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As a product of church planting, there’s
something to be said about both speaking to creating worship in light of some “bells
and smells,” as well as incorporating or fine-tuning existing rubrics of
spiritual transition to enhance the theological and spiritual strength of a
service. Stepping into an oddly shaped
or perhaps intentionally designed giant structure that both incorporated an
almost iconic white steeple and Colonial front, alongside a factory sheet metal
warehouse, made you think about where their priorities are set. The inside of the structure is set up much
like a mall with interconnecting rooms or hallways highlighting different
ministries and meetings. Their youth set
up reminded me of stepping into a movie theatre box office. Everything, in essence, spoke to the secular
culture with an accent of speaking to what people should consider “doing” after
their multifaceted Sunday experience panorama.
What I found myself questioning and
reflecting a lot upon was if this set up of church was faithfully including the
marks of the church in spiritual practice being Koinonia, Didache, Diakonia,
Kerygma and Lietourgia. This past Summer
I wrote an extensive paper on Lutheran worship based upon my studies, experiments
and appreciation of it. Was this popular
mega-church speaking faithfully enough to community, teaching, service, witnessing
the Word and worship? What I experienced in both services was primarily a
vertical sense of instilling, stirring up faith and some abstract moralistic
principles but the horizontal, being our sharing in the world, seemed
truncated. It was like thinking of the cross that had its sides only reaching
so far. Is this a reflection of
appealing too much to culture? The
finely polished auditorium or amphitheater donned no cross yet alone was set up
and ready to go for loud interlinking traditional and modern Christian hymns,
rock songs and related. I’ve never been someone to “flick a lighter to Jesus”
in any setting, (though I really do like K Love, in my car!) but I held back
overly criticizing this to see how clear and solid their theology was.
Echoing that thought again, are
some of these churches appealing too much to culture(?); had me think of
Bonhoeffer and his quest to clarify discipleship as an obedience that can only
really come from realizing costly Grace.
This Costly grace, the great pearl of Christ given to the heart of those
who truly come to believe, receive, incorporate said Grace, Word of God and
share it. Much like the mega Lutheran
church I went to in Las Vegas, I saw myself thinking of a giant Sundae with all
things wonderfully put in place except for the Grace which seemed like little
crumbs just cautiously sprinkled on top.
Why were these churches doing something like this? Both churches had million-dollar
coffers regularly filled… Strong enough pastors to at least teach simple concepts
very well but neither place would touch the full Monty call of Grace with a 10-foot
pole.
There is a fine line to witnessing
the Word of God as a faith-filled disciple in the 21st century. The radical call of the Gospel of Christ to ‘Be-the-Attitude’
should be something that is timeless, inspiring and truly motivating to be as
Luther’s favorite author James said: ‘Doers of the Word.’ When I think of my own discipleship journey
to where I am now, I’ve never stopped learning and growing with God’s Word and
what He needs my heart to realize as a pastor to His church. The artist in me can and did appreciate the
non-denom’s abstract art behind the worship stage. The image captured both a sense of the cross
as well as an arrow pointing straight up.
While we’re to be looking up to hear God’s Word speak to and commission
our hearts to service, what are we seeing right next to us? What are we to see beyond the auditorium and
theater-like interlinking hallways? That aspect was not made clear for me.
Being a disciple is a very real,
standing on solid ground reality. Bonhoeffer had this understanding most
beautifully and profoundly realized in his own mission to help save the German
church. We can not truthfully “grow and
go” upon moralistic abstractions to help us with the nitty gritty of response
to the world as His disciples. Costly
Grace is neither to be considered a moralistic abstraction or be diluted to
palatable nuggets of “comfort” for the disciple’s growth. It is our hearts turning to God, knocking on
God’s door and really asking, growing, seeking, believing in what the awesome
Grace of God does: NEW LIFE.
New Life in a Chronos-bent 9 to 5
world encapsulates the problem in expression, wisdom and commissioning. Worship is the fuel to gathering together as
the Body in the world (but not to be of it).
We forget that last part all too easily during this time of transition
in society, culture and context. Much like art, one needs to think of the
elemental aspects of its design. For me
what has always been important to composing worship is its solid spiritual
formation’s design alongside of course, good theology. Music is the “sound” to burgeon our natural
charismatic reflections to God. You can’t
just throw Advent hymnary off to the side for Christmas hymns, just because
someone wants it that way... Well, partly because: Jesus isn’t supposed to be
born yet! I thought about this in connection to when I went to this first
service. I thought to myself, ok, K-Love
top 40 greatest hits… As much as I liked
that music, was it relevant to the expository sermon series the pastors were
preaching upon? ‘Satisfied.’
The main theological nugget to take
away from this first service was witnessing wisdom. They look to a snippet from
St. Paul’s letter to the Colossians 4:2-6. They basically extrapolate four
nuggets of discipline St. Paul seeks for the flock at Colossae to accept: Pray
intentionally, communicate clearly, live wisely and speak graciously. In regard to marketing the teaching element
here, they made bookmarks that were handed out at the end of the service for
those to reflect on the message more on their own. I’ve tried something similar
with ‘Sermon Nuggets’ inserts in some bulletins during the church year. These
are four solid statements but how do we take those “life-instructions” internally
to change the disciple’s heart most concretely to God? These statements can be
seen as the mirror of the Law but what about Gospel? This is probably the
problem I find with expository preaching.
It is very mechanical and precise in exegeting a particular slice of the
moment in Paul’s pastoral journey, but it stops short or is made to seem to
stop short here and become purely instruction.
If this particular community was
following any kind of lectionary perhaps reflecting upon this calendar years’ days
of Easter, the monumental impact of the resurrection upon the disciples from
that day forward would’ve spoken more towards agape love and metanoia. The heart of the Gospel is the love of Christ
being the conquering force against sin, death and evil. If we lay claim daily in remembering our
Baptism to this truth as His disciples, why aren’t we speaking more directly to
it? This goes beyond my Lutheran shading here: Do we faithfully teach the
process and progress of the heart turning to God as an aspect of aspiring to
incorporate, understand agape love? I’ll
close this article by sharing a wonderful dream I had thinking of talking to
Him and asking Him how I was doing as His disciple. He said: “Nicole, my daughter, I know the
artist in you is trying to see me as the Jesus from Franco Zefferelli’s movie
with a touch of St. Catherine of Sienna’s monastery painting of my human self… but
think of me as the light in the world, the light in your very heart and my face
will show within many you come to minister to.”
That was a powerful dream for me
and was recent. I may have been trying
to ask from my heart what God wants me to do next… but what I saw was just His
mouth, and I thought prayerfully of His Word in every day that past week. This
is what “church” should be doing for us every day after the Sunday time of gathering.
God’s Word becomes ubiquitous to being challenged to thrive or flourish within
the problem of the human condition. God’s
purpose and instruction needs to be realized through costly grace. We must be careful of offering or accepting
the crumbs.
Rev. Nicole A.M. Collins
