WORSHIP WARS AND A POSTMODERN CULTURE
"If small group ministries are the most fundamental paradigm shift in the history of North American Christianity, the shift in the style of worship is the most obvious and divisive. This divisiveness is over the style of worship rather than doctrine or theology." (William Easun, Dancing With Dinosaurs: Ministry in a Hostile and Hurting World (Abingdon, 1993):81.)
Paradigm Churches grow out of the culture of the area. The style and form is comfortable to those attending worship from the non-Christian world. (See Elmer Towns, Ten of Today's Most Innovative Churches (Ventura, CA: Regal Press, 1990):60)
The worship wars are present in every church type from Pentecostals, Episcopal, Baptist, Lutheran, and United Methodist and all the non-interdenominational churches. The small groups mode derives from Cho of South Korea. Small group emphasis is not new with Cho but he is the guru who has invaded the searching Western church, via American Church Growth scholars. . This is the largest church in the world. (See, The Baby Boomerang: Catching Baby Boomers As They Return to Church (Ventura: Regal, 1990): 189). See the radical change in Roman Catholic liturgy after Vatican II. This ingression of a new generation is principally made of those attracted by "New Worship Styles", not theology!! An example of lack of concern for theology is the United Methodist Church who are returning to the Constantinian practice of mass baptism, i.e., "baptized infants" are to be considered members of the Church. This recent development exposes the lack of concern of personal experience for Church membership among the generations after World War II (William M. Eccum, How to Reach Baby Boomers (Abingdon Press, 1991), see especially J. Menking, Preparing for The Future: A Report—Generation X: Perkins School of Theology (Dallas, TX) 75275, June, 1996).
Zwingli eliminated all music from his services and Calvin tried to do the same. When the Genevan reformer finally admitted music to worship, it was limited to metrical psalms, sung in unison with the congregation. Cromwell's Puritans eradicated choral and instrumental music, all written liturgy and all worship symbolism. The Reformed influence created an aesthetic poverty for centuries!
On the American Frontier (ca. 1800's), the camp meeting revival broke out in the frontier culture of Bourbon County Kentucky. "Brush Arbor" meetings were characterized by highly emotional verbal and physical expressions which resemble modem postmodern charismatic worship or animistic narcotic induced chaos! e.g.. narcotic use by the Counter Culture of the 1960's and present peyote use among some Native Americans. This music was simplistic, highly repetitive, often improvised, foreshadowing postmodern "praise chorus." This cultural music influence lost interest in the theologically-rich hymns of Isaac Watts and Charles Wesley. By the time these influences reach American churches there will be a new paradigm in Church music. (Note the controversy with the Restoration Heritage over styles of music and biblical authority.) The Camp Meeting movement was part of a long succession of revival phenomena which culminated in the Second Awakening under Charles Finney and the missions of Dwight L. Moody by the end of the 19th century. The camp meeting spiritual became the model for the composing of Sunday School songs and later Gospel songs, which dominated much evangelical life for 150 years. The new song structure were adjuncts of "evangelistic preaching."
There is a pluralism of postmodern liturgical changes "impacting Church worship services." The South has been dominated by "revivalistic worship" services. The Sunday worship service was largely a time for evangelism to the unsaved or to recruit Church members, the foundational features of this style of service consists of an exciting and captivating period of music and witness, directed by attractive and gifted musicians and service leader teams. The radical paradigmatic revolution which has precipitated consumerism in the Household of God. The Worship Wars derives its format from media, MTV, From Audibility to Visibility (e.g.. Amusing Ourselves to Death—cultural shift from audibility to visibility.) Now in some mega churches there is a one hundred member choir, a full orchestra and several soloists, who seek to express today's media and concert stars. Many mega churches have services for the "Seeker", perhaps an Olympic sized swimming pool and adjoining saunas and a full schedule of athletic and social services for all age groups. Church gurus have cloned postmodern preachers into response to our "consumer culture" in which people are going to make choices. This phenomena often appears to be a "theological cafeteria" and "Christian shoppers' mall.!" You select what you want—where your needs will be met, even though the costs may be considerable, at best, much within the postmodern model of worship is pre-evangelism entertainment followed by a evangelistic sermon. The bigger platform filled with musicians, only makes it seem to be more of a professional performance, and the enormous crowd, often surrounded by totally inadequate acoustics, finds little encouragement to accept Christ or join the Church, join in singing of the classical hymns. It's Show Time.
The worship team of the mega church plan programs to attract the unchurched, with performances that are as professionally executed and emotionally stimulating as those of secular show business. Often, too often, these theatrical productions are competing with the sense-bombarding decibels of pop music. The former editor of Eternity Magazine. Kenneth A. Myers, has written a useful book entitled. All God's Children and Blue Suede Shoes. He contends the postmodern evangelicalism has identified itself rather completely with today's popular culture, a culture of diversion whose two symbols are rock music and television, a culture which is characterized by a quest for novelty [creativity and imagination] and desire for instant gratification. Both 0. Guiness and D. Wells are persona non grata for proposing these same critiques in the evangelical churches, (eg. Worship Wars and a Pluralism of Models!)
SEEKERS' MODEL
The Willow Creek Church in suburban Chicago is very effective as genuine evangelism on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings. Their services are not announced as worship, only as opportunities for seekers to hear about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The "Seeker" is often turned off by traditional Church services because "it is constantly asking for money" or because "the worship forms are meaningless" or because "the preaching is not related to life." They are not expected to give money, dress in special Sunday clothes or to sing. The setting is an auditorium with a stage. The pre-sermon performance is professional quality activity by a large orchestra and excellent singers who are at home in multiple styles of music, and dramatic presentations to "set up" the sermon by showing its relationship to real life situations. The sermon is a non-emotional, not highly biblical or theological, but carefully reasoned, which sets forth the relevance of the Christian faith to postmodern life experience, e.g.. there are those of us who deny that you can market Jesus to the Seeker Friendly audience.
