Balancing Form and Freedom

Spontaneity offers no innate advantage over liturgy. Liberty is where the Spirit is, not where the preacher has thrown away his notes.
—Paul Anderson

A woman who was visiting a liturgical service kept punctuating the pastor’s sermon with “Praise the Lord!” Another woman finally turned around and said, “Excuse me, but we don’t praise the Lord in the Lutheran church.”

A man down the pew corrected her. “Yes we do; it’s on page 19.”

The conflict between form and freedom is not new, and we have both sides in our congregation. Some wish we would throw out the liturgy so we could be free to “move with the Spirit.” Others are tired of innovations and want to return to the good ol’ days when they knew what was happening and could follow the bulletin play by play.

Is it possible to have the best of both worlds? Yes! Order and ardor can be happily wed. The issue is not structure or freedom, but Spirit. God has no preference for formless spiritualism or Spiritless formalism—he rejects both. Spontaneity offers no innate advantage over liturgy. Liberty is where the Spirit is, not where the preacher has thrown away his notes.

Protestants have traditionally been better workers than worshipers. Pastors may spend fifteen hours on sermon preparation and fifteen minutes throwing the service together.

But God wants worshipers above anything else. Jesus told the Samaritan woman, “He seeketh such to worship him.” Karl Barth wrote, “Christian worship is the most momentous, the most urgent, the most glorious action that can take place in human life.” If we agree, then worship must not be “the things we do before we get to the important stuff.”

One glimpse into heaven reveals that it is of eternal significance. The whole book of Leviticus was written to teach a nation how to worship, an acknowledgment that at the center of life is the worship of God.

Like other Christian disciplines, worship requires balance. Here are some areas we try to handle appropriately.

Balancing praise and worship

Our family went to see “The Glory of Christmas” concert at the Crystal Cathedral in Southern California, and it was glorious! Dr. Schuller asked that applause be held till the end of the performance. After every marvelous piece of music, complete with drama (live camels and flying angels included!), my four-year-old daughter clapped vigorously. She knew it called for a response, and I could not convince her that silence was more appropriate (much to my embarrassment). With all respect to Dr. Schuller, I think Naomi was taking her cue properly from a joyful heart, not the rubrics of the evening.

Reading about the worship of Israel convinces me that God is no grouch. Dancers, singers, and instrumentalists combined to make worship a time for rejoicing: “Four thousand shall offer praises to the Lord with the instruments that I have made for praise” (1 Chron. 23:5 nrsv).

One of the men in our church said, “I used to think Cecil B. De Mille was overdoing it—trumpeters on this wall, heralds on that wall, and a chorus in every corner. But after reading the Old Testament, maybe he was downplaying it! I’d love to see a service with processions, banners, colorful vestments, and antiphonal singing.”

David declared it legal to shout to the Lord; Pentecostals have gradually made it more acceptable.

And yet after entering his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise, there comes a time of needful quiet—worship. “Know ye that the Lord is God” is best done in silence. “Be still and know that I am God.”

One of the Hebrew words for worship means “falling on one’s face.” Prostration before God says we are seeing something of his greatness in contrast to our frailty. In worship, Isaiah’s “Woe is me” is more appropriate than Peter’s “It’s sure good to be here.”

We realize in worship we ultimately have frightfully little to say to the Lord who inhabits eternity. In the words of the hymn writer:

O, how I fear thee, living God,
with deepest, tenderest fears,
And worship thee with trembling hope
and penitential tears!

A congregation that praises loudly without worshiping meekly has not experienced the awesome and terrible side of the Almighty. To celebrate his presence is one thing; to tremble before him, as the psalmist exhorts, is another.

Yet praise is usually the necessary prelude to worship. It is rare for people to drop to their knees after the opening prayer. The skillful leader woos the congregation into worship like the patient lover draws the beloved. The congregation is brought into the audience of God more by evoking than provoking. The leader who breaks in with a jarring “Okay, let’s sing all the verses of number 317, and real loud on the last verse” doesn’t realize that instead of exhorting, it’s better to enter into the experience of praise and encourage others to follow by example.

