Worship Weblog

Edmonton Book Group – Second Meeting

Posted by cicw

Monday, November 9th, 2009

Book Groups

We invited 34 book groups across the U.S. and Canada to meet and discuss The Church of All Ages and its implications for their worship, and to share their notes here.
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The Power of Story to Unite Generations

Our group gathered in November to discuss chapters 4-7 of The Church of All Ages. We were inspired by the idea of telling stories in worship and many of us expressed a desire to hear more sermons that tell the stories of scripture. We recognize how accessible stories are and how they have the ability to capture the attention and expand the imagination of people of all ages. Stories, on which chapter 6 focuses, seem to fit well with the idea of chatting, gossiping, and daydreaming in preaching, as chapter 7 explains. After we all praised the ideas in this chapter and talked about sermons and preachers we have heard in the past who have done this well, Lisa asked me how I, as someone who preaches, heard this chapter. I responded by explaining that it was a really good reminder to me and that I’ve been trying to be more conversational and tell more stories in my preaching. (Since that conversation, I have preached three times and have applied some of the principles of the chapters to my preaching.)

We discussed the question “What do you think each generation in your church wants in worship?” Of course, we can’t be sure or claim that these wants are true for everyone within a generation, but we identified a number of things we think different generations might want, including authenticity (young adults), good preaching, a sense that something new or different is happening (teens), stability/familiarity (older generations), feeling loved/safe (children), help taking care of kids during worship (young parents). We noted that none of these desires are bad in and of themselves—it is when they become the goal or the focus of worship that they become problematic. We were then reminded of the chapter that spoke of the importance of putting “aside one’s preferences for the sake of others” (83). This, we felt, is a good reminder and something we need to hear. However, we struggled with the seemingly simplistic proposal in the chapter when it talked about needing to “distinguish between personal preferences and scriptural warrant” (81). We agree with this idea. But, we struggle with it at the same time because there are so many different interpretations of scripture, and often our interpretations are influenced (without us being aware) by our own preferences. It’s a right principle, but we recognize the difficulty in living it out as we plan worship.

As we concluded, we went back to our beginning discussion about the power of story, remembering that this is something that can connect all generations, even with all of their different desires for worship.

We’re looking forward to the last few chapters and our last discussion in a few weeks.

Tags: bgedmonton, Book Groups 2009, intergenerational