Perspectives on Christian Worship: Five Views [Paperback]

J. Matthew Pinson (Editor), Timothy Quill (Contributor), Ligon Duncan (Contributor), Dan Wilt (Contributor), Michael Lawrence (Contributor), Mark Dever (Contributor), Dan Kimball (Contributor)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 2009 | Series: Perspectives

Perspectives on Christian Worship presents in counterpoint form five basic common beliefs on Christian worship that have developed over the course of church history with a view toward determining which is most faithful to Scripture. Each chapter is written by a prominent person within each tradition, and each writer has the opportunity to respond to each differing view.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

J. Matthew Pinson is president of Free Will Baptist Bible College in Nashville, Tennessee. Prior to that he served as a pastor of churches in Alabama, Connecticut, and Georgia. He has received bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of West Florida, a master's degree from Yale, and a doctorate from Vanderbilt. He lives with his wife, Melinda, and their children, Anna and Matthew, in Nashville.

Product Details

• Paperback: 368 pages
• Publisher: B&H Academic (March 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805440992
• ISBN-13: 978-0805440997
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #95,202 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #92 in Books > Christian Books & Bibles > Worship & Devotion > Rites & Ceremonies

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "Helpful and stimulating for my own thinking about worship", November 2, 2009

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This review is from: Perspectives on Christian Worship: Five Views (Paperback)

How do we remain biblically rooted in our corporate worship of God without becoming culturally irrelevant? That's the question Perspectives on Christian Worship: 5 Views seeks to answer.

Editor Matthew Pinson introduces the book with a brief and insightful historical overview of Christian worship. Then we're offered five different views (and responses) of public worship today: liturgical (Timothy Quill), traditional evangelical (Ligon Duncan), contemporary (Dan Wilt), blended (Michael Lawrence and Mark Dever), and emerging (Dan Kimball).

POINTS ON THE SPECTRUM

The book admittedly fails to cover the full spectrum of worship practices and traditions today, and Duncan, Dever, and Lawrence seemed to agree with each other a lot, as did Kimball and Wilt (maybe it should have been three views?). Still, there's enough variation here to provide food for substantive conversations about how the corporate worship in your church could be more biblical and culturally impacting.

Liturgical

Timothy Quill, a former Lutheran pastor, tries to persuade us that the Liturgy of Word and Sacrament has "sustained the church and reached the lost for the past two thousand years" (21). While that may be overstated, I agree with Ligon Duncan who, in his response, says that Quill is "thoroughly Trinitarian, Christocentric, theological, and biblical in his understanding of worship" (82). Quill highlights worship as God's gift of grace to us, rather than our gift to God, a point he reiterates in most of his responses.

Quill admits early on that the Liturgy belongs to the adiaphora, matters neither commanded nor forbidden by Scripture (19), but you get the impression he feels more strongly than that. Thus, his justification for liturgical worship is ultimately more pragmatic and historical than biblical. In response, Duncan points out that, "Liturgy can...create complacency and simply going through the motions in worship" (83). As edifying and educational as his chapter is, I don't think Quill sufficiently addresses this point.

Traditional Evangelical

Duncan' s chapter on traditional evangelical worship focuses less on forms and more on the meaning, elements, goals, and qualities of biblical corporate worship. His values are similar to Quill, with forms being more negotiable, but not irrelevant. He alerts us to the "law of unintended consequences" (112) with respect to the mediums we use. "The minute a service is called 'contemporary,' we have just conveyed, whether we like it or not, that the most important thing about it is the featured musical style" (111). He also warns that using music to attract people encourages participants "to view themselves as consumers rather than as worshipers" (113). Like all the contributors, Duncan says "worship is all about God" (149) and that conviction comes through in his chapter. He roots his views of worship in scriptural principles and commands, and says the Bible is to be read, preached, prayed, sung, and seen in public worship (105).

Wilt and Kimball affirm Duncan's chapter, but wonder if his practices are at times more influenced by his own tradition and experiences than he realizes. I think they make a good point. Wilt stresses that cultural accommodation is very different from cultural connection (133).

