Feature Article: Winter 2006-2007
What is the irreducible core of worship?
by Marlene Kropf
Several years ago I experienced an unusually long layover in Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. When I heard an announcement over the intercom inviting people to a worship service, I decided to go. It turned out to be a Roman Catholic mass attended by airport workers, pilots and flight attendants, and travelers from countries all over the world. Surrounded by the noise of take-offs and landings, we sang and prayed together and heard an inspiring homily offered by a Catholic sister. For me, the body of Christ came vividly to life that morning, even though most of us were strangers to each other.
Part of what made this experience of Christian unity possible was the fixed order of worship. Even though some worshippers may not have been English-speakers, they could still participate because the structure of the mass is the same all over the world.
While freedom offers opportunity for creativity and relevance in each local context, it can also mean that certain essentials of worship may be overlooked.
If a congregation of Mennonites from around the world had gathered to worship in O’Hare Airport that morning, we might have experienced a great deal more difficulty worshipping together. In our free-church tradition, each congregation chooses both the structure and the style of its worship. When we visit other Mennonite churches, whether in our own area conference or in another part of the world, we may be genuinely perplexed by what is happening. While such freedom offers opportunities for creativity and relevance in each local context, it can also mean that certain essentials of worship may be overlooked.
So what is essential? Many Christians have found the underlying movements of Isaiah’s vision in Isaiah 6 to be a useful guide for identifying what is essential.
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. And one called to another and said: ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.’ The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. And I said: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. (Isaiah 6:1-8, NRSV)
The dynamic interaction of Isaiah’s story includes three basic rhythms:
Encounter with God
We see who God is and offer thanks and praise.
Engagement with self and others
We see ourselves as we are and offer confession, receiving mercy and grace.
Empowerment for faithful living
We hear the Word of God and respond in obedience.
Another way of describing these rhythms is to say that Christian worship is trinitarian. Worship has a vertical dimension (God-focus), a horizontal dimension (an experience of the body of Christ), and an outwardly flowing dimension (a Spiritguided response). If any of these three is missing, worship will be incomplete or misshapen.
Even though Mennonites do not have a common or fixed order of worship, we do share a core understanding that worship is a response to our gracious God.
How these three rhythms are expressed in any particular worship service can be endlessly varied. Recently, for example, when I worked with a team to plan a worship service using Matthew 14:13-21 as the focal text (the familiar story of Jesus feeding the five thousand-plus women and children), we identified three underlying questions that correlate with the above template:
1. Who is Jesus in this story? What is he doing?
2. Who are we in the context of the story? What are our hungers?
3. How are we being called to respond to the story?
As we shaped the service, we chose actions of gathering and praising that focused on God as generous Provider who cares for our needs. In the prayer of confession we named our fears of not having enough and asked to be filled with the Bread of life. We heard the word of God proclaimed in dramatic form as the story of Jesus feeding the multitude was presented to the children. The sermon called us to receive Jesus as compassionate Host, the One who feeds and sustains us in ordinary and extraordinary ways. Our response was a bread-breaking ritual, which included prayers for the world. We were sent out with the words of #136 in Sing the Journey:
Leader: Christ’s food in our souls,
ALL: our food shared like his.
Leader: Christ’s life in our hands,
ALL: our lives shaped by his.
Leader: Christ’s love in our hearts,
ALL: our love warmed through his.
Leader: Christ’s peace on our path,
ALL: our path following his.
Once we have this basic framework in mind, we can plan worship with a wide and colorful variety of styles. We can also expand and deepen our experience of each of the three rhythms:
1. As we encounter God in worship, how is the congregation invited to experience the richness and depth of God’s character and mission?
2. As we engage with ourselves and one another in worship, how is everyone offered both a gracious welcome and honest challenge within the body of Christ?
3. As we wait on the Spirit’s empowerment, how are we guided to discern and participate in God’s mission in the world?
Even though Mennonites do not have a common or fixed order of worship, we do share a core understanding that worship is a response to our gracious God. As we pay attention to the three biblical rhythms of worship, we will discover that our faith in God is renewed, our life in community is enriched, and our witness in the world is made strong by the power of God’s Spirit.
Marlene Kropf is minister of worship for Mennonite Church USA as well as associate professor of spiritual formation and worship at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart, Indiana. She is coauthor of Singing: A Mennonite Voice (Herald Press) and Preparing the Sunday Dinner: A Collaborative Approach to Worship and Preaching (Herald Press)..