exchanged living.

Gathering Around Our Story

There is a form of worship design that has been followed in the church for a long time that embodies the pattern of revelation and response well. This form involves four distinct focuses: gathering, revelation, response, and sending. 

The opening action of gathering or coming together, in a way, speaks already of the work of God: he has done something that brings us all into this place for a specific reason. We gather as a response, but we also gather to remember and re-tell this reason. It orients who we are and what we are to be about.

We gather because God has already revealed himself to the world in Jesus Christ; we gather as people who have seen, but in part, and who seek to see more fully. We gather because what we have seen in Jesus Christ is beautiful and worthy of worship. We gather because when we saw Him, we were transformed by Him, and we also became more aware of our deep need to continue to be changed. 

In this line of thinking, then, worship design must see the gathering as the doorway into the continuing pattern of revelation-response.  The gathering states three really important things to those coming to worship:

1. God is here. 
2. You are welcomed here by God. 
3. We are welcomed here together by God, and so we welcome one another.

Good worship design immediately highlights the reality of God’s presence and the invitation to all to participate in this reality together.  This is why the story of salvation must become central to worship design: it tells us of the reality of what God has done to make a way for all to participate fully in this reality everyday. The story of Christ reminds us that the transformative presence of God has been made ours through his sacrifice, and the power of his life is ours through his resurrection and given Spirit.  

So we gather, then we remember together the truth of what God has done by re-telling the story of Jesus. The Gospel is the key to revelation, and in the next section, we begin to re-tell the story of salvation. 

Seeing and Singing: A Pattern in Worship Design

Let’s take this pattern of seeing and singing and flesh it out a bit. 

Worship is an action that begins with God, not us. Humanity did not exist without the creative Word of God, and it has always been God who has initiated relationship with us. Our response to God is just that: a reaction to the revelation of God. We see - we sing. This pattern is clearly seen throughout Scripture. It builds a cycle of sorts; as people journey with God, he continues his revelation of Himself, and as his faithfulness and salvation is seen, the journeying people (along with those who see and join into the journey) become a worshipping people.  

The cycle looks like this:

revelation->response->revelation->response->revelation…etc…

And worship design centers on bringing people into this cycle, that they may live lives as worshippers of God in all things. 

The entrance into this cycle is not response; it is revelation. So let’s keep this really simple: if worship starts with seeing God, good worship design builds off of how God has already been seen most clearly. And we believe, 

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (Col 1:15-17)

Worship Design, then, must begin with the goal of lifting up the clear revelation of God in the person of Jesus Christ; as we lift him up, he will draw everyone to himself. There are historical practices that have been used to help bring people into this cycle of seeing and responding. We’ll talk about the first element next time. 

Question for Thought: How can the things we say and do in the corporate gathering better position people to see? 

Dethroning Creativity in Worship

There is another commonly used method of worship design that deserves some discussion: Constance Cherry calls it the “white board” approach to worship design. The idea behind it is that we should approach the worship gathering with a blank slate every time we design, and let the text and the creativity of the designers shape something new for the church to experience. Often what is championed here is the innovative and novel; the “cutting edge” of worship is often birthed in this setting, and those who keep bringing fresh experiences to the church are seen as successful worship designers. 

Creativity is interwoven into our fabric; I would argue that the drive to create roots in the image of God that we bear as humans, and bringing this creativity into the sphere of worship is absolutely right and necessary. However, I don’t think that worship design driven primarily by the innovative and creativity of the designers will bear much fruit, especially in the long run. Here’s why:

When worship design hinges on creativity, the practice and reach of worship depends on how well others facilitate my experience of worship, not on an actual encounter with the Triune God. Think about what this practice assumes: the more creative the experience, the better the worship experience for the people. The less creative, the more people disconnect from worship. Is this logic true? We must be careful not to champion a design strategy that requires great creative strides but very little exchange between Creator and created. 

This model also positions the body of Christ as the audience of an experience, not participants in the larger story of God. They become consumers of sorts; like the audience of a rock show or a theater productions. This is not to say that they don’t participate in some way- people participate when they see Blue Man Group, but ultimately they are there to consume, not be transformed. People can see and appreciate and “get” the creative thrust of a worship experience and still leave having experienced more catharsis than transformation, and that’s dangerous. They can leave full, but not filled. 

Alan Hirsch said it well at a conference I attended, “If we’re offering church as a consumer product, don’t be surprised when people treat it like one” 

So here’s another worship design question: How can we structure our gatherings in a way that moves past entertainment or the discussion of meaningful subject matter and towards true spiritual transformation?

Moving Past the Mind in Worship

Yesterday, I posted a video to highlight an important idea for those who design the corporate worship time of the local church: the way we communicate often says as much, if not more, than what we communicate. For those who help design corporate worship gatherings, we must regularly be thinking about the actions of worship with as much diligence as we do about the message of worship. Part of the reason why this is so important is because worship is a response rooted in our whole being, not just our minds. 

Take one of the common methods of designing worship: the thematic approach. This approach takes a theme, a metaphor, or a central idea and seeks to connect every activity in the worship experience to it somehow. If we are talking about “God as our Liberator”, everything in the service would be chosen and structured in order to help people “get it”. The goal becomes facilitating some sort of epiphany about the theme, and a successful gathering time, then, would mean than many left with a firm grasp of this theme.

Look at what this approach does, though: it makes the aim of a worship gathering a transfer of information. If they understand, they have worshipped. In all reality, the work of the cross or the Spirit are not particularly needed for this gathering to be successful; all we really need is for the message to be understood. The actions of both the individual and the corporate body are pushed to the margin, and we end up with worship looking more like a lecture series than a call to cruciform life together. 

Perhaps this question can help us find some anchoring points as we look at what we do and say in worship: Can our gathering function without Divine (Inter)Action and still be perceived as successful? 

What is Worship Design?

I spent the past week in Orlando attending a class/conference at Asbury Theological Seminary. As I met a number of my classmates, one of the common questions we began our conversations with was about what we did (or wanted to do) in the context of ministry. In three different conversations, I described my primary job as one of a worship designer, and in all three conversations I was asked what that meant. 

Worship design was a new term to me when I first encountered it three years ago; while the practice of worship design is certainly not new to the church, the name “worship design” helped me put some handles on the practice and gave me a way to study and learn about it more deeply. In its essence, worship design is the intentional structuring of the elements that comprise a corporate gathering of worship in the church. A worship designer, then, makes choices that inform the content, the actions, and the directions of worship in the setting. 

As weird as it is to admit, I had never given much thought to how all of the elements of a worship service function together. I had lead worship gatherings in one way or another for years, but I had never taken the time to stop and ask why we were doing what we were doing, or taken the time to think about how we worship and what that says about why and Who we worship. 

Before I keep going, I have a question, and I’d love to hear from you on it: when it comes to the corporate worship gathering, what are the essential elements of a worship service?