Some congregations excel in praise, complete with guitar, tamborines, and drums. But having learned to make the joyful noise, let us also practice the blessed quiet. Noisemaking seems out of place when “the Lord is in his holy temple.” Clapping after every choir anthem does not distinguish between the joyful moment and the sacred one. The holy hush is just as powerful as the jubilant hallelujah.

I’ve found most congregations are more adept at praise than worship. Where this is the case I have used times of planned silence. A sermon that has gripped hearts may need a moment to settle before the service moves on. We have discovered that words of confirmation and personal application often grow out of the soil of silence.

But we do not begin there. Our preludes used to be typically quiet organ meditations. People entered in silence and did not make a sound until the opening hymn. But starting with silence makes it harder for people to feel a kinship with one another. Too often the quietness betokens only unholy hush of mental inactivity.

We now sing songs of praise for fifteen minutes before the service “officially” begins. This change has brought a greater spirit of celebration and camaraderie. And, I believe, helps us balance praise and worship.

Balancing structure and spontaneity

Liturgical forms give worshipers a sense of continuity. Confessing the ancient creeds reminds us that the church is a lot bigger than we are and has been around a lot longer. Forms help establish community by creating church family traditions, so valuable for people whose present situations change by the minute.

Liturgy gives people identity. It links them with saints around the world and down through the ages who share a common confession. It helps guard against an individual piety and a proud contemporaneity. People who tend to be dazzled (and tyrannized) by the latest model Oldsmobile and computer appreciate coming to a Sunday service and finding some things don’t change as fast.

Liturgy gives structure to worship, reminding the participants of the breadth of concerns in the hearts of the saints. You will have an agenda, whether it is planned years in advance or on the spot. Ritual provides a workable plan, which is often the springboard for spontaneity.

Liturgy is drama, and the better it is performed, the more beautiful worship can be. The psalmist who combined holiness and beauty (“Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness”) saw that ethics and aesthetics are friends.

Protestant worship often lacks aesthetically, because it has throughout its short history shown more of a propensity for freedom than form. But if actions do communicate better than words, if symbols are the language of the soul, then the forms of the faith can speak to our subconscious in ways that spoken propositions cannot.

But forms have their liabilities. We who want to worship God in the worst way often do. Rite easily moves into rote. Those active participants may learn the forms and stay disengaged throughout the whole process. The prophets denounced the priests who made rite more important than righteousness. Jesus had harsh words for them also. While their lips honored God, their hearts were far from him.

Spirit is replaced by technique, doing the rite thing the right way. The state of the art supersedes the state of the heart. Any sensitive worship leader appreciates the importance of mechanics, but when the how-tos get magnified, externals have replaced internals. Nothing made Jesus angrier. Liturgy void of Spirit is brassy.

So, we emphasize freedom and leave the rite—right? Wrong. Freedom without form imprisons us as much as form without freedom. What the Corinthian Christians lacked in maturity they made up with frenzy. Paul put an apostolic check on their emotional excesses and gave some structure and guidelines to their freewheeling worship. Freedom can be human-centered, superficial, or just lazy.

From an anthropological point of view, Mary Douglas argues that “the contempt of external ritual in modern western society has led to a private internalizing of religious experience.” We miss the artistic, the mysterious, the subconscious, and the historical in the overly intense drive for the immediate. Enthusiasm may run high, but nervous systems cannot take that much stimulation for long.

Again, balance is needed. A Spirit-inspired free prayer does more than a cold form. But a well-crafted prayer that expresses the heart of the worshiping community does not have to be cold. Liturgy that breathes will not suffocate the saints.

A small directive can give worshipers just enough structure to set them at ease. A train on its track is going somewhere. Some might call that limiting, but those willing to be instructed make good team players. They can have their part and play their part and know it is a part, not the whole.

