Resurrection Worship

I know that we are in the middle of Lent, but every Sunday is resurrection day.  Every Sunday, we suspend our fasting, and allow ourselves to celebrate the power of the resurrection in our worship.  I came across this passage from Eugene Peterson's Living the Resurrection today and thought I would share it as a meditation for all of us who plan worship on a regular basis:

Matthew gives us Mary Magdelene and a woman he names "the other Mary" making an early Sunday morning visit to the tomb in which on late Friday afternoon they had watched Joseph of Arimathea place Jesus' crucified body (see 28:1-10).  As they approach the tomb, the ground suddenly shakes under their feet - an earthquake.  This is followed by a blaze of lightening, which turns out to be an angel.  The combination of earthquake and lightening puts the Roman soldiers who are guarding this tomb out of commission.  Scarred out of their wits, they sprawl out on the ground in a dead faint.

But the two Marys stay on their feet and hear the angel address them personally with two phrases: "Do not be afraid" and "He is risen" (verses 5-6).  The angel then gives them a message to be delivered to the disciples.  They leave the site of the tomb, as ordered by the angel.  Deep in wonder and full of joy, they are off on the run to share the news with the disciples.  But then they are stopped in their tracks by a greeting: "Good morning!" (verse 9, MSG).  They hear a welcome in the greeting and fall to their knees before the resurrected Jesus.  their first response to the risen Christ was to kneel in awed reverence.  There was also an element of intimacy in that reverence, for they dared to touch and hold on to his feet: They "worshiped him" (verse 9).

The two elements together became worship.  Falling to our knees before Jesus - an act of reverence - is not in itself resurrection worship.  Touching and holding the feet of Jesus - an act of intimacy - is not in itself resurrection worship.  The acts of reverence and intimacy need each other.  The reverence needs the infusion of intimacy lest it become a cool detached aesthetic.  The intimacy needs to be suffused in reverence lest it become gushy emotion.

Reverence and intimacy.  How well do we do as worship leaders to intentionally seek to balance these two?  I must confess that I too often get up in the "What choir special have we been working on" and the "what is the chorus of month" type questions that I forget the heart of what we are called to do: bring the congregation before the LORD in reverence of God's glory, and to invite them to crawl up into the lap of our Abba, that we might be engulfed in the loving arms of our Heavenly Father.

Maybe you didn't need this reminder, but I know I do.  We cannot get so caught up in the what and how of worship that we forget the who and why.

Hanging of the Green (cont.)

I've posted an additional sample of a Hanging of the Green service on our church website.  You can access it by clicking here.  This one is based on the idea of the marriage supper of the lamb and celebrating Christmas/Advent through those lens.

Hanging of the Green

I don't know about you, but i've never been a part of a church that did a "Hanging of the Green" Service.  For those who don't know what this is, this is the service where we decorate the church for the Advent/Christmas season.  This has been a very important service in our church, involving a lot of people, as we hang wreaths, place poinsettias, put the nativity on the manger, etc.  this year, I took on the task of writing our service.  In doing so, I found that there just aren't very many resources out there for designing this particular service.  Therefore, I've decided to make ours available for anyone else that might find it helpful.  You can find it by clicking here.  It is themed around some of the names of Christ - emphasizing an answer to the question: Who is this baby in the manger that we celebrate?  I am also trying to get the script we used last year, which was written by one of our members and was based on the theme of the marriage supper of the Lamb.  It was very powerful!  Hopefully, I'll be able to post that in a future link.

Take a Moment for National Adoption Month

November is National Adoption Month.  Did you know that a child is orphaned every 18 seconds in the world?  That there are 143 million orphans in the world today?  that they will spend an average of 10 years of their life in an orphanage or in foster care if we do nothing to help?  That if only 7% of the 2 billion Christians in the world would care for the orphans, there would effectively be no more orphans?  God has led the way by adopting us into God's family.  The scriptures also tell us that pure religious that is faultless is to care for orphans and widows (James 1:27).  

In honor of national adoption month, the very least we can do is to pray for these kids.  This Sunday, we are using the following prayer, adapted from a poem/prayer by Ina Hughes.  We are doing it with two readers and the congregation's response (it should make sense when you read it).  Maybe you could use it in your church this week?