Contemporary

Dan Wilt's chapter on "contemporary worship" focuses more on contemporary worship music, which raises obvious conflicts with Duncan's chapter (although he graciously avoids them in his response). Wilt takes engaging with the culture seriously and emphasizes the importance of the heart and authenticity in worship. While he is an appreciative student of historic traditions, Wilt says the contemporary worship movement "is a significant force that is shaping the discipleship life of average believers around the globe" (197). Wilt's case seems stronger for the values of biblical worship than contemporary music itself, but his passion to see people truly encounter God when they sing is admirable.

Lawrence and Dever express concerns about Wilt's over-emphasis on cultural relevance and personal authenticity. They write, "Certainly we must worship our Savior from within our culture. Yet just as certainly worship must take its cues not from its context, but from its subject, not from our changing culture, but from the unchanging character of God" (215).

Blended

Regulative Principle adherents might be surprised to find out that Lawrence and Dever wrote the chapter on "blended worship." But after making clear what blended worship is not, they define it simply as "using various forms for invariable elements." They offer some helpful guidelines and some great quotes. They say our worship is to be intelligible, orderly, edifying, unifying, and reverent. "To the saved heart, the richness of the gospel will always exceed even the most impoverished music that celebrates it" (252). "No one church, much less one public service, can incorporate and blend every biblically informed tradition" (256). They astutely observe that, in contrast with our own, the worship wars of previous generations were always an attempt to answer the question, "What is most faithful to the Bible?"

In his response, Kimball takes issue with Lawrence and Dever's understanding of the Word in worship. "As much as there is a desire to protect the church using only 'Word-focused' worship, we must remember that the subtle stylistic things we do in addition to words also communicate" (284). Wilt questions viewing the "Word" simply as preaching, and says "the thought that to preach is to transform is magical and lacks substance" (278). In seeking to heighten our awareness of how words are received, both Dans run the risk of minimizing the preached word, despite their claims to the contrary.

Emerging

In the final chapter, Dan Kimball makes a case for "emerging worship," which he defines as "expressions of worship that are relating to how people in today's culture communicate, learn, and express their love to God" (297). It's evident that Kimball loves the church, the lost, and the Lord. And he's concerned about the criticism emerging churches have received for not taking the Bible seriously. His eight guidelines for "emerging worship" on pages 297-298 would be helpful for any church.

That said, his references to a Chinese proverb, nine spiritual temperaments, and worship as a "multisensory experience" muddy the waters. Dan Wilt humbly comments, "The random and sometimes cavalier use of Scripture must continue to be eradicated from both contemporary and emerging worship patterns" (346). Lawrence and Dever sound a similar alarm: "We are on safer ground biblically if we assume that culture's default effect will be to misshape our worship, and that what is needed is to allow the Scriptures to constantly reform and reshape our worship according to the pattern of the Spirit rather than the pattern of the world" (351).

HELPFUL, EVEN WITHOUT A CHARISMATIC VIEW

I would have appreciated a chapter that reflected a more charismatic or continuationist perspective, but I still found the interaction between the authors to be helpful and stimulating for my own thinking about worship. The authors agree in more areas than they disagree, and if you focus on those areas, you'll be well on your way to worship that is more in line with what God desires and has made possible through the gospel.

--Bob Kauflin's review for 9marks.org

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Overall I really enjoyed this book, October 9, 2009

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Reader (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Perspectives on Christian Worship: Five Views (Paperback)