Theologian J. J. van Allman writes, “Liturgical beauty is a protest, not only against all aesthetic self-centeredness, but also against negligence, coarseness, casualness and in general against vulgar familiarity.” Total freedom leads to heresy. Anything doesn’t go. There are ways to approach God, and there are avenues that dead-end. Uzzah found that out when he touched the ark. Truth is a boundary in which the Spirit moves.

Worship is as much a matter of seeing as of hearing. We have so elevated the pulpit (sometimes as much as twenty feet in some post-Reformation sanctuaries) that we have created stiffnecked people who think they have worshiped if they took good sermon notes. For Israel worship was a dramatic production that invited the attendance of the majestic Lord of hosts. The more the senses are involved—seeing, smelling, tasting, touching, hearing—the more the people of God are doing liturgy. If the form has not created such action, we have not properly used it.

Ways we have sought to let the liturgy live in our church include combining the great hymns of the church with more contemporary worship songs, often without a break in between. When they are in the same key, one can flow beautifully into the other. The hymns have a theological richness often missing in modern songs. On the other hand, the songs of today have simple Scripture texts that are quickly learned. They enable people to worship freely without props.

We also include well-known liturgical responses as a part of our informal prayer and praise services. By doing this we are telling the people we like to bring out the treasure of things both old and new.

Balancing the timely and the timeless

God is a progressive. While the saints are singing, “Gimme that old-time religion” the Almighty is declaring, “Behold, I do a new thing.” He is not the old fogey some might picture him—we are the experts at maintaining the status quo. We routinely turn movements into monuments, institutionalizing them so we can control them.

We don’t do well with change, though we desperately need it. Those trained by Jesus to be people of the Spirit rather than people of technique will be alive to the now, “The Spirit blows where it wills,” and sensitive people are eager to catch the direction of the wind.

The New Testament has two Greek words for time, chronos, or linear time, and kairos, which is opportunity. Hebrews thought more in terms of kairos than chronos. The opportunity presents itself and must be seized. It is the fullness of time. All times are in God’s hands. He orders the times and seasons, and his creation must be sensitive to his action and respond appropriately.

If we are only alive to the chronos (and in our church, the clock is in clear view), we might get out at the scheduled time, but fall short of God’s opportunity. Sensitivity to the moment does not preclude planning, but it may prompt the minister to change his direction because of some nudging he believes is from God.

When God comes into the midst of his people, we should know it and be able to respond to it. To be locked in to the bulletin at that time is to be absorbed with the menu rather than to enjoy the food.

There are times in liturgical worship that cry out for free expression. That’s why we often allow people to tell how God is working in their lives. To miss this is to leave worship unfulfilled.

And yet the past has volumes to say to the present. Faith is related to history. The God who acts is known because of the God who has acted. History and encounter are cousins. Remembrance and realization meet in worship.

James Dobson, Christian psychologist, writes that “our generation has the idea that history first began when the Beatles hit the Palladium. Such thinking alienates us from yesterday and creates a rootless society.”

The strength of the contemporary is that it speaks our language. The major liability is that it appears (and may be) shallow. It has not stood the test of time. The danger of time-dated material, however, is that it is so distant it seems unapproachable. Gregorian chants make fine songs for monks, but not for kids in Levi’s and sandals, or so it seems. People like one or two antiques around the house, but they don’t get much use.

Can we blend the two together? We try by offering a variety of musical styles. To throw out Bach because half the church is under thirty is to cheat the young. Those who appreciate “good” music will get it elsewhere, but few youth will ever go for Baroque unless we make use of it.

Contemporary music reaches their ears. Still, there is a side of God they are less likely to know. When President Kennedy was assassinated, several radio stations abandoned their normal programming and played three days of powerful classical music. Rock ‘n’ roll was judged inappropriate for the situation. It could not speak what had to be said.

So we use both hymns and worship songs. Music shapes theology. Of the 287 Old Testament quotes in the New Testament, 116 come from the Psalms, the hymnbook. The theology of today’s songs will shape the minds of our children. Luther said, “Music is the handmaiden of theology.” His enemies said, “Our people are singing their way into Luther’s theology.” We make sure our music is saying what we want it to—then use it generously.

