Like does not equal Good

Today in class I started to put something together in my head. I tend to be a pretty intolerant person when it comes to personal taste. Maybe it was all the years of dating Manny, but if I don’t like something, I don’t like it. End of story. Does that mean the art/music is crap or useless or pointless or should be burned at the bottom of a volcano? Course not! Someone else might like it and why should I dictate what everyone will like.

On a different level, there is what I think as bad music/art/movies/etc. I don’t usually have strong opinions about art because I know little about it. Music, on the other hand, I have very specific ideas on what makes music good or bad. It should be noted that I do like bad music and I do dislike good music. Like does not always equal good.

This distinction became very clear for me when I was the worship director at St Marks, although in a very different way. What I like in a worship service and what I don’t like in a worship service has to do with my personal taste and personal theology. I don’t like guitars and drums and five-chord progressions. I don’t like sing-a-longs or projection screens. I don’t like these modern churches built to look like a tree or a fish or a tomb. But I don’t think any of these things are bad, and I know there are people in the world who like those settings. I just don’t.

The temptation as a worship leader (or really leader of anything) is to do only the things you like. I’m in charge, I pick the music, therefore we will do only what I like to do. But that is not what being a worship leader is about. There is a bit of majority rules and democratic decision making that takes place. There were hymns that I really couldn’t stand out of the Lutheran hymnal. But they were special to the church members, and an important piece of worship to them. So as the leader, I made an effort to learn those hymns and use them. They were not all bad hymns; they were not heretical. So I let them be. Even if they had been bad hymns (and a few really are), there was nothing heretical them and therefore I could not in good faith omit them from the church’s diet. Now if I had come across something heretical, or even something with only a smidgen of common grace, I would have fought to remove it. As a leader, that is my responsibility. To make sure the people aren’t being fed poison.

Now lets say I’m at a different church now – like PCRC, where I’m going now. They use more contemporary forms of worship alongside the more traditional means. Its a pretty good mix and blended pretty well. I’m giving the contemporary mediums my best effort, especially when I’ve been asked to play piano. I can’t stand them. I can’t worship. I just don’t like them. I know some people do and that’s great. There is even some good stuff in there. But I just don’t like it.

So maybe its a really good thing I didn’t get the job at PCRC. I can leave after this year. Although maybe I need to stay. I asked this question of Paul today when I dropped him off. As worship leaders, we are called to lead what the congregation wants. Our personal tastes will always color what we choose to do and not do, but its not all about us. Its about the church as a community. So if a church is going in a direction of wanting to be more and more contemporary, but as a worship director, I don’t like that medium, what is my obligation? To stay and lead my church to the best of my abilities in something I don’t enjoy and can’t worship within? Or to part in faith and love? Find another place where I fit in?

This is the basis for every church struggling with what is known as the "worship wars." Half the church wants the drums up front. Half the church wants nothing but organ. In some cases, a blending takes place, and both are used. But its not always well done. Something always suffers. In some cases, churches split or members leave. In more cases, people dig in their heels, start shouting and all of a sudden the term "worship wars" isn’t so far-fetched. This is the reality of the landscape of the career I’m going into. I know this, because its always been the landscape. The old is always railing against the new. Whether it be language or music or space or paint jobs or liturgy. So what is the correct thing to do?

Do you stay with the church that is not doing what you want? Or do you leave to find something that you relate to better? Do you stamp your feet and demand things are done my way? Or do you open yourself up to something new? Where is the line? Where is the bending and where is the breaking point?

All these questions and problems about worship seem to merely generate more questions and problems.

So lets get basic….

What is worship? What is the church? Are they mutually exclusive? Are they completely separate entities?

Neither worship nor the church are new ideas. So to answer this question, I need to see what history can tell us. Why were they started originally? What did they do? What was worship and what was church? Was there a difference?

I know a little of how it started. Christians meeting in secret to share the stories of Jesus and the letters of the Apostles. To share their encounters and to pray. But didn’t worship start before 2000 years ago? Worship, I’m starting to believe, started with the Israelites building the Ark of the Covenant and the tabernacle. This was done during the wandering in the desert, so the whole thing was movable. How did we get from there to Solomon’s temple to secret home churches in Rome 70AD to St Peter’s Basilica to Notre Dame and York Minster to the Crystal Cathedral in California?  There is an evolution and process that took worship from the desert to the Crystal Cathedral.  I believe its a process that is still ongoing, and we’re all just stepping into the tide.

I have a book I need to order and read and start figuring out.  Then I need to start figuring out how I’m going to make a living off doing this!