TIMOTHY QUILL'S ESSAY ON LITURGICAL WORSHIP

Timothy Quill is associate professor of Pastoral Ministry and Missions at Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Quill's essay on liturgical worship was informative and in many ways compelling. I appreciated his emphasis on God and that the liturgy is "first of all what God is doing." (p. 23) Quill also shows how important the relationship is between doctrine and worship and how the two influence each other. One cannot disregard either without tragic results. Nowhere is this more clearly illustrated than in the importance of doctrinally accurate hymns and their role in reinforcing the teaching of the church. Quill points to Bishop Ambrose of Milan and the role he played in countering Arianism via his hymnody. I wish he had done more to show how ancient the liturgy really is. Though I've had some experiences with liturgical churches in my early years as a Christian I was under the impression that the liturgy was a late development. The antiquity of the liturgy is something I was grossly unaware. Quill also ably demonstrates much of the rationale of the liturgy. Indeed, the majority of his essay is an exposition of why this or that is part of the liturgy. A dominant theme throughout the essay is the law/gospel dynamic which is fundamental to Lutheran theology. Law is what we do for God and gospel is what God does for us. Quill sees much of contemporary worship as law based rather than gospel based. When we come to worship with an attitude of what we can do or bring to God rather than what we can receive from him our priorities are backwards and unhealthy. As for the response essays I found the ones from Dan Wilt (contemporary worship) and Richard Lawrence and Mark Dever (blended worship) to be the most helpful. A common critique was the fact that liturgical churches can often breed a type of worship that becomes ritualistic and thoughtless. Wilt was the most cutting by associating liturgical worship with aspects of Gnosticism, Svengalism, and the worship of a God "who far more resembles the gods of the Greeks than He resembles the emotionally charged God of the Hebrews." (p. 89) Lawrence and Dever seem right when they say Quill's argument "seems to be limited to the historical and pragmatic." (p. 93) Dan Kimball (emerging worship) essentially says his only critique is that Quill appears to say "unless people use liturgical worship, they are not worshiping in the best way possible." (p. 95) I agree as I think would Quill. That's the point of the book. For someone like Kimball who is very eclectic in his approach this would be a problem. Kimball points to the countless non-liturgical churches that are producing vibrant healthy disciples and notes many of the liberal churches are dominated by liturgy. Overall I was impressed with Quill much more so than I thought I would be. The next post will be on Ligon Duncan and traditional evangelical worship.

LIGON DUNCAN'S ESSAY ON TRADITIONAL EVANGELICAL WORSHIP

Duncan is senior minister of First Presbyterian Church in Jackson, Mississippi. If one of the problems with Quill's essay was that it was "limited to the historical and pragmatic" Ligon Duncan heavily bases his approach on Scripture as he argues for traditional evangelical worship. This is to be expected from a Reformed Evangelical and Duncan does not disappoint. Duncan carefully articulates what worship is and is not as understood by both the Old and New Testament. He describes his approach with the motto "Read the Bible, Preach the Bible, Pray the Bible, Sing the Bible, See the Bible." (p. 105) From this he describes what worship should look like. He notes that "The preached word is the central feature of Reformed worship." (p. 106). He also describes the approach as employing the "regulative principle," that is, "to have a public worship service that is according to Scripture." (p. 107) Duncan helpfully distinguishes between the elements of worship (reading, preaching, singing, praying, and seeing the Word) and the circumstances of worship (the specific order of worship, the texts and tunes of the hymnody, the musical instruments used and the musical style). (p. 110) He cautions two errors to avoid. We shouldn't make the circumstances more important than the elements and we shouldn't think that circumstances are neutral. The latter is especially important since to assume that all musical styles are neutral and carry no baggage and are equally serviceable for public praise is "naïve and harmful." (p. 111) He describes Biblical worship as Scriptural, simple, spiritual, God-centered, historic, reverent and joyful, mediated, corporate, evangelistic, delightful, active and passive and to be celebrated on the Lord's Day (which he understands to be both morning and evening worship on Sunday). Quill's response is predictable if you're reading the book in order. Duncan should not have as a starting point "man's acknowledgement of the sovereignty and glory of God but with the grace of God in Christ." (p. 125) This is not minor issue for Quill since he sees Duncan's view of worship as "primarily and foremost what man does. The last thing on the list is receiving God's favor." (p. 126) Quill contends that "at the heart and center of [God's] nature . . . is . . . grace--underserved, immeasurable love and grace." (p. 126) Wilt (contemporary worship) complains that he doesn't think "God wants us to each just plain, cooked potatoes" but thinks God "loves to `spice things up.' (p. 133) He further thinks Duncan does not appreciate the difference between cultural accommodation and cultural connection. Kimball's (emerging worship) response has the most bite even if he does say in places he's "joking" or using "hyperbole." Kimball focuses on Duncan's critique of Celtic music as "contrived" and notes the sword cuts both ways since much in Reformed worship could equally be seen as contrived. For example the hymns from the 1600s could be seen as contrived by people today. Pews are a medieval European form of seating and to many could be seen as contrived.

