Transforming Worship

Planning and Leading Sunday Services as If Spiritual Formation Mattered

Rory Noland

• Publisher: IVP Formatio
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9780830841738
• Topic: Teologia e religione
• Subtopic: Pratiche e rituali cristiani

Spiritual formation is the key to the survival of our faith.There is an urgent need today for church services that are substantive and purposeful. Stigmatized by scandal, the church in North America and throughout Europe has been branded as useless and irrelevant. To stem the tide of nominal Christianity, we need to get serious about making disciples who can make other disciples.Rory Noland is a worship leader who has led in contexts ranging from megachurches to small retreat settings such as the Transforming Center with Ruth Haley Barton. Combining discipleship and worship—what Noland calls transforming worship—he offers a vision for worship as spiritual formation. We need to reclaim our worship services as a formative space, and through that we will become the light of Christ in a dark world.

BIBLICAL, HISTORICAL, AND THEOLOGICAL FOUNDATIONS OF TRANSFORMING WORSHIP

TRANSFORMING WORSHIP is not a new idea; it has biblical and historical precedence and is grounded in a sound theology of worship. In these opening chapters we’ll first investigate the biblical origins of transforming worship and glean principles that both the Old and New Testaments endorse. We will then identify a working template, again drawn from Scripture, that is not intended to be a rigid order of service but a general outline or shape for corporate worship. Chapter three showcases a New Testament model for transforming worship that clarifies who should be more of a priority on Sunday morning: believers or unbelievers. In my research for this book I kept looking for the best example of a church that conducted worship as if spiritual formation mattered. I eventually landed on the early church. So for a historical perspective, chapter four examines how those early Christians incorporated the biblical principles of worship into their Sunday services. Chapter five focuses on a theology of the sacred and seeks to answer important questions about sacramentality. How should Protestants view sacred symbols and religious rituals? Is there a philosophy of the sacred—of sacramentality—that is appropriate for the twenty-first century? What do symbology, ritual, and sacramentality have to do with modern worship? The biblical, historical, and theological perspectives not only provide a firm foundation for transforming worship, but they also enhance our vision of what it looks like and entails.

1

IT ALL STARTED AT SINAI

FOR THE LAST SEVERAL YEARS I have served as a consultant for churches seeking to improve the overall worship experience at their Sunday services. Though situations vary, churches typically bring me in to help them get from point A to point B. I put it that way because I’ve found that church leaders always have an idea of what point B looks like. In other words, they have a vision, an idea of what they want to see happen every Sunday at their church. If I’ve learned one thing from my experience doing church work, it’s that everyone has a picture in their mind of what constitutes real or true worship. Some of our preconceived notions of worship are based on the church we grew up in or one we previously attended. We’re comfortable with a certain style of worship simply because we’re used to it; it’s familiar to us. Some are attracted to a particular type of music; they can’t engage unless the music is “right.” Others have a notion of worship derived from a megachurch they visited or a conference they attended that featured a professional quality worship band.

I can’t help but notice that most everyone’s concept of worship, including my own, mirrors our personal experience and preferences. But what about God? What does God think about worship? We assume that if the worship feels right to us, it must feel right to God, which is presumptuous. How do we know for sure how God feels about our particular brand of worship? Does God have a favorite style of music? Is the style of music even important to God?

Fortunately, God has revealed in his Word how he desires to be worshiped, and, surprisingly, it has little if anything to do with music. Exodus 1–15 presents the story of God rescuing the Israelites from slavery in Egypt. This epic drama culminated in a meeting between God and his chosen people at Mount Sinai, during which God prescribed how he desires to be worshiped. In this chapter we will explore the foundational principles of corporate worship gleaned from Israel’s encounter with God atop Mount Sinai and assess how to apply those principles to modern worship.

SINAI SCHOOL OF WORSHIP

We assume that if the worship feels right to us, it must feel right to God, which is presumptuous.

As recorded in Exodus 3, Moses was tending sheep at Mount Sinai when God spoke to him through a burning bush and revealed his plan to rescue Israel from slavery. God promised Moses that after delivering his people he would bring them to the very spot where Moses was standing, specifically so they could worship God (Exodus 3:12; 7:16).

Fast forward several years to the same location. God has led Israel out of Egypt and directed them to Mount Sinai, just as he promised (Exodus 19–32). Freed from the shackles of slavery, the people were now free to worship. But before they could do so, God established his covenant with them and offered instructions concerning how he wants to be worshiped. After all, Israel had been entrenched in a pagan society for over four hundred years; judging from their actions in the desert, they no longer consistently reflected the piety of their faith tradition. For example, their constant complaining throughout their sojourn demonstrated a blatant lack of trust in God, especially in light of all the miracles he performed to rescue them. The moaning and griping were pervasive; Scripture notes the frequency with which the entire community grumbled against Moses and Aaron (Exodus 16:2, 8; 17:2-4, 7). The most disgruntled among them longed for the comforts of Egypt even if it meant returning to slavery (Exodus 14:11-12; 16:3), which discloses an ignorance of their true identity. They were a nation destined for greatness, who, according to the Abrahamic covenant, would eventually bless all the peoples of the earth (Genesis 12:1-3; 15:1-5; 17:1-8).

