Saturday, April 23, 2011

learning to worship

Last Sunday was Palm Sunday, which is also called Passion Sunday. I wanted to attend a performance of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion. I wasn’t deeply familiar with the SMP (as it’s called) so I’ve been reading about it and listening to it during Lent, allowing Bach’s re-creating of the passion of our Lord to shape my own experience of this season. I had asked my kids if any of them wanted to attend the performance with me and it was my youngest who wanted to go. I warned him that sitting through 3+ hours of Baroque choral music (in German!) would be challenging, but he insisted that he wanted to go.

He made it through about 20 minutes and then started nodding off. I let him sleep for a bit and then he woke up refreshed and made it through the rest of Part 1 alert as I whispered to him a running commentary on the music. After the intermission we changed seats and sat in the back of the large church, closer to the cool air coming from the open doors, which became our emergency exit when he needed another intermission halfway through the much longer Part 2. We came back in to enjoy the final 40 minutes. At the end we actually started the applause, during which he then bolted for the door and skipped outside yelling, “I’m free!” We were the first ones out of the parking lot.

But I experienced the SMP more deeply because of Josh. I prepared for the concert more thoroughly because I wanted to explain the piece to him. In the car beforehand I explained to him that the singers would sing words directly from the Bible, along with contemplative responses to the story, and that the chorales represented the response of the Church to the story. I brought along the score with English translation so that we could read along and I could show him things like the 11 repetitions of “Lord, is it I?” as all the disciples except Judas are portrayed musically by Bach. We were both touched as the soloist playing the role of the Evangelist depicted Peter’s devastation at realizing that he had fulfilled Jesus’ prophesy of Peter’s betrayal.

During the intermission an older gentleman asked Josh if he was a singer, what instruments he played, etc. He complimented Josh on his attendance at this performance of a piece that the gentleman obviously treasured: he told us he’s attended performances of the SMP 10-15 times. And in some ways, I think Josh had a better experience of the SMP than some bored-looking adults sitting near us who looked envious when we made our emergency exit. He experienced it as I would expect most 8 year-olds would. But we experienced it together. And that older gentleman gave us his blessing.

And I think that’s a great picture of worshiping together as a church community: kids welcome to participate as they can, with adults giving guidance and blessing. In the process, everyone is enriched as God is glorified. Soli Deo Gloria.

worship together

I couldn’t “enjoy” the Good Friday service last night because I was busy explaining things to my younger kids and making sure they weren’t too noisy. And I suppose my kids and the other kids in the service were a little distracting to the adults present who didn’t have kids.

But what’s the purpose of corporate worship, especially during Holy Week? Worship isn’t merely about me having a “worship experience”. It’s about all of us, as a church community, re-telling, re-living, and re-creating the gospel, the good news that is epitomized in the events of Holy Week as we remember Jesus’ teaching us to love each other, suffering and dying for the redemption of the world, and becoming the firstfruits of the resurrection.

I’m not saying that there isn’t a time for quiet reflection in worship and that kids should be allowed to run wild during worship services. But the worship life of the church community should not be exclusively “adults only”. As Jesus said to the disapproving Pharisees on the first Palm Sunday, if the kids aren’t allowed to make some noise then the very rocks will cry out. Corporate worship is the response of the church community to God’s work in our world and in us. And it shapes us as a community (including our children), as well as shaping me as an individual.

How do I measure a “successful” worship service? By how deeply I am moved? Or how engaged my kids are? If that’s the case, then I’m probably looking at each worship service as an event in itself and as a kind of baptized entertainment venue. I’m guilty of using the same standards to measure worship as I use to measure a movie. And I’m becoming a critic instead of a participant.

Worship throughout the Christian year sets the rhythms of our life together as a family and as a church community, and shapes our identity as the people of God. So I was glad to see so many of Grace’s families attending the Good Friday service together. As parents brought their children up to the communion stations, some parents were just accompanied by their younger children while others were explaining and then administering the communion to their older children. I’m sure the kids would rather be watching cartoons or playing video games. And the parents couldn’t have a time of deep individual reflection. But it was still a holy moment. Because if we as a church community aren’t becoming more deeply the people of God, then eventually all that will be left to praise God will be the stones.