Colourful Dreamer

As I said in my previous posting we did something a little different yesterday at church. Hence no sermon notes this week. And then last night we held a Taizé service based around the Stations of the Cross. Our previous Taizé service had nearly 20 attend. Last night we got to 5, eventually. My wife, who had done most of the work wondered before we started, if we just flag what was organised and if we just sing some Taizé   songs. I said no, let’s do it even if there are only 3 here, which there were at that point. This caused me to reflect on my approach to preaching and to worship. Both come out of my youth ministry days, and in particular Dr Bob Mayo at the first international youth ministry conference and the work of Pete Ward. At the conference Bob’s suggested that in evangelism, instead of trying to explain the scripture stories we need to tell them and then shut up. We don’t need to explain them, we don’t need to help people work out what they are about. Just let...

I was at a service a couple of months ago. The leading musician, or "worship leader" welcomed God to the service at the end of one of the initial set of songs. I have heard this phrase before, and maybe have used it. But what struck me this time was, who are we to welcome God to worship? Isn't worship something God invites us into, and welcomes us to? Isn't God at the center of worship? When we welcome God, suddenly we are the center of the act of worship. We call the shots. It becomes about us!!! and not about God. And then I listened to the songs, and while they talked about how great God is, they all pretty much described God in relationship to the central figures of us. I was surprised by all this, and shocked. It reinforced for me one of the the things I wrote about in my dissertation, that those who have responsibility for leading and organizing worship (in its fullest meaning and not just singing praise songs) need to be biblically and theologically literate, a...