DAN WILT'S ESSAY ON CONTEMPORARY WORSHIP

Dan Wilt is director of the Institute of Contemporary Worship Studies at St. Stephen's University in St. Stephen, New Brunswick. Dan Wilt's essay was not very persuasive. Early on he admits he's not a "liturgiologist, theologian, or historian." (p. 149) His approach is as a "studied practitioner of contemporary worship expressions and as a writer of contemporary worship music." (p. 149). For that reason his essay is almost exclusively on the role and benefit of contemporary music in worship. He does spend time on the interaction of church and culture. This leads him to show that "contemporary worship is one of the means through which the church leads the way in culture." (p. 166) He gives the three major practical skills for a contemporary worship leader: 1) the skill of song selection, 2) band development and 3) worship leadership. In response to those who charge that contemporary worship is too emotional Wilt says the traditional view of God is "anemic" and "more Neoplatonic than biblical." (p. 183). He says the church has been strong in "celebrating great minds and communicators" but "less adept at celebrating great hearts and artists. It is fine for great thinkers to be our heroes. Yet it is vital that great feelers be our heroes as well." (emphasis his, p. 185) The criticisms in the response essays, while accurate in many places, could have been avoided had Wilt not so confined himself to simply music. Quill acknowledges Wilt when he says the contemporary songs are sung to God rather than about God. But he points out liturgical language not only speaks to God and about God but also God speaks to us. Quill says those at home with revivalist or Arminian theology will find the appeal of Wilt's essay where you have a "highly emotional worship designed to move people to `give their hearts to Jesus' and to `choose God now.'" (p. 205) Quill finally observes that the "constant demand to give God all our praise, heart, and love is a burden than condemns us. Freedom comes not from sermon and song that demand us to do more, but from the living proclamation of Christ's unconditional love, acceptance, and pardon." (p. 208) Lawrence and Dever start off strong with "It was our understanding that the church gathered around Christ, not His anthems; that it was the Holy Spirit that fanned into flame redemptive activity, not music; and that the immanence of God was an attribute of the Godhead rather than a function of melody and verse." (p. 211) The also target Wilt's admission that "'some contemporary worship songs could as easily be sung to one's spouse as to God.' In our circles, this is known as the `Jesus is my boyfriend' song, and it is not exactly a compliment." (p. 214) Kimball rounds off the criticism with wishing he had heard more than just about music. "I would have liked to hear how preaching, prayer, other artistic expressions play into a worship gathering." (p. 216) On this point I couldn't agree more. Wilt's essay was more an argument for contemporary music than contemporary worship unless we reduce worship to singing which Wilt clearly does not believe.

MICHAEL LAWRENCE AND MARK DEVER'S ESSAY ON BLENDED WORSHIP

They are the associate and senior pastors respectively at Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, D.C. Michael Lawrence and Mark Dever (hereafter L/D) offer a rigorous defense of blended worship. Like Duncan, L/D start with a Biblical understanding of worship. Worship cannot be limited to just a Sunday morning gathering. It is rather "our service to God." (p. 218) So as not to be confused with Robert Webber's notions of blended worship they begin by telling us what blended worship is not. It is not a blending of truths or truth-perspectives, nor a blending of diverse theological and liturgical... Read more ›

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting Read, February 19, 2012

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This review is from: Perspectives on Christian Worship: Five Views (Paperback)

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. Their biblical basis acknowledges the strict methodology of Old... Read more ›