The Exodus account contains no indication that the people worshiped together during their six-week sojourn to Sinai. Except for a brief praise song they sang on the shores of the Red Sea (Exodus 15), the narrative mentions no regular worship observances. Apparently, gathered worship did not play a vital role in the ongoing life of the community. The Israelites had been subjected to the prevailing Egyptian culture for so long they had formed an incomplete concept of God, lost their identity as God’s chosen, covenant people, and had no established routine for gathered worship.

At Mount Sinai, God was now calling these former slaves to be his treasured possession, a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation (Exodus 19:5-6). In other words God was inviting them to be his specially chosen people and to partner with him in his global mission to redeem his fallen creation. God brought Israel to Sinai for what Samuel Balentine portrays as a sabbath experience—a furlough that began during the seventh week of the exodus, which lasted for eleven months (Numbers 10:11), and afforded the Israelites an extended time of deliberation to reflect on the implications of their covenant relationship with God. Because the concept of covenant plays a vital role in worship theology, a brief analysis of a typical Old Testament covenant is in order.

Covenants in antiquity. In the ancient world a covenant was a treaty or agreement between two parties; typically one party was superior to the other. For example, a powerful king, nation, or tribe would enter into an official agreement with a weaker one. The stronger ruler was often referred to as “lord,” the weaker one as “servant.” The terms of the covenant bound the lord to protect the servant who in turn pledged unwavering allegiance to the lord, which meant going to war against the lord’s enemies as well as paying tribute to his authority. Alliances formed by a covenant, therefore, were politically and socially motivated.

A covenant transaction adhered to a standard protocol that began with a brief narrative chronicling the participants’ shared history. Terms of the agreement were then spelled out, the benefits, obligations, and responsibilities for both parties were clearly indicated. Punitive measures for treaty violations were also detailed. A physical sign, such as a scar, was often used to seal the agreement, and the lesser king or nation would be given a new name indicating that they were now owned, in a sense, by their new leader. Finally, the covenant was captured and preserved in a document that served to remind both parties of their pact.

Covenants in antiquity were typically ratified in a special ceremony that incorporated some type of blood sacrifice. Participants were either sprinkled with the blood of a sacrificial animal or they would walk between pieces of the animal that had been cut up for the occasion, a ritual that communicated “May the gods cut me to pieces, should I violate the terms of this treaty.” Covenant partners sometimes shared a meal to ratify the pact. Although God also entered into covenants with Noah (Genesis 9:1-17), Abraham (Genesis 12:2-3; 15; 17:1-22), and David (2 Samuel 7:11-16), it was the agreement God initiated with Moses that profoundly influenced Israel’s approach to worship.

Sinai worship service. The ratification of the Mosaic covenant, recorded in Exodus 24, occurred in the context of a worship service. God, always the initiator in the human-divine relationship, summoned Moses so the Lord and he could meet before Moses met with the people (Exodus 24:1). Then Moses called the Israelites together and, following God’s previous orders (Exodus 21–23), began to share with them all the words that God spoke to him atop Mount Sinai (Exodus 24:3). What the text summarizes in one verse comprises four chapters of the book of Exodus (20–23). In what must have been a lengthy sermon, Moses taught the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:1-17) and presented the terms of Israel’s covenant agreement with God, known subsequently as the Book of the Covenant (Exodus 20:22–23:33). Interestingly, the Book of the Covenant begins and ends with explicit instructions about worship: Exodus 20:22-26 calls for God’s faithful to offer sacrifices on an altar; Exodus 23:10-12 commands them to observe weekly Sabbath. This passage also includes three festivals that God instructed them to observe annually—Passover, the Festival of Harvest, and the Festival of Ingathering (Exodus 23:14-19). Upon hearing God’s instructions the congregation responded by vowing to obey God’s laws (Exodus 24:3). The Sinai sermon, therefore, was substantive, was received as the word of God for his people, and elicited a response from them as well.

When Moses finished delivering God’s word, he built an altar and offered sacrifices, both of which were activities God previously instructed him to do (Exodus 24:4-5). As part of the sacrificial ritual, Moses sprinkled the people with blood from the sacrificial oxen (Exodus 24:8), which, following ancient custom, bound covenant partners together in mutual loyalty. Therefore, Israel’s ritual of animal sacrifice, the centerpiece of Old Testament worship, was inaugurated at Mount Sinai as an expression of their loyalty and commitment to God. The ceremony climaxed with Moses leading Israel’s seventy elders up Mount Sinai to commune with God as God had earlier prescribed (Exodus 24:1, 9-11). Atop Sinai, Israel’s leaders “saw God, and they ate and drank” (Exodus 24:11). They encountered God and shared a meal in his presence. Though Israel emerged from slavery as a ragtag tribe without a cogent religious identity and with no compelling vision for worship, they left Sinai for the Promised Land as what Balentine characterizes as both a covenant community as well as a worshiping community. Indeed, God had perso...