We also mix free prayers with written prayers of the great saints. This way, people grow to appreciate “the older members of their family.”

Balancing leaders and laity

Worship in the New Testament drew from the sacrificial system as well as from the postexilic synagogue service. The Lord’s Supper took the place of the Passover as the dramatized act of redemption. The indwelling Spirit made every believer a priest and gifted member of the body. According to New Testament theologian Ralph Martin, Pauline worship stood on three legs: the didactic, the eucharistic, and the charismatic. Word and sacrament were blended with the sovereign activity of the Spirit.

By the time of Constantine, the freedom of the Spirit had been replaced by form. An increasing division between the people and the priest left the laity with little to do but watch. They did not share in Communion, now a Mass. Long cathedrals magnified the separation.

The Reformation recovered the truth of the priesthood of all believers. The Scriptures were given to the common people, singing by all was encouraged, prayers were spoken in a language all could understand, and sermons were preached to build up the people of God.

And yet how much new ground have we won since 1517? Does the Spirit blow as it wills in our services? Do we have a new trinity, as some suggest—the Father, Son, and holy Scriptures? On Sunday morning are we entertaining spectators or training participants? Is it a one-person show or a gathering of the called? Church was not meant to be a place where the minister ministers and the congregation congregates. Worship is not something done for the laity but by them. Our goal, according to A. W. Tozer, is more than believing—it is beholding. Actively beholding.

While the apostle did put the clamps on the Corinthian “charismaniacs,” he did encourage considerable liberty by the individual worshipers (1 Cor. 14:26-33). How much freedom are pastors willing to risk? Do they want the person in the pew healed of spectatoritis?

A revolution in communication has put the pressure on pastors to do their stuff on Sunday. Some feel guilty if they do not run a three-ring circus for people who are paying well to see a good show. God deliver us!

But we do need pastoral leadership in worship. Paul’s admonition about the need for “distinct notes” (1 Cor. 14:7 nrsv) came in the context of corporate worship. Tending the flock includes giving them the best we can when they are all gathered together. The more secure the leader, the more we are able to draw the people into worship and take them where the Spirit is moving.

One way I’ve tried to live this out is by letting the proclamation of the Word be shared by a variety of people, although I do most of it. I work with people individually and as a group to prepare them for speaking assignments. When I preach, I often use members to share testimonies as an illustration of my main point.

I’ve also found that the more people are free to respond to the initiative of the Spirit, the less nudging they need from the pastor. In our church, the teaching through the years has created an expectation that God will indeed move through the people and not only the pastor.

The end of worship

Most of us spend too much time with people, too little with God. We enjoy the koinonia in the outer court; we are less comfortable entering the Holy of Holies. We ride more on the good ship fellowship than the more important one called worship.

Yet the cure of countless physical and spiritual maladies is found in approaching His Majesty.

When have we worshiped? For some, it is when people have raised their hands or clapped joyfully. For others, when they have contributed to inspired singing or heard a powerful sermon. For still others, when the service has moved smoothly without any hitches in the sound system, the ushering, or the music.

For Israel, however, it was meeting with God. Being in the Presence might bring quietude or exuberance, weeping or joy, repentance or reflection. But worship meant coming to God on his terms and encountering him.

One morning God moved among us in a special way. A woman came out the door with tears in her eyes. “I’ve never worshiped before,” she exclaimed softly. “I’ve been to hundreds of services, but today I worshiped.”

And that, of course, is the reason for all our attempts at balance—to enable people to enter the presence of God to worship.

In touch with God

Prayer gets us in touch with God, causing us to swing like a needle to the pole star of the Spirit. It gives us focus, unity, purpose. We discover serenity, the unshakable firmness of life orientation. Prayer opens us to the subterranean sanctuary of the soul where we hear the Kol Yahweh, the voice of the Lord. It puts fire into our words and compassion into our spirits. It fills our walk and talk with new life and light. We begin to live out the demands of our day perpetually bowed in worship and adoration.

