I just finished a paper on Luther and his hymns. I think the thing about Luther that is ammusing is the view of the reformation in the sense that the worship and liturgies of the church were all taken away from the people and instead performed at the altar by the ministers and the choir.
While researching and reading, I laughed at the correlation of the church today and how we are in desperate need for a reformation of some kind within our church. The services are very performance oriented in churches who have the money to buy cool backgrounds for their powerpoint slides, and the services in churches who don't have money to buy all the bells and whistles strive to meet the standards of excellence that the bigger brother across town had set up.
I laugh earlier, but it makes me sad and upset that people's minds work in these ways to bring the worship to a point where somebody can come to church and talk of the "great worship" instead of meeting or experiencing God. Even at mid-week "communion" services, people are more moved by the music than a stirring of God in their thoughts and hearts. These services had also become a show. Once going in with the purest intentions possible, now instead of worshipping God through rememberance we look at setlists and service orders and try to figure out where we can place the taking of the elements of which this service was intended for in the first place instead of revolving everything around the communion itself.
And then, we also make communion such a personal thing by seperating the bread for people so that they can go off in a corner and hide as they consume Christ. When I think Communion, I think community. Something that we experience together - same bread, same cup. This is my traditional fascination coming out in me, but I think that it is something that could be practiced whether in a church of 20 or 2000. Christ said "eat me" and "have a drink on me" in rememberance of him. But he told all of his disciples and they did it together, not individually.
I did this in one of my classes, where we served communion to each other instead of our prof giving us the elements. It was crazy having the person on my left, who wasn't a pastor by title, giving the elements to me and taking them, and then turning to my right and giving the elements to that person. So on and so on throughout the room hearing the words, "The Body and Blood of CHrist for you...". Imagine hearing this 20-100+ times in your congregation's communion service rather than hearing the band playing, "amazing love", "the wonderous cross", or "insert cliche communion song here". Surreal yet awkward. Counter Cultural - the way we christians are supposed to be.
Music I'm listening to: This week I've decided to select a bunch of CD's and listen to them throughout the week. Here is my week's list.
Joss Stone - Soul Sessions
Television - Marquee Moon
Ben Harper - Live from Mars (Disc 2)
Bob Dylan - Blonde on Blonde
Rage Against the Machine - Evil Empire
Chris Issak - Baja Sessions
Lyfe Jennings - Lyfe 268-192
The Cure - Galore (The Singles 1987-1997)
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2 comments:
ron good choice of music.
i am intrueged on your ideas of worship and comuniun. tell me more.
also did you know i am gone i live in p-town now, yes thats portland. so drp me a line if you ever feel so inclined.
I think it's the same when we have times of extended worship (typically musical worship),and many go off to the corners to be alone in worship. We are always so self-centered in our worship, looking for a personal experience of God when we should be coming together to corporately worship Him. Of course, if we start doing things like serving one another communion, we may have to come to terms with the fact that we don't even know our brothers and sisters; not even their names! Then we'd have to admit that the church really is a whore; the bride of Christ desecrated...
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