Perspectives on Christian Worship is a compilation of five essays, each written by a different author, presenting five divergent approaches to Christian, evangelical worship. Each essay forms one chapter of the book, and is immediately followed by a chapter in which all other contributing authors present a formal response to it. This structure has the benefit of presenting each view along with its criticisms, affording the reader a well-balanced and thoroughly researched spectrum of ideas from which to draw his or her own conclusions. The five perspectives and their authors are as follows: Liturgical Worship written by Timothy C. J. Quill; Traditional Evangelical Worship written by Ligon Duncan; Contemporary Worship written by Dan Wilt; Blended Worship written by Michael Lawrence and Mark Dever; and Emerging Worship written by Dan Kimball.
After a brief introduction by editor, J. Matthew Pinson, which presents a broad timeline of the development of Christian worship, the first view is presented: Liturgical Worship. Considering the fact that the other four perspectives have developed from and within one another (blended worship is a measured response to the values of both contemporary and traditional worship, while emerging worship is in essence an extension of the contemporary worship movement), liturgical worship may be the most foreign to many readers, unless, of course, they have spent time in a liturgical church. Fittingly, this chapter is quite length and very thorough.
The greatest distinction that Quill makes between liturgical worship and any other non-liturgical approach is the question of who is primarily taking action in worship: man or God? He argues, "If worship is primarily something we do, then we can never be certain we did enough. The law always accuses and condemns. It leads to a `mathematical,' measure-oriented way of evaluating how worship is done...This is law worship. Gospel worship works the other way. The liturgy is first of all what God is doing. In law worship, we bring our obedience and praise to God. In gospel worship, we bring our sin and sinfulness, and God brings His gifts to us."[1] According to Quill, this distinction removes a lot of the burden from ministers and congregants alike of have moving, emotional worship services that cause us to feel "close to Jesus." In the liturgy, the Christian meets God through His Word and the sacraments, and does not need "to get closer than this." He writes, "The important thing is that our Lord's gifts are always certain, true, and given out to us. When we have wonderful, moving, emotional experiences, it is something for which to give God thanks. We can enjoy them and give thanks for them, but we do not put our faith in them. We put our faith in Christ and His Word, His promises, and His gifts."[2]
In defending liturgical worship, Quill does not mask his personal disdain for contemporary worship when he characterizes the movement in general and across history as "disorder, irreverence and frivolity."[3] Liturgical worship on the other hand, "retains ceremony not only for the sake of reverence but also in order to teach the faith."[4] He takes aim squarely at the heart of contemporary worship's passion for reaching and engaging the culture around us when he states, "The word culture comes from cultus, the Latin word for worship. Divine Worship is a culture unlike any other, and is in fact a counterculture."[5] In his further defense of liturgical worship, Quill points to various characteristics of the liturgy such as repetition, longevity, the use of the church year and lectionary, order and form as its great strengths.[6]
The latter half of Quill's essay emphasizes the importance of Christology in worship, and suggests that this is best accomplished in the liturgical tradition. To prove his point, he expounds on the various components of the liturgy to demonstrate its Christ-centric character.[7] At one point, he even includes a graphic suggesting that the liturgy is the sole point of intersection between heaven and earth.[8]
The responses to Quill's essay target a range of issues, but by far their over-arching theme, not surprisingly, centers on the element of human emotion in worship. Wilt calls for a balance in worship of God's transcendence and immanence, and "contends that life above liturgy is the place where heaven and earth meet,"[9] while Lawrence and Dever cry out for inclusion in worship of the "legitimately subjective aspects of the gospel."[10]