Willow Creek services (Saturday and Sunday) are not for mature believers. This demographic group is focused on Wednesday and Thursday evening services and in small cell groups organized for all those who are members of the Church. The design is commendable but the larger services (ca. 15,000) are really made up of Church people, not unchurched Harry and Mary. This group might be hiding from maturity and discipleship in the anonymity of a larger crowd. Perhaps they are identifying entertainment with a profound Christ-centered experience of true worship.
To be sure, true worship experience is simply necessarily the experience of much smaller churches. In my contact with the Willow Creek congregation the constant threat that postmodern multicultural dynamics—imaging, consumerism, and therapeutic mode—might dominate the worship service. Who is the center of worship—man or God? Perhaps people, rather than God, are at the center of even the Seeker service. One of the main criticism this author has of the Willow Creek group is expressed in an encounter between Bill Hybels and Peter Jennings on ABC television. Jennings, who is not a Christian, asked Hybels why there was no cross in the auditorium. Hybels replied that the leadership decided not to have a cross at the center of the theater because it might offend some one. I am sure that is true! The cross of Christ has always been offensive. "It is foolish, a stumbling block, or the source of salvation from sin and death." (I Corinthians 1.1 Iff) Strange that in the great cathedrals of large cities, such as Chicago and New York, hundreds come every day to look and pray and the cross is at the center there. There isn't even a cross for the Thursday and Friday worship services. There is also no property is a gathering place for those who believe in Jesus Christ as Lord. Even architecture reveals theology or the absence of it. This represents an effort to preach an inoffensive gospel to the Seeker Sensitive—Generation Xers. There should be a warning sign—This is not a worship service." Biblically, believers gather to worship and leave to serve.
PRAISE AND WORSHIP MUSIC
For this group, worship occurs only in a transcendent, often glossolalic experience in which the true believer enters a spiritual "Holy of Holies" in God's very presence. Worship is an ecstatic experience through the "Holy Place." Here the worshipers sing only songs of praise. The leader is crucial. He is backed up by singers and a stage band with lots of percussion instruments which leads from chorus to chorus according to a well planned, but seemingly, spontaneous progression which encourages the audience to "abandon themselves to the Spirit" in singing and clapping. If this appears to be emotional manipulation this group would say that "manipulation is a fact of life." "Manipulation to freedom" in worship is a worthy goal. (See John Killinger, Leave It To The Spirit (NY: Harper and Row, 1971), 75-76). The exciting songs of pure praise give way to the hush of awe. This condition precipitates speaking and singing in tongues, in interpretation or prophecy (e.g.. Hebrews 13.15, "sacrifice of praise" II Chronicles 5.11-14). The Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements lists "praise" as one of the most unique emphasis of this trans-denominational movement.
THE CHARISMATIC MODEL OF WORSHIP
This emphasis is one dimension of the previously mentioned model. This group truly believes that a spiritual springtime has already arrived. Without question, these glossalalic evangelicals have developed a fall practice of worship within their own theology and scriptural exegesis. This group and the Pentecostals have a good evangelistic track record. One of their own representatives, Graham Kendrick, has written a book. Learning to Worship (Minneapolis:Bethany House Publication, 1984) and is a good place to start a study of this model. Many of the emphasis of this group are significant but the extreme significance is exposed in the Praise and Worship Music. Is there a New Testament norm for worship in our postmodern culture?
Charismatics use Old Testament images in developing a worship rationale. They all but ignore the New Testament. (Ephesians 5.19; Colossians 3.16) Spiritual songs in the New Testament are not the unique expression of glossalalic singing. An early Christian hymn is found in I Timothy 3.16, It was not only practical for Martin Luther and Charles Wesley to expect that worship music should teach Christian doctrine, but it was also biblical. Does overhead screen projection of postmodern church music center the congregation's attention on God? Perhaps! The overhead screen does not contain any music notation, so the music must be very simple; also the worshipers cannot sing harmony parts from a screen, only the melody. This lack may or may not be essential to Christian worship.
God is "doing a new thing" in the last days (Joel 2.28) so we must do new things. Postmodern Church musicology will not produce any "classics." The heart of Christian worship is our historic faith, because our God is a God of history. New Church music might express the postmodern revisionist view of history, i.e., always searching for relevance, not necessarily True Truth. In fact, there is no True Truth! The search for relevance is person centered—not God centered. The scriptures begin with God and ends with God. All in between is God solving the human condition of sin. The charismatics claim that God is doing a new thing in these "last days" and that this renewal must not be compromised by "old methods" and "forms" including classical hymns. In postmodern worship styles even projected transparencies which have been used for a period will be replaced by a new set. God is a God of history, not merely the postmodern revisionist epoch.
Since the call for change is a universal passion, it seems reasonably safe to assume that change is needed. But on what biblical, historical, theological basis should these changes be made? What is the source for the agenda for change? Scripture or Culture or Both? Shall we simply copy those techniques that seem to be popular in other churches and media? Postmodern evangelicals, as well as mainline churches, are convinced that the Churches need a "celebration experience" mode of worship. Pentecostal "praise singing" need not lead us into their "Holy of Holies" because they fall short of the Pauline norm of worship song. The question most often asked is not "should we have more Scripture reading, more prayer in worship?" Rather the goal seems to be merely to add some emotional stimulation to their received "worship outline" - a format based on the use of controlled informality and sensory expression that often results in "emotion for emotion's sake."