A worship space that is intentionally designed and decorated with elements of beauty that stimulate the imagination and delight the heart and mind.

• A worship service that is personal, hospitable, and authentic, but not "chatty" or "casual."

• A worship service that encourages the active participation of all worshipers, not one that reduces the congregation to an audience of spectators and listeners.

• A worship service in which the leaders understand the power of words, and use them to lift us into a higher realm of thinking, imagining, and relating to others.

• A worship service that is not just all about analysis and answers, but one that invites us into the mysteries of realities that transcend what our minds can comprehend.

• A worship service that is filled with Scripture, along with time and space to meditate on what God is saying.

• A worship service that honors the sacraments as well as the Scriptures.

• A worship service that allows for holy silence.

• A worship service that both reflects what the Holy Spirit has taught the church over the ages (history and tradition) and what the Spirit is saying to the church today (creativity, spontaneity, freshness).

• A worship service that respects and includes people of all ages and backgrounds.
  

Transcendence. Mystery. Beauty. Imagination. Silence. Participation. Hospitality. Reverence. Careful and thoughtful preparation, especially with regard to words and atmosphere. These are characteristic of a transforming worship that looks up to the Father through the Son in the Spirit.

Such worship lifts us out of the prosaic and becomes a poetic window to the heavenly, spiritual realm, a foretaste of eternal newness.