The Meaning of the Many Forms We Utilize for Worship.

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I’ve been to a lot of worship services in my life, each a unique experience of connecting with a community while connecting with God.  I’ve worshipped in a church sanctuary with just a few people scattered around the pews, and I’ve worshipped in a sanctuary that was more like a stadium, with thousands upon thousands of people in attendance.  I’ve worshipped in services that were around fifteen minutes long and worshipped in services that were still going when my friend and I left after three hours. 

I’ve worshipped on the side of a hill. I’ve worshipped in a forest. I’ve worshipped in the desert.  I’ve worshipped by the riverside (and even in the river).  I’ve worshipped inside of a prison.  I’ve worshipped in people’s homes.  I’ve worshipped inside of convention centers.   I’ve worshipped outside in the bright heat of the summer and the shadowy cold of the winter.  I’ve worshipped only in silence, and I’ve worshipped only in song.  I’ve worshipped in services that had portions in a language I didn’t know and services that were completely in a language I didn’t know.  I’ve worshipped with different denominations, different faiths, and different people celebrating different traditions, different holidays, and different ways of practicing faith.

Many of my worship experiences come from the fact that I’m a pastor, a worship leader, but all these worship experiences I just listed were ones in which I was only a participant.   Perhaps you have also had some of these worship experiences, and perhaps some of these experiences are ones you’d like to try.  What I’ve learned in my life, both in my time as a pastor and in my time attending worship as a lay person, is that there are a lot of different ways to worship because there are a lot of different kinds of people that prefer different kinds of worship.

Some of these ways to worship speak to me in more profound ways than others.  I am absolutely not interested in returning to the mega-church that preached a message of violence and war.   I’m not particularly attracted to worshipping in silence again.  I’d be up for worshipping again in a language I don’t know.  I’d love to worship again by the riverside, or, better yet, by the ocean.  But as I think about all the different ways to worship, and all the different ways we worship in our community, I’ve begun to wonder less about what we do and more about why we do it.

You’ve heard me talk before about the importance of finding our “why” as we determine what to do in the future.  As one of my dear mentors, Rev. Phil Hart, likes to repeat, it’s a question of form versus meaning.  When meaning is at the core, there can be many forms.  As Phil likes to point out, there are over 87,000 types of drinks at Starbucks.  That’s a lot of different forms of coffee to reach the meaning of helping you wake up in the morning.

This is also true of worship.  When we think about the ways we choose to worship- the forms- it’s important to ask why, to get to the deeper meaning.  Why do we come to worship?  But we also have to dig deeper than that and ask why we do the individual parts of worship? Why do we sing hymns?  Why do we listen to a sermon?  Why do we offer our money?  Why do we eat and drink around a table while proclaiming the name of Jesus?

That’s what’s on my mind as we think about refreshing worship for the coming summer season and the program year beyond.  There are a lot of different ways we can choose to worship.  How do we figure out what works best for us, especially understanding that we might each prefer a different form of worship?  Getting to the meaning helps us create one vision that speaks to the meaning out of the many forms we utilize for worship.

This Sunday, for our Big Sunday Brunch discussion time, we’ll be asking why so we can learn more about the meaning we make as we worship.  Then we’ll use that as a guide to help create a vision of worship as we move into the summer and look to the program year that starts in September.  So come to the Big Sunday Brunch this weekend and be a part of asking why, then see what we discover together. 

-Pastor JT