People can sense this life of the spirit, though they may not know what it is they feel. It affects the feeling tones of our preaching. People can discern that our preaching is not the performance of thirty minutes but the outlook of a life. Without such praying, our exegesis may be impeccable, our rhetoric may be magnetic, but we will be dry, empty, hollow.

We are told that when the Sanhedrin saw the bold preaching of Peter and John, they perceived them to be men who had been with Jesus. Why? Because they had a Galilean accent? Perhaps. But more likely it was because they carried themselves with such a new spirit of life and authority that even their enemies sensed it. So it is for us. If we have it, people will know it; if we don’t, no homiletic skills will take up the void.

What does prayer of this kind look like? What do we do? Intercede for others? Perhaps, but primarily we are coming to enjoy his presence. We are relaxing in the light of Christ. We are worshiping, adoring. Most of all, we are listening. Francois Fénelon counseled, “Be still, and listen to God. Let your heart be in such a state of preparation that his spirit may impress upon you such virtues as will please him. Let all within you listen to him. This silence of all outward and earthly affection and of human thoughts within us is essential if we are to hear his voice.”

Add to those words this perceptive observation of SØren Kierkegaard: “A man prayed, and at first he thought prayer was talking. But he became more and more quiet, until in the end he realized that prayer was listening.”

Prayer involves what the devotional masters often called “recollection.” It cultivates a gentle receptiveness to divine breathings. We do not do violence to our rational faculties, but we listen with more than the mind—we listen with our spirit, with our heart, with our whole being. Like the Virgin Mary, we ponder these things in our hearts.

Perhaps one meditation exercise will illustrate how we practice centered listening. I call it simply “palms down, palms up.” Begin by placing your palms down as a symbolic indication of your desire to turn over any concerns you may have to God. Inwardly you may pray, “Lord, I give to you my anger toward John. I release my fear of the dentist appointment this morning. I surrender my anxiety over not having enough money to pay the bills this month. I release my frustration over trying to find a baby-sitter for tonight.” Whatever it is that weighs on your mind, just say, “Palms down.” Release it. You may even feel a certain sense of release in your hands.

After several moments of surrender, turn your palms up as a symbol of your desire to receive from the Lord. Perhaps you will pray silently, “Lord, I would like to receive your divine love for John, your peace about the dentist appointment, your patience, your joy.” Whatever you need, say, “Palms up.” Having centered down, spend the remaining moments in complete silence.

There is no need for hurry. There is no need for words, for like good friends you are just glad to be together, to enjoy one another’s presence.

And as we grow accustomed to his company, slowly, almost imperceptibly, a miracle works its way into us. The feverish scramble that used to characterize our lives is replaced by serenity and steady vigor. Without the slightest sense of contradiction, we’ve become both tough with issues and tender with people. Authority and compassion become twins and infiltrate our preaching. Indeed, prayer permeates everything about us. It is winsome, life-giving, strong, and our people will know it.

In touch with people

Some of the richest times in my pastoral ministry came when I would go into the sanctuary during the week and walk through the pews praying for the people who sat there Sunday after Sunday. Our people tend to sit in the same pews week after week, and I would visualize them there and lift them into the light of Christ. I would pray the sermons on Friday that I would preach on Sunday. Praying for their hurts and fears and anxieties does something inside you. It puts you in touch with your people in a deep, intimate way. Through prayer our people become our friends in a whole new dimension.

In our congregation in Oregon was a little fellow who underwent two serious brain operations. The times of prayer we shared during those six weeks built a bond between us that was like steel. Twice I stayed in that hospital all day with his mom and dad waiting to see if Davey would live or die. Davey was only five years old, and he had Down’s syndrome, but I value him as one of my closest friends. And would he listen to me preach! No children’s church for him; he would perch himself up on that pew, eager, attentive. I do not know if he ever understood a word I said, but I would preach my heart out because I knew Davey was listening. If we have prayed with our people—really prayed with them—they will listen to us preach because they know we love them.