I invite you to read carefully the full
article on worshipinfo.com. I am grateful for Dr. Best's eloquent
words because they prompt healthy self-examination. I wish to respond
to his comments, for I believe some readers might think this chapter
is a good candidate for criticisms like his. It is important that
we find a place to stand with integrity.
First, I agree that contemporary worship is too lopsided
in its dependence on music presently, and, in my opinion, has neglected
prayer and the reading of Scripture in its services. I agree that
worship conferences should talk more about theology and less about
"tools." I agree that there is also too much dependence on "production"
in some churches. I agree that we don't need music in order to worship.
And I agree we can make worship "too much the subject," and fail to
keep our Lord central.
However, drawing out, wooing, inspiring, encouraging,
enhancing, and facilitating an offering of worship or the release
of praise-all of these seem to be proper roles for any worship leader.
When people see a sunset, or hear a praise song, worship is facilitated.
People are inspired to respond. That is legitimate and normal.
Moreover, architecture can facilitate worship. I believe
it is not wrong to be "shaped" by architecture-I don't believe it
is idolatry. In the worship environment designed in heaven (Rev. 4,
5), God is at the center; all the angels and the redeemed community
appear to be in concentric circles around the throne. I would argue
that heaven's architecture is purposefully meant to clarify the meaning
of worship and to shape of our thinking of it. Moreover, God is even
more dynamic! He employs thunder, flashes of lightning, hail, a rainbow,
incense, and altars, in the worship environment. Is He being manipulative
in surrounding His throne with super-charged, effects and symbols?
Is God in danger of letting the spectacular "override" true worship?
The arts do, in fact, enhance and facilitate worship.
And they can also be abused-like any good thing. The arts have power.
We simply cannot escape from the power of artistic imagery. My question
is, "How can we enhance our materials for the glory of God, and benefit
from them?"
In Scripture, worship is closely connected with emotion
(see chapter 10). We must acknowledge that we are creatures not only
with a spirit, but a body. We are created in the image of God. Moreover,
Christ "validated" the body by taking on human form. Scripture also
promises we will have a resurrection body.
As worship leaders, it is not wrong to do the psychologically
sensitive thing-even do it consciously. That is wisdom. I make no
apologies for the fact that the 5-phase worship set is a psychologically
based model. However, I would never use the words "coerce, "induce,"
or "cause" to characterize the role of the worship leader in leading
people. Yet, words like "urge," "enhance," "facilitate" seem appropriate.
I do respect Harold Best for speaking boldly and articulately, for
he has addressed some issues that urgently need correction. I hope
his words prompt us all to spend time in serious self-examination.
Furthermore, I invited Dr. Best to respond to what I've written, which
he has graciously done.
Dr. Harold Best responded:
Harold Best (personal communication, June 14, 2000):
"I appreciate the kindness of Dr. Liesch in asking for
my response to the materials in Chapter 3. It was unfortunate that
a few quotes from the earlier part of the paper were not included
as well, for the key to the disagreement we might have does not lie
in the nature of music and the arts-their intense power or effect
on people. The key, rather, lies in two completely different views
of worship. I would therefore encourage everyone who might be interested
to read the entire paper.
I hold that, in the most biblical sense, worship is
not something we do now and then, but always. The now-and-thenness
of worship fits Old Testament models nicely. But as we progress from
the time-place-circumstance contexts of the old Testament to those
of Romans 12:1, and John 4:23-24, (among others) we discover two things.
1. It is God, Christ and the Holy Spirit who are the
sanctuaries. It is now the Body of Christ who is the temple. It is
also now each redeemed believer who is likewise a temple. The indwellings,
therefore, triply participate in each other: The Triune God indwelling
itself eternally and blissfully; the Triune God indwelling the Body
of Christ yet indwelling each believer; each believer indwelling every
other believer while being found in Christ. Therefore, how can believers
enter into the presence of God, in Dr. Liesch's words, how can we...
"draw them into worship," or "...begin to draw near to God..." when
He is already within us? It seems to me to be a fundamental theological
mistake to assume that we should construe worship as drawing near,
when we are already indwelt. It seems a mistake to assume that worship
is progressively attained or fully arrived at only after certain things
are done (each of which is described in the Wimber model). Worship
is not like building a car, where part by part, or actions by action,
a final product is achieved. Worship, in the Christ-centered sense
is completed from the heart from the very start. That is, as living
sacrifices, worshipping continuously in spirit and truth, with faith,
hope, and love, as the resounding forces, we err if we think that
worship is brought on, especially with the arts. So the questions
is, without the arts can we worship in the same biblically-full way
as with them? According to the thinking of Wimber and Liesch, the
answer would seem to be "No" or some modification of it.
2. If worship, in the Christo-centric sense is continuous,
then all of the things that comprise worship, inside or outside of
corporate gatherings, can only be acts of worship, not lead-ins or
drawings-near or response builders. Music or architecture or dance,
or any artifactual activity must be seen as sign of the Body of Christ
being at worship rather than the events that enhance it. How can anyone
who is supposed to be living by faith, made effective by love (Galations
5), and in the fullness of hope-how can anyone who is created and
redeemed to be continuously in love with God, bowing down continuously
before him, and rejoicing continuously in His presence, irrespective
of time, place, or circumstance-how can we assume that these limping
artifacts called music can do what only His Holy Spirit has been commissioned
from the eternities to do? Perhaps, just perhaps, our concepts of
being in the Spirit actually get in the way of His being in us.
