The Lutheran Liturgy: To be continued...
About a year ago, I posted an introductory explanation to the Lutheran Liturgy. I'm not an expert on the subject by any stretch of the imagination - but I love the liturgy and I love sharing the depth and the richness and the Biblical foundations of this historic form of worship. I had the best of intentions of posting on it on a regular basis...alas, you know what they say about good intentions and all that.
In any case, I've noticed that I get a dozen or so hits each day from folks who have googled on "Lutheran Liturgy". (Lately, I've been getting many hits on "Ash Wednesday Lutheran" as well.) Clearly, a lot of people have an interest in learning about the historic worship of the Church.
One of the hits I got recently originated from Willow Creek Community Church. Willow Creek, of course, is one of those seeker-sensitive mega-churches in Illinois - it is a decidedly non-liturgical church. As well, they recently revealed the results of a spiritual health survey they conducted among their members that revealed that their "programming" approach to discipleship is not working.
Now, I don't want to make too much of it, but I just found it interesting that somebody over at Willow Creek has been doing an online search of the Lutheran liturgy. It confirms for me something that I have suspected for a long while: that contemporary Christians are hungry for something more than what the typical Western church is delivering. They're longing for something more solid, with both relevance and roots. The historic Lutheran liturgy provides just that. And so much more."…increasing levels of participation in these sets of activities [church programs] does NOT predict whether someone’s becoming more of a disciple of Christ."
~The REVEAL Conference, October 14-15, 2008
So...given this interest, I'm going to make an effort to produce a series that will attempt explain the liturgy - in everyday language - to the non-liturgical Christian. I'm even thinking of inviting guest posters. (Anybody interested?)
3 comments:
Anita,
really interesting you mention Willow Creek... just got mentioned tonight with the college kids re:worship style/liturgy and how big and "stadium like" it is. Anyway, I hope to take my college kids on a "walk through the litugry" sharing with the wonderfulness of Christ centered-Lutheran Worship. looking forward to your series! GOOD STUFF! Hope you guys are well. Pax!
Is that it? I'm anxiously awaiting your next update.
Re: Willow Creek, I was impressed with their sharing the outcome of their research and what seems like a real desire to reach hearts. If they are researching the liturgy, I hope it is not in an attempt to institute yet another program, to find some kind of "formula" for making disciples. KWIM?
To assume that Willow Creek is non-liturgical because it does not rely on dead tree liturgical resources is hardly fair. After all, "Liturgy" literally mean "the work of the people". To limit it to something so low as the antiquated liturgical pieces of the past is hardly logical. Willow Creek has a liturgy, as do all worshiping bodies. The efficacy of such liturgies can only be measured in how well the "people" doing the "work" engage with the worship piece. You may discover that so called non-liturgical people are engaging much more deeply in the liturgical process than their so called liturgical cousins.
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