Worship

Our church sermon this morning was very moving. 1 Corinthians chapter 14. "You shouldn't come to church to get what YOU want...you should come to church to give, build up, comfort, strengthen, exhort and edify others...and to receive that. The church assembly is the temple of the Holy Spirit. We are to seek and to edify one another".
(Quote from J & A Knapp Schrock, Facebook)

After the sermon, I was reminded of this article from World Magazine.

The pianist Alex McDonald, 30, made his orchestral debut at 11, earned a Doctorate in Musical Art at Juilliard, and recently competed in the 14th Van Cliburn International Competition in Fort Worth, Texas. Currently teaching piano at Texas Women’s University, he is also an articulate and reflective Christian. McDonald spoke to WORLD after the first of his two Cliburn Competition recitals.

What role do you think church music should play in one’s experience of worship? In modern churches, we have a graven image of what the experience of God ought to be like, and we want our music to simulate that experience in us. It could be an organ or a praise team—either can create a God experience that may not have any of God in it at all. But people will feel like they’ve worshipped. And because the existential experience of God is more important to us than the [actual] experience of God, we’re satisfied—wrongly, I would add. If it feels impossible to worship God through styles that are uncomfortable to us, it’s because we’re asking the music to do for us what is actually an issue of the heart. The problem with the “worship wars” is that they’ve hidden the real issue: We are in love with ourselves, and we blame the music.

I am thankful for our simple, reverent, unadorned worship service, the support, accountability, and the wonderful fellowship we are blessed with. 

Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord;

Ephesians 5:19