This Side of the Pulpit » Entries tagged with "consumerist worship"
Power and Humility
Rachel Held Adams writes about Mark Driscoll* and such mega-church consumerist evangelicalism: When you build your church and your culture around hierarchy and power, you are naturally going to be 1) highly-organized, and 2) personality focused. But when you build your church and your culture around humility and service, you are naturally going to be 1) organic, growing at the grassroots level, and 2) less dependent on one or two flashy personalities and more dependent on the daily faithfulness of regular people…. The Mark Driscolls of this world pull in (and publicize) the big numbers because that is how they measure success…. We are part of a living, growing Kingdom in which the last will be first and the first will be last, in which the peacemakers and the merciful and the meek … Read entire article »
Filed under: Uncategorized
Hymns, Part II: The Advent Version
I love Advent hymns. Probably more than Christmas carols and hymns. Definitely more than Lenten hymns. Easter hymns would give them a run for their money, however. I’m not sure why I love them so much. Perhaps because they are not overused and overdone like Christmas carols are. Perhaps they evoke the Christmas spirit without evoking muzak, Elvis and Kenny G versions heard at stuffy shopping malls. Maybe they are just pretty. But, to toot the same … Read entire article »
Filed under: Theology
Small Business Congregations
This seems to be making some rounds. I stole it from incarnatus est: The pastors of America have metamorphosed into a company of shopkeepers and the shop they keep are churches. They are preoccupied with shopkeeper’s concerns—how to keep the customers happy, how to lure customers away from competitors down the street, how to package the goods so that the customers will lay out more money…The biblical fact is that there are no successful churches. There are, instead, communities of sinners, gathered before God week after week in town and villages all over the world. The Holy Spirit gathers them and does his work in them. In these communities of sinners, one of the sinners is called pastor and given a designated responsibility in the community. It is this … Read entire article »
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A Call to Worship?
I grew up in the LCMS. From day one, I’ve worshiped at Lutheran Churches, spending just a few years in the Evangelical Lutheran Synod. Lots of us have. But how many of you ever saw a “Call to Worship” in the hymnal. Nor did any of those worship services begin with a “Call to Worship.” But many of the “Creative Worship” services that float around the LCMS these days have one of these at the … Read entire article »
Filed under: Theology
Church Personalities
Some members visited a Consumerist-Entertaino Church this weekend with their granddaughter. They were surprised and impressed with the sermon, which they said clearly proclaimed the Gospel, but were disappointed in how “unfriendly” the congregation was. They put them to the test, sitting themselves in the lounge, drinking coffee, watching all the people walk past and into Sunday School rooms, waiting to be spoken to, waiting to be invited. Finally, right at the moment all the … Read entire article »
Filed under: Theology
Yes, Virgina, There Is a Slippery Slope and this is Where it Leads
Yes. “Christian pole dancing.” If you really want to know what is wrong in American Christianity and where all the Consumerist Worship leads, this is it. … Read entire article »
Filed under: Theology
World(ly) Music
I actually enjoy secular music. I enjoy classic rock, modern rock to some extent, anti-folk artists like Regina Spektor (a new favorite), some metal, classic country, alt-country/no depression, jazz (especially avant-garde), minimalist classical, baroque. You can say I love music. But let’s face it. This stuff is worldly. Worldly things do not belong in the spiritual worship of God. How you judge what is worldly or not is a matter of subtlety and discernment. And we all need to be cautious about how much worldly music and entertainment we take in anyway, outside of worship and church life. Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. They are from the world; therefore they speak from … Read entire article »
Filed under: Theology
Church Music Lives
Hey…you’re still here? After all this time? Don’t you people every go home? On to the blog… I was in a doctor’s office the other day checking out. One of the staff members had music playing from her computer, and as I walked to the window the song changed to something played on a pipe organ. From where I was standing it was too faint to be heard clearly. The woman setting up the next appointment for me clicked at her mouse and squinted at the screen, and then out of nowhere said over her shoulder, “Is that your music playing, Nancy?” “Christmas carols,” she responded. “Sounds like church music. I don’t want to listen to church music. I’m not in church.” I’ve heard the complaint before when working at a music store. On occasion we … Read entire article »
Filed under: Theology
(The) Who will fix our Synod
Many of the LCMS blogs these days–at least the ones I read–are posting about the upcoming LCMS Convention this summer, and posting a lot about it. It is the topic du jour. It always is. But not here. At least, not so much. It is true the LCMS is in a world of hurt, at least when it comes to financial operations, unity in doctrine and practice and unity of purpose. It’s gotten so bad that I have to fight off an inward cringe when I have members who tell me, “I visited and LCMS when I was on vacation, and they…” Almost inevitably, they continue by saying something that sounds more Consumerist Mega-Church Metho-bapti-costal than anything Lutheran. Well now. So we should all be concerned with what is happening at the … Read entire article »
Filed under: Theology
It used to be Awesome, but now I Want…
A few weeks ago I changed my schedule to having Mondays off instead of Fridays. There are some good benefits to it: it makes the work week feel longer for some reason; Fridays are great days to get things done here at the office, where it is nice and quiet; people who need things usually wait until Tuesday or Wednesday to ask me, and with this schedule I have an extra week day to help them. But I can already tell that the charm will wear off eventually. It will soon enough be like all things. Starting out a joy, then becoming something enjoyable, soon enough it becomes worn and comfortable, then the flaws appear and something new begins to hearken. That fancy new phone? That brand new car? That cute new blouse? That adorable … Read entire article »
Filed under: Theology
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