It's very much in that spirit that this piece is intended. This is my opinion; there are other opinions out there, and they are all to be respected. I welcome challenge to my thinking and am open to change; equally I would hope that by putting my case forward it would also challenge some of the ideas and opinions that others have formed.
So back to that opening sentence; the two most important things in life are choosing to live for God, and actually living for God. I don't believe that worship and evangelism are separate - quite the opposite in fact. The particular aspect of worship that fires me up the most is its ability to enable people to access God, to banish foolish stereotypes about God and Christianity being old fashioned or irrelevant, and to help people to realise that God is alive and relevant today, in the here and now. So I have a few principles that I believe apply to worship:
- Our worship should not encourage the mistaken view that Christianity is about a fuddy duddy, old fashioned ritual based set of traditions as opposed to a living, vibrant, current relationship with a real person who is alive today and engaged in our culture
- We should address God in a way that is respectful, but also allows for intimacy; a way which demonstrates our patriotism to his kingdom but that doesn't patronise the king
- Our worship should not put up barriers that impede people's understanding of what's going on or prevent them from being actively involved themselves
- Our worship should help to demonstrate that God is alive and relevant today to everyone
- Principles should be applied consistently, without picking and choosing when and where they
1. Not encouraging the "old fashioned" stereotype
In Britain the media love to spread the notion that Christianity is old fashioned and based on little more than a set of historic, traditional rituals. They like to propagate the idea that only traditional pipe organ music with archaic lyrics should be sung in church, and that any congregation embracing anything more up to date are a bunch of happy clappy weirdos. This perception of Christianity is of course completely and utterly false, but like a lot of urban myths it has become deeply ingrained in our society's psyche.
When the church meets it shouldn't be like a period drama or one of those groups that re-enact battle scenes at ancient monuments, but an experience that reflects the style of and is engaging to the society and culture in which we live today. Christianity is not about keeping old traditions alive but about a real, current relationship.
It can be a very difficult task for a Christian to demonstrate to his non Christian friends that actually God, and the church, are very much in the world today and very much relevant to it, and to them on a personal level. To reach the stage where that friend accepts an invitation to a church gathering can take monumental effort. If just one small part of that gathering only serves to encourage the idea that Christianity is out of date and out of touch, then it can be the undoing of months and years of effort, and only further propagates the myth that we are working hard to destroy.
2. We don't need a special language to address God
There are some parts of God's family where there exists a belief that addressing God in archaic terms is somehow a sign of respect and reverence. Of course we should respect and revere God, but we can express that in everyday language. He knows our innermost thoughts, he sees us naked; we don't need to put on special clothes or use special words to in order enter God's presence, personally or corporately.
When someone meets royalty, there is a certain etiquette involved. You address the Queen in a certain way (first "your majesty" and thereafter "ma'am" - pronounced "mam" not "marm") but you don't have to suddenly change the modern form of words to some ancient way of speaking. You don't suddenly suffix every verb with "-eth", change "you" to "thee" or "thou", "your" to "thy" and so on. I suspect if you addressed the Queen that way she would look at you with a somewhat bemused look on her face. The thoughts "what an idiot" might pass through her mind - such things impede communication, aren't particularly respectful and just make the speaker look a tad silly. It also sends a message that her majesty wouldn't understand you if you just spoke normally to her, or that you believe doing so would not be fitting for her ears to hear. That of course is simply not the case, and it's even less the case with God.
"Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."Jesus says we should worship "in spirit and in truth". "In truth" means honestly; not putting on special airs and graces, but instead being humble, open and honest before God. Putting on a show of reverence by using silly old words that fell out of contemporary use decades if not centuries ago does not tick that box. True reverence, true respect, is an attitude of the heart, not a an act of tongue-tying linguistic trickery.
Jesus (John 4:23-24)
3. We shouldn't make it harder for the "unchurched" to access church
We want people to come to church. So why would we make conscious choices that put them off, or make it harder for those who aren't used to attending church to understand what's going on and take part in it, for no particular reason other than to uphold ancient traditions?
Now, brothers, if I come to you and speak in tongues, what good will I be to you, unless I bring you some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or word of instruction? Even in the case of lifeless things that make sounds, such as the flute or harp, how will anyone know what tune is being played unless there is a distinction in the notes? Again, if the trumpet does not sound a clear call, who will get ready for battle? So it is with you. Unless you speak intelligible words with your tongue, how will anyone know what you are saying? You will just be speaking into the air. Undoubtedly there are all sorts of languages in the world, yet none of them is without meaning. If then I do not grasp the meaning of what someone is saying, I am a foreigner to the speaker, and he is a foreigner to me. So it is with you. Since you are eager to have spiritual gifts, try to excel in gifts that build up the church.Paul is talking about speaking in tongues here but he is actually imparting a universal principle, not something specific to speaking in tongues: that we should strive to make our worship accessible to those from outside of our usual congregation. "If then I do not grasp the meaning of what someone is saying, I am a foreigner to the speaker, and he is a foreigner to me." - it couldn't be much clearer. Except for scholars of Shakespeare and those brought up in traditional church settings, Old English is a foreign language that has very little relevance to modern British culture. If we want modern Britons to attend, understand, and participate in our activities, we must embrace today's language and dispense with the "thees and thous".
