Let all things be done decently and in order - ahhhhh!

Recently I've been considering our worship time together. It "seems" like too many of us are just going through the motions. Well actually, that's probably painting the picture to look a little nicer than it probably is. What I should say, while most of us are going through the motions, some are not motioning at all. A couple of Sunday's ago while the congregation was standing and singing together, I noticed a man was sitting down and reading the bulletin. On a bench behind him, a parent was sitting down singing while her two teenage kids sent text-messages. When did we get to the point where we come together to worship our Creator to now where it seems like we come to the building to check off our religious requirements sheet for the week? I think a lot of this is because hearts are hard and no longer living a life of love as a follower of Jesus. Where instead, those hearts that once flamed brightly are relegated to the life of a religious drone.

All that aside, I think the Church leaders bear some responsibility for this. Take for instance our worship service. It is completely scripted, planned and even timed. We do the exact same thing every week in the exact same order. We sing the same number of songs in the same order and we take the Communion at the same point - every week, week after week. All with the effort of getting through it all so that we can get to the sermon, so the preacher can get done quicker, so we can be done right at one hour. And we do it all in the name of "letting all things be done decently and in order" (1 Cor. 14:40). It kind of makes we want to go into a closed room and yell - "that's not what Paul was talking about!!!"

I came across this blog from Timothy Archer. Take a look at it.

"C.S. Lewis was no fan of change within worship services. He wrote, “Every service is a structure of acts and words through which we receive a sacrament, or repent, or supplicate, or adore. And it enables us to do these things best—if you like it, it ‘works’ best—when, through long familiarity, we don’t have to think about it.…But every novelty prevents this. It fixes our attention on the service itself…” He goes on to quote an unnamed source that said, “I wish they’d remember that the charge to Peter was Feed my sheep; not Try experiments on my rats, or even Teach my performing dogs new tricks.” (The Joyful Christian, pp. 80-81)

Personally, though I highly esteem Lewis as a thinker and a writer, I don’t agree with his views on familiarity in worship. I find that familiarity often breeds unthinking repetition. It becomes too easy to “go through the motions,” without being aware of what we’re doing or why. We say things without even thinking what they mean. We sing without being aware of who we’re singing to (is it a song of encouragement to my brothers or a song of worship to God?). We instinctively reach for our checkbook while sipping the homogenized grape juice from the plastic cup.

I think that we need change at times if only to make us aware of what we’re doing. My high school choir director used to say, “A rut is just a grave with both ends knocked out.” We need to be conscious of the forms of what we’re doing and the meanings behind those forms. What do you find to be true? Is change a distraction or a call to awareness? Is routine an aid to worship or a hindrance to our worshiping with our minds as well as our actions?"

Kind of makes you think.