In his (quite good) book "Unfashionable," Tullian Tchividjian talks about the unity that Christians should be developing among each other, basing his arguments heavily on Ephesians 4:1-7. He talks about having traditional versus contemporary worship services and he makes this really interesting point I never thought about:
"I understand the good intentions behind these seemingly harmless efforts, but they evidence a fundamental failure to comprehend the heart of the gospel. We're not only feeding toxic tribalism; we're also saying the gospel can't successfully bring these two different groups together. It's a declaration of doubt about the unifying power of God's gospel. Generational appeal in worship is an unintentional admission that the gospel is powerless to join together what man has separated.
Building the church on stylistic preferences or age appeal (whether old or young) is just as contrary to the reconciling effect of the gospel as building it on class, race, or gender distinctions. In a recent interview, J.I. Packer said, 'If worship styles are so fixed that what's being offered fits the expectations, the hopes, even the prejudices or any of these groups as opposed to the others, I don't believe the worship style glorifies God.'"
wow. quite interesting, though (I think) profoundly true.
No comments:
Post a Comment