Friday, July 22, 2005
Teaching Worship 9
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
God’s mercies never come to an end.
They are new every morning, new every morning;
great is your faithfulness, O Lord, great is your faithfulness.
SNC 242
After meditating on Malachi 3, we followed up on the idea of non-negotiables from yesterday’s discussion. We reflected on proverbs about worship instead of laws or requirements. We suggested using other terminology, such as “gifts of the Spirit that we are stewards of,” “treasures,” or Debra’s “things we should not do without.”
We spent the majority of our session on issues raised by participants. In this context we explored ideas concerning teaching worship as a Sunday school class, genuinely experiencing other cultures, leading worship in a multi-denominational setting, and teaching in a way that is both instructive and gracious.
We admitted that it is difficult to experience other cultures without the atmosphere of tourism. To offset the tourism tendency, someone suggested visiting services with the knowledge that we are visiting that body of Christ. As a member of the body of Christ, therefore, part of our visit is helping us know who we are.
A couple of exercises were mentioned on these specific topics that could be helpful in any setting. One idea involved having that specific community compile its own song book through nominations from the community. The only requirement for nomination would be an explanation of how the song deepened the person’s life as a worshipper, what biblically grounded dimension the song represented, and what community characteristic would it help form. This could create a thoughtful resource, but it could also provide a means to connect songs with people in the community in a powerful way.
Another idea was a class exercise to teach students flexibility. In this exercise one student would select a short song list and bring it to class. The assignment for another student would be to take this list, change only one song, and provide the reasons why for class discussion. Ideally, this would be an exercise in submitting individual preferences for the common good.
During the morning Cindy de Jong visited our session to tell us about her summer project on college campus worship. She is researching worship on various college campuses and creating a webpage. We discussed what resources this should include to make it most beneficial; some suggestions included small group development, social justice and worship, leadership, and a snapshot of how they do what they do.
Towards the end of the morning we begin talking about Tom Long’s Testimony. We thought about the words we speak in worship and specifically a quote from the text that said the way we talk in worship affects the way we talk in the rest of our lives and vice versa. One participant said, “In worship, we learn to say things to God and each other that we would never come up with on our own.”
We closed with the blessing that is sung at the end of each of the Calvin College Sunday night LOFT services:
My friends, may you grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior.
My friends, may you grow in grace, and in the knowledge of Jesus Christ.
To God be the glory, now and forever, now and forever, amen.
To God be the glory, now and forever, now and forever, amen.
SNC 288
Leadership • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink