accessibility vs gift

was just reading yet another complaint about alt worship services being too 'hip' and aesthetically exclusive and inaccessible. so i'm musing:

if our church event is primarily about communicating god to any and every third party who walks in, then it needs to be accessible to the widest range of people, speak the broadest language, be clear.

if our church event is primarily our gift to god then it needs to be the offering of the firstfruits - the most sophisticated and difficult thing we can cook up.

and we hover in the tension between the two. a public event that is definitely not for everybody. a private event that wants to be for anybody.

Comments

[richard]

excellent point Steve. Its often challenging though to discern whether the sophistication is being motivated by a desire to offer to God or to give ourselves goose bumps - a kind of ecclesiological masturbation

[Nic]

'If you think you comprehend it, it is not God.'
Church Father

Here's too difficult worship.

[Nic]

'If you think you comprehend it, it is not God.'
Church Father

Here's too difficult worship.

[moya]

hi steve
maybe those people who say that are just so much in church culture that normal on the street life that in my head alt worship comes from, seems elusive and strange to them ???

[steve collins]

re richard's comment:

i've heard that worry used so many times as a justification for not doing anything interesting [if we're not having fun we must be doing it just for god] that i now say, just do it. traditional worship can be just as masturbatory. you can't get away from mixed motives, but if you go for the thrill you might find yourself amazed at god, because in a sense all thrill and wonder has its source in him.

[richard]

you've really got me thinking steve - I feel instictively uncomfortable with "go for the thrill" but i'm not sure if that's inherited baggage or a valid concern. I do know that when planning worship I often try to impress others in a way that isn't giving to God, but that's different... need to think on this one!

[Peter Schweitzer]

re: "I do know that when planning worship I often try to impress others in a way that isn't giving to God, but that's different."

Would it help to re-express this as "planning an opportunity for worship"? Worship as something that might happen, or might not, and we're cultivating the setting, not controlling the actual experiences of others (or even of ourselves)?

[Lorna]

The tension is there. All the time. There are no right answers.

We've been in a state of transition for ages, some steps forward some back. Mistakes and good stuff too.

I correct myself. There ARE right answers, just no easy ones.