In other words, our sense of God (to put it almost crassly)
should be so great--because of His greatness and the greatness of
our salvation-that music and the arts are witness to something already
accomplished and at work. Therefore, intensity in worship takes many
forms, but it is always intensity, not because of something we do,
but because of who God is.
Finally, three other matters deserve comment:
1. Dr. Liesch's comments about pitch spans and their
relation to projecting a sense of God's greatness, deviate markedly
toward a flawed philosophical system, namely Platonism, in which particular
aspects of music are said to promote various behaviors or to reflect
particular essences. In fact, the relationship between phased enhancements
of worship, as suggested or implied by the authors that Dr. Liesch
quotes (Espinosa and Wimber) are a curious mix of Platonism and Skinnerian
psychology, in which environment is said to be the determining factor
in shaping behavior. Here is where Dr. Liesch's quote from my paper
deserve clarification. It is not that I do not believe that the arts
do not shape us somehow. They do. It is not that the arts are not
powerful forces in lives. They are. Rather, it's that there are greater
enhancements, if you will, to which the enhancements of the arts are
to be subject and to which they are but a lisp. Thus, God, being infinitely
greater than all we can ask, say, or think, sing or play, is the One
whose greatness is first of all made real to us through the Holy Spirit.
This alone should bring on a hilarity that no artistic force can match.
Then, and only then, do we use the arts as witnesses to this, even
though we can bring witness to this without them. Their power, their
enhancing prowess, are to be offered up, rather than used as a means.
So we are moved by them; we do feel their force, but they can only
point to God, not enhance His presence. Furthermore, what is enhanced
is our emotions and our thoughts, not God's presence.
2. With due respect, I feel that Espinosa and Wimber's
five-phase model, among other things, works the lover's analogy to
the detriment of a biblical theology of worship. The analogy of the
skillful worship leader wooing "the congregation into worship like
the patient lover draws the beloved" seems to be seriously flawed.
Since when is a third party (in this case, the worship leader) necessary
to draw two lovers together. Do they need this much help, especially
when one is already infinitely loved by the Other, as an eternally
accomplished fact? So first, we have courtship (invitation), then
engagement when people "...begin to draw near to God." But hasn't
nearness already been effected by wooing? And if, according to Espinosa,
this engagement period is marked by attention and seriousness, how
dare we assume that even in the most initial approaches to God (invitation)
we are not already attentive and serious? Is not engagement a pledge
of something yet to come, as in marriage? But in true worship, how
can something be yet to come if it is continuous?
What happens next. In the exaltation phase the analogy
of lover and loved is discontinued. Why? If it were continued, what
is exaltation analogous to in the male/female relationship? Is it
marriage or an act of intimate love within marriage? If we are already
the Bride of Christ before we step inside of a corporate gathering,
where does this analogy lead? If adoration (phase four) is what the
Bible says it is (in its fullest sense), how could it be limited to
quieting down? Could it not be the opposite? And once again, why do
pitch span and other cultural relativities enter equationally into
adoration?
I hope that I'm not being unfair or theologically snippy.
But it seems to me that these suppositions have to be examined much
more carefully, both from a logical and a theological standpoint.
3. I appreciate how Dr. Liesch makes it clear that the
most innovative corporate gatherings are eclectic. Styles can merge;
procedures can be mixed; liturgical action is no more out of place
in the Vineyard model than in a "high" service. And so on. I merely
want to confirm this. Long ago, those who wanted to give biblical
thought to the subject of worship came to the conclusion that style,
per se, is not the issue. Unfortunately many still make it so and
this is to be regretted. No one at this time knows what model will
finally gain preeminence. Dr. Liesch seems to think that the free-flowing
praise will. I am not sure he is entirely right, for certain national
corners appear to be turning in another direction. At any rate, I
[belief] that no present model will finally win out because each is
flawed, as a model, especially when biblical exegesis may be not be
the substance and center of the issue. If the Wesleys were only partly
correct in their prayer, then a thousand tongues will never be enough;
a thousand styles will never say it all. In fact, as Calvin Miller
has so often said, when the Holy Spirit truly put the hit on a person,
style becomes curiously irrelevant That is, the Spirit does not work
because of a style-He blows where He pleases. And He often works in
spite of a style. He is, in the best sense of the word, style-less.
I fully believe that if we truly depended more on His full person
and work, we could cut our worship discussions, plans, models, debates,
and protocols by 99.9%. For after all is said and done, we are now
talking more about worship, as a set-apart specificity, than the Bible
does and we are more worried about how we worship than how people
are saved. I stand condemned by this last statement, but I must make
it.
Liesch response (12.2000)
Best wrote: I hold that, in the most biblical sense,
worship is not something we do now and then, but always. The now-and-thenness
of worship fits Old Testament models nicely.
I believe: Not so. A life of praise is the Old Testament
model as well.