We pray for the children

who put chocolate fingers everywhere,

who like to be tickled,

who stomp in puddles and ruin their new pants,

who sneak Popsicles before supper,

who erase holes in math workbooks,

who can never find their shoes.  

And we pray for those

who stare at photographers from behind barbed wire,

who’ve never squeaked across the floor in new sneakers,

who never had crayons to count,

who are born in places we wouldn’t be caught dead,

who never go to the circus,

who live in an X-rated world.  

Lord, hear our prayer.

We pray for children

who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions,

who sleep with the dog and bury goldfish,

who give hugs in a hurry and forget their lunch money,

who cover themselves with Band-Aids and sing off-key,

who squeeze toothpaste all over the sink,

who slurp their soup.  

And we pray for those

who never get dessert,

who watch their parents watch them die,

who have no safe blanket to drag behind,

who can’t find any bread to steal,

who don’t have any rooms to clean up,

whose pictures aren’t on anybody’s dresser,

whose monsters are real.

Lord, hear our prayer.

We pray for children

who spend all their allowance before Tuesday,

who throw tantrums in the grocery store and pick at their food,

who like ghost stories,

who shove dirty clothes under the bed,

who never rinse out the tub,

who get visits from the tooth fairy,

who don't like to be kissed in front of the school,

who squirm in church and scream in the phone,

whose tears we sometimes laugh at and

whose smiles can make us cry.

And we pray for those

whose nightmares come in the daytime,

who will eat anything,

who aren't spoiled by anybody,

who go to bed hungry and cry themselves to sleep,

who live and move, but have no being.

Lord, hear our prayer.

We pray for children who want to be carried,

and for those who must be.

For those we never give up on,

and for those who never get a chance.

For those we smother with our love,

and for those who will grab the hand of

anybody kind enough to offer.

Lord, hear our prayer. Amen.

*Adapted from “We Pray for the Children” by Ina J. Hughes

The Incubator

How many people should be a part of worship of worship planning?  This is  question we started asking ourselves a little over a year ago.  We are a diverse staff: 

Pastor - grew up Independent Baptist in New Jersey

Music Minister - grew up United Methodist in Memphis/Dallas

Youth Minister - grew up Non-Denominational in Puerto Rico

Now, us city boys are serving a relatively rural church in NC.  It would come as no surprise to learn that our illustrations didn't always "work," shall we say.  After attending a worship conference a couple of years ago, I suggested that we start a "creative arts team" to help us plan in worship.  The idea had been birthed after reading a book by Bob Rognlien entitled Experiential Worship (you can read a couple of articles of Bob's summarizing the book by clicking here).

We decided to get more people involved with our worship planning, calling this group "The Incubator."

in·cu·ba·tor (ĭn'kyə-bā'tər) n.  A place or situation that permits or encourages the formation and development, as of new ideas.

We invited about 15 people in our congregation that we felt had creative talents and abilities of all types (musicians, painters, interior decorators, florists, writers, poets, technology people, children's ministry representatives, youth ministry reps., etc.) and brought them together with this assignment:

"We want to invite you to be a part of a team of people whose primary responsibility would be to dream (and dream big).  About 6 weeks before the start of a sermon series, this team would come together to brainstorm ideas about how we could enhance our worship (song selections, sanctuary decoration, use of drama or video, ways to engage the congregation in response, how to engage our children, etc.).  The sky would be the limit, as this team would not be responsible for implementing the ideas, just dreaming big."

About 4-6 weeks prior to the start of a series, the pastor will send out a list of his titles, scriptures, and main themes for all the sermons in the series (yes, this takes more work on the part of the staff to think ahead).  Then, we give the group a week or so to brainstorm on their own before coming together for a corporate brainstorming session.

We really try to create an environment where creativity can flourish - we don't judge ideas or throw them out because they are too crazy during these meetings - we just let imaginations run wild (if the best way to illustrate a sermon is to have a helicopter land in the parking lot during the service, we put that idea down).  Now later, as the staff reviews the suggestions, we obviously have to narrow down possibilities to the resources we have available.  By allowing people to think WAY outside the box, though, it gives birth to other ideas that may be more doable.

After a year of trying this, we have seen some really good results and have had some really meaningful times of worship. If you are more interested in the specifics of how we do it (the forms we send out and things like that), let me know and I would be happy to get more information to those who might find it useful.  We have found that the more people involved in this process, the better.