The next chapter presents traditional evangelical worship. Whereas Quill emphasized the Christology of liturgical worship, Duncan presents a "Bible-centric" view of worship. He begins by defining worship as "declaring--with our lips and lives--that God is more important than anything else to us, that He is our deepest desire, that His inherent worth is beyond everything else we hold dear."[11] In describing what our worship ought to look like, Duncan asserts that the traditional evangelical approach seeks to read, preach, pray, sing and see the Bible.[12] Duncan closes his essay by expounding on a long list of qualities he believes will be evident in Biblical worship, namely that it will be scriptural, simple, spiritual, God-centered, historic, reverent and joyful, Christ-based, corporate, evangelistic, delightful, and both active and passive.[13] Finally, he mentions that Biblical worship should emphasize the Sabbath or Lord's Day, and that this is done by "regular and faithful congregational Sunday morning and evening worship."[14]
In the responses to Duncan's chapter, Quill quickly points out the theological distinction that I mentioned earlier: that of worship as being first what God does, not what man does.[15] Wilt takes issue primarily with the way in which Duncan treats the impact of one's culture on one's worship.[16] Similarly, Kimball challenges the idea that Christian worship should not have a "style" by pointing out that, intentional or not, even the worship of the early church invariably had some type of stylistic character.[17] Lawrence and Dever largely agree with Duncan taking issue only with his treatment of the "Lord's Day" topic.[18]
Dan Wilt's chapter on "Contemporary Worship" follows next, and makes no apology for its lopsided emphasis on contemporary worship music to the exclusion of all other aspects of corporate Christian worship. He writes, "When most of us think about `contemporary worship,' we think about the music that defines it."[19] This exclusion of other artistic expressions was indeed one point of criticism from Wilt's responders.[20] Wilt provides a number of key scripture references in his definition of worship, all of which address worship from the standpoint of whole-life (holistic) worship to the exclusion of corporate, gathered worship,[21] a point criticized by Ligon Duncan in his response.[22] Wilt follows his definition of worship with a scriptural and historical defense of the "new song."
It is after these preliminaries, that, in my opinion, Wilt gets to the real meat of his essay: the question, "what forces shape contemporary music?" For Wilt, the answer is, quite simply, culture. Wilt references the writing of Bishop N.T. Wright which points to the Enlightenment, the Romantic movement and the Existentialist and self-actualization movements as key factors in the shaping of contemporary culture, and suggests that "large portions of contemporary culture are built on a pursuit of self-discovery that has been swallowed hook, line and sinker by both conservative and liberal churches."[23] Wilt does not believe, however, that the church's response should be to eschew culture, but rather to engage it. He purports that the church is part of culture, but is also beyond culture.[24] This point was picked up by Lawrence and Dever in their response. Though they disagree with Wilt's ultimate arrival, they acknowledge that his essay correctly identifies the debate: "From the contemporary worship perspective, the debate is not over the interpretation and application of scripture. Rather, it is a philosophical and sociological discussion about the relationship between the church and the culture it is trying to reach with the gospel of Jesus Christ."[25]
Wilt continues by identifying the guiding values of contemporary worship expression. Not surprisingly, for him, cultural relevance is at the top of the list, followed by integrity, holism, immanence, incarnational worship, simplicity, diversity, and unity.[26] He concludes by offering a brief look into what the future may hold for the contemporary worship movement, noting that "if contemporary worship music and contemporary service can continue to `further the plot' of the kingdom story in tandem with the historic patterns of living worship, then we have found our place."[27]
The heart of Lawrence and Dever's essay on blended worship is found in the opening statement of their essay: "The style of music you use on Sunday morning is incredibly unimportant." The authors' intent is made clear, when they say, "our aim...is to put both worship and style back into their proper places and proper relationship with one another."[28] To that end, the writers suggest four things that blended worship is not: a blending of truths or truth-perspectives, a blending of diverse theological and liturgical traditions, a blending of elements of worship, or a blending of media or means of communication. Rather, for Lawrence and Dever, blended worship is "corporate worship that consists of its biblical elements (prayer, singing, reading and preaching God's Word, the ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper) but in a variety of styles or forms.[29]
The writers provide both a biblical and a theological basis for blended worship.
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