Share this Digg Del.icio.us Reddit StumbleUpon Slashdot Furl Yahoo Technorati Newsvine Googlize this Blinklist Facebook Wikio Print E-mail

“The Maintenance of Divine Worship.” At first blush, those words cause some Presbyterians to fantasize elaborate organ preludes, choir processions, and “that voice” coming from the great pulpit.  But, in an era plagued by the unfortunately named “worship wars” and a culture where Jesus’ followers are constantly challenged to proclaim the hope, beauty, promise, and joy of Jesus Christ, some of the most conscientious “maintainers” of “divine worship” are carefully and lovingly re-clothing the historic patterns and texts of Christian worship to speak to people who have either been alienated from the “church we all know” or have yet to have an authentic experience of Jesus’ followers expressing their love for our Lord.

Here are some insights from two of our denomination’s finest young worship leaders, Andy Gathman, Director of Contemporary Worship and Worship Support at Central Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, MD, and Jon Abel, 1105 Worship Leader at Highland Park Presbyterian Church, Dallas, TX.   Both of these men will be among the leaders of PFR’s 2010 Christian Life Conference, July 3-6 in Montreat, NC.

Q:    At its best, what is the Church called to be?

Andy: I just finished reading NT Wright’s book, Simply Christian. He speaks of our culture as hearing the “echoes of God’s voice” in its search for justice, spirituality, relational wholeness, and beauty. I believe the Church’s call is to announce to the world that those echoes are from the voice of our Creator.  As Wright puts it, “… through the church God will announce to the wider world that he is indeed its wise, loving, and just creator; that through Jesus he has defeated the powers that corrupt and enslave it; and that by his Spirit he is at work to heal and renew it.”

To that end, the role of corporate worship is to allow God’s people to respond to God for who he is and what he has done. Worship is when God’s people recount and bear witness to God’s character and his acts of justice, mercy, and salvation—beginning with Creation and calling of Israel, the Death and Resurrection of Jesus, the giving of the Holy Spirit, continuing on to his work in the present day through the church. With regard to the “echoes of a voice” that Wright talks about, our corporate worship should also demonstrate the justice, spirituality, relational wholeness, and beauty that are to be found in God’s Kingdom through a loving relationship with the Triune God. In other words, our corporate worship is where we reflect the transformation the church is called to announce.


Jon: I wrote a song with a friend a couple weeks ago about the jealousy of God.  We both had had recent experiences where we separately journeyed through seasons of God’s discipline in our lives. Now on the other side, we could gratefully look back and clearly see the reasons for His “tough love.” This inspired us to write a song about the fact that God is jealous for the Church’s love and worship that so often we give to other unworthy things. 

I think that I tend to complicate and over-think what the Church is called to be.  I love how simple Jesus made it: to love Him with all that we are, to love Him for the sole purpose that He has rescued and loved us.  More than our good behavior, sacred traditions, or our modern mega-movements, I believe He wants our hearts the most.  He’s jealous for them.  Once that’s in place, then the things that God has called us to do as His Church will hopefully follow in selfless acts of faith to fulfill His purposes.


Q:    How do you describe your ministry as a worship leader to someone outside the Church?

Andy: I consider my primary ministry to be the pastoral role of helping the community connect with God through the corporate worship service. My top priority is creating / designing services (including shaping the theme of the service) that minister to our guests and the congregation in general. Among other things, I coordinate with the pastors to select media and other art forms that support the pastor’s theme, work with volunteer leaders to select music that’s aligned with the goal for the service, and direct the contemporary worship team.

Jon: If I were to tell a person that I’m a “worship leader,” who knows what they might think?  I sometimes describe what I do as a singer/songwriter, but for the church.  I also try to share my whole story so as to provide context for why I do what I do.  I find that being transparent with who I am disarms people and leads to a much better conversation about God and the Church.


Q:    How did God call you to become a worship leader?

Andy: My first experience with contemporary worship was on a mission trip to the Navajo Reservation in Arizona. The authenticity and informality of words and music expressed something that reflected my inner spiritual awakening. Not long after that, I picked up a guitar and started playing some of the songs I had learned on that trip. From that point on, playing guitar and singing became a natural way to express my faith. At first, singing and playing was a private expression, but as I became better at guitar and more excited about the music, I began sharing it with friends at youth group. Eventually, our church’s youth leader asked me to begin leading a time of worship during youth group, and that’s how I got started.

Jon: My parents gave me a guitar as a gift for my high school graduation.  I had never been involved in music before so this gift was a huge surprise.  After almost pawning the Ibanez acoustic to get some cash, I started learning how to play via patient friends.  Shortly after that, I started my freshman year at Montreat College and it was there that God began to plant seeds of songwriting and leading worship. 


Q:    How do you describe the primary worship you lead in your congregations?

Andy: Mosaic’s vision statement talks about expressing our ancient faith in today’s language. On the surface, the service may appear to be completely contemporary: guitars, drums, video screens, multi-media elements, etc. But underneath you’ll find deeply rooted biblical foundations. We want to create an environment in worship where our congregation can express authentic worship in their native cultural style and language. At the same time, we design our worship services to be formative to the congregation’s faith, deepening their understanding of God and their relationship with him through the liturgy.