Paul (1 Corinthians 14:6-12)
4. Our worship should be culturally relevant
An accusation often levelled at modern Christians is that we pick and choose which parts of the Bible we embrace and heed. This usually stems from a misunderstanding of two important things - firstly that when Jesus came he fulfilled the law, and set his people free from many of the rituals and practices that were the norm up to that point; and secondly that the perception interpretation of some passages, particularly some of Paul's writings, has changed from a black-and-white literal view to an examination of what he was communicating while acknowledging he was doing so in a different cultural and societal setting. So there's much in Paul's letters about who should and shouldn't wear hats when worshipping God, and when (and whether) women should speak during church gatherings, that are not approached in a literal way in most modern churches. But we still believe that the Bible is God's word, and that Paul's letters are a part of that. Which means that we need to not ignore what Paul wrote, but to understand what the message is that we need to heed today.
The chapter I quoted from above, 1 Corinthians 14, contains some of the more contentious instructions:
Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.This of course was at a time when women received no education at all; they were ignorant of what was going on because of the culture they lived in, and were therefore full of questions which interrupted the flow of proceedings, so Paul's instructions do make some sense in that context but we don't apply that particular instruction literally today. But does that mean we can just ignore the things that Paul says in this chapter, which are all about how the church should conduct worship in the context of its culture? Well, no:
Paul (1 Corinthians 14:34-35)
If anybody thinks he is a prophet or spiritually gifted, let him acknowledge that what I am writing to you is the Lord's command. If he ignores this, he himself will be ignored.Strong stuff indeed. So we cannot ignore what Paul is getting at in this chapter; and what Paul is fundamentally doing throughout 1 Corinthians 14 is explaining the etiquette, customs and style of the culture of the time, and stating again and again that the church should embrace those things. There are caveats of course; the city of Corinth was famous for its sexual immorality and earlier in this letter Paul warns the church strongly against engaging in those practices - so cultural relevance in worship does not mean surrendering our morality or "giving in" to the pressures in our modern world to do things we know are contrary to God's will. But it does mean that if a certain style of music, dance, fashion or visual art is popular in our culture and doesn't impede others from getting close to God, then let's have it in church. So... when was the last time a book full of "thees and thous" won the Booker prize (or whatever it's called these days!), or a song with lyrics full of "thees and thous" topped the singles charts? Can't remember one? My point exactly.
Paul (1 Corinthians 14:37-38)
5. If we can change musical style, why not linguistic style too?
Now don't misunderstand me; I love old hymns and songs. There's a lot of value in them, some brilliant tunes and lyrics, and many of them are quite adaptable and can be altered ever so slightly to bring them up to date as far as style and cultural relevance are concerned. It frequently happens; many old hymns can be played in a much more modern style than the historical pipe organ dirge of yesteryear permitted, and in some cases music for some classic hymns has been rewritten completely from scratch. This is all good stuff, but there are a surprising number of people who are more than comfortable with experimenting and altering the music, whether that's just in terms of style or as a wholesale makeover, but fiercely protective of the original lyrics - even if those lyrics can be translated really easily into modern English without any loss of meaning or impact.
That irks me; if the principle of bringing a song up to date is sound, then it applies as much to the linguistic style as it does to the musical style. What's wrong with singing "how great you are" instead of "how great thou art" other than the fact that a selection of people - those who have been in the church a while - are more used to singing the latter? Worship isn't about being comfortable, and doing what we've always done. If we truly want to progress to another level of worship, one that is genuinely accessible to today's British culture, one which doesn't reinforce incorrect stereotypes, and one which doesn't put up man-made barriers between ourselves and God, then such a tiny step outside of one's comfort zone is surely something we can deal with.
I mentioned above the frequent criticism of Christians that we apparently pick and choose which bits of the Bible we apply, and which bits of our lives we apply them to. It's vital that we answer such criticism not by arguing against it but by demonstrating its untruth with our actions and decisions. If, then, we apply the principle of modernising worship for the reasons I've outlined but apply it just to music and not to lyrics, or indeed other areas of worship, then we simply play into the hands of those levelling that criticism at us. After all, for many of the songs in question, it's not as if the lyrics we sing today are exactly what was originally written (see the Wikipedia article on How Great Thou Art, for example) so what's the problem with performing a further minor tweak?
Conclusion
I began this piece with the qualification that this is my opinion, that other opinions exist, and I'm happy to engage in discussion on this very important (to me, at least) subject. But I hope that I've demonstrated that this is about more than simple personal preference; it's not a case of "I like this style, you like that style, let's agree to disagree" but there's something more fundamental in this: it's about enabling people to access worship, it's about challenging false stereotypes, it's about being honest with God, it's about being relevant to the society we live in, and it's about being consistent in our application of principles and values.
That said, I do need to qualify this some more, because I haven't addressed the subject of the target audience. The target audience for my worship is God; therefore for me to address him as "thee" or "thou" in my worship would be incongruous, because that's not how I speak. But there are people out there who have lived long lives and been brought up in ultra-traditional churches, who would really struggle to engage in any style of worship that wasn't the pipe-organ-hymns-with-archaic-lyrics style. So when I facilitate worship in retirement homes and the like I don't consider for a moment that we should update the lyrics of their favourite old hymns, because they can worship God more effectively with those old words. But the same songs, the same style, in a different context, could be a complete disaster of language barriers and alien musical styles. So while God is the ultimate audience of all worship, there is something to be said for ensuring worship is not just relevant to our culture at last, but occasionally specifically tailored to a particular subculture that we may be serving at a particular time.
So if a church decides that it's purpose and strategy is to serve the elderly that are already steeped in (very) traditional Christianity, then clearly "thees and thous" are in order. But if a church decides that it wants to be relevant to today's culture at large, or to any other particular demographic, then I think what I've said above stands; "thee" and "thou" are foreign words to the majority, so we serve the majority best by not using them where perfectly clear and equivalent modern alternatives would do the same job.