Jon: 1105 at Highland Park is sincere, welcoming, imperfect, honest, relaxed, and passionate.


Q:    What kind of feedback do you get?  Why do people find the worship you lead inviting?

Andy: Generally when we get feedback from members of the congregation it’s because they have been moved, engaged, or motivated by God through the service in some way. Often they’ve connected with the music or other creative element of the service. Whenever someone shares a story like that with us, we feel deeply humbled and grateful that the Holy Spirit would choose to work in someone’s life through our efforts. At the same time, we are very intentional about designing the service so that music, sermon, prayers, and other elements work together to help people make those connections.

Jon: I love when people say that they experienced God in a new way or that God used the sermon or a song in the service to draw them closer to Him or understand Scripture better. I also love when parents say that their kids are the ones that bring them to 1105 because of how God has used it in their lives. I hope that people would find 1105 inviting because they can relate with the leadership and also find community.  We try to be very sincere and honest with the fact that we, as leaders, are imperfect worshippers too— grateful to come and worship our God together. It has also been fun to watch the 1105 community grow. When the service began 3.5 years ago, people would leave very quickly, but now people are hanging out and connecting long after the service is done.

Q:    How do you use the unique characteristics and “vibe” of the worship you lead to communicate both the love and the glory of God?

Andy: Contemporary arts have tremendous power to communicate both transcendence as well as intimacy. We try to explore both ends of the range in each service through music, video, sermon, active responses, prayer and silence, and opportunities for fellowship. We also attempt to strike the right balance between authenticity and excellence.

Jon: One way we take advantage of the more casual and relaxed atmosphere of 1105 is by having people share their stories.  Like this past Sunday when we had one of our own Highland Park ministry partners share how his local coffee house ministry is used to love the homosexual community in Dallas.  A couple weeks ago we had a couple in our church share about their tragic journey of not being able to have children, but were just blessed with two foster kids overnight.  These are just a couple examples, but we’ve found that the power of “story” is a great tool to communicate the love and glory of God.

Q:    What is the response you’re looking for?

Andy: We expect that corporate worship will be both formative and transformative. Formative in that, over time, people’s faith and relationship with God will be shaped in positive ways. We also expect that worship will be transformative, and that at particular times God will reach particular people in special ways. We plan our services with both of these responses in mind.

Jon: Sincerity. Whether you are a believer or not, we want people to engage and respond honestly. Wherever people are “at” with God, we’re excited about the fact that they have come and encourage them to be “there.” If you follow Christ, then worship with all your heart by singing, confessing, and listening to the Word preached. If not, don’t sing; ask questions, doubt, and explore. From the music leadership that I get to be a part of to the preaching, we try to teach the congregation to see themselves not as an audience, but as “players” participating and engaging their hearts with our true Audience.  We hope that as people learn to see the whole service as participatory they will experience the love and power of God in deeper ways.

Q:    How does the worship you lead relate/interact with the more “traditional” worship in your congregation?

Andy: When we’re at the early stages of deciding on sermon topics and overall objectives for a particular service, both the traditional and contemporary services are jointly involved. Once we begin to talk about specific elements of a service, each team works separately to design and create elements that will work for their service. Toward the end of the process, we share the ideas we’re planning to implement so each team has the option of utilizing each other’s ideas if desired.

Jon: I see 1105, our “Traditional,” and our “All Nations” services as all the same.  There just happen to be different musical instruments. All three services have the same heart of guiding people to encounter God’s greatness and Truth through our different styles of music, preaching, and sacraments. We interact by our pastors rotating to preach at the different services, by providing common fellowship areas, and by having combined services a couple times every year.


Q:    Looking as far into the future as you can at this moment, what is the largest challenge you are facing as a leader of Christian worship?  How are you addressing it?

Andy: More and more of our guests are coming to church without understanding some of the most basic elements of the Christian faith. We also have a large core of our congregation who are life-long deeply committed believers. I think the biggest challenge we face is not doing “church as usual” because it’s comfortable to the core of the congregation, but instead thinking critically about how our sermons, songs, and service designs will help bear witness to the depth and breadth of our faith to those who are new or just exploring Christianity. This is not a matter of simply being “evangelistic” in our sermons or providing “altar calls.” We need to systematically explore and interpret our faith in ways that don’t assume prior knowledge. At the same time, we need to create worship services that are deeply spiritual and not bogged down by too much explanation. Finding the right balance can be difficult, and the inertia to revert to comfortable habits is very strong.

Jon: The largest challenge that I see is bad theology. Non-believers and believers alike can assume a lot of things about God, the Bible, and the Church that are simply not true and that directly affect the way we live our lives. Our team addresses this challenge in a couple different ways.  First, we don’t choose songs just because they’re popular, but we screen them to see if the lyrics are true and accurate.  Like I said before, what we believe about God affects everything, so we take this very seriously.  Our Senior Pastor encourages us to screen songs by asking, “Can I sing this song in a Buddhist Temple?”  If so, we don’t do it.  We want to sing Truth.  We want to sing songs that are sound and founded on Scripture. In addition to modern offerings, we also contemporize a lot of old hymns which are full of great theology.