Last week I caught the end of “Pop Britannia – Two Tribes” on BBC Four. It was a documentary looking at the “struggle between the forces of art and commerce” in British pop music over the last 30 years. You know the kind of thing –
Stock, Aitken, Waterman versus Blur
X-Factor or Arctic Monkeys
It was well presented and quite uplifting to recall how the radical edge has always re-surfaced to challenge the production line approach. Towards the end the presenter comments:
“British pop always eats itself and creates something totally new.”
Hence the title for this entry.
For a long time now, I’ve been frustrated by the ‘production line’ approach to church services. The same basic formula week in, week out. Where is the innovation? The pulsating, creative response to our Creator God? John Drane wrote a book called ‘The McDonaldization of the Church’ and I fear that’s exactly where we’ve reached.
Time to take a fresh look, try some new approaches, different emphases.
Why do we limit our worship for a limitless God?
Stock, Aitken, Waterman versus Blur
X-Factor or Arctic Monkeys
It was well presented and quite uplifting to recall how the radical edge has always re-surfaced to challenge the production line approach. Towards the end the presenter comments:
“British pop always eats itself and creates something totally new.”
Hence the title for this entry.
For a long time now, I’ve been frustrated by the ‘production line’ approach to church services. The same basic formula week in, week out. Where is the innovation? The pulsating, creative response to our Creator God? John Drane wrote a book called ‘The McDonaldization of the Church’ and I fear that’s exactly where we’ve reached.
Time to take a fresh look, try some new approaches, different emphases.
Why do we limit our worship for a limitless God?
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1 comment:
I understand where you are coming from. What I would like to see are your suggestions for alternative types of service, ideas, suggestions etc etc.
Personally I find it a wonderful honour to take-part in services, but devising and leading worship I really dislike doing - essentially becuase I am not at all creative and do not have much to offer in this area.
With respect to McDonald's I think that we face something slightly different. While McD's invest millions and spend years carefully planning the bland uniformity they impose on us, when our services become samey, its more to do with the exact opposite; that they are put together by overworked people, carrying greater burdens then we imagine.
Although the obvious answer to this is greater congregational involvement - the proportion of people willing/able to do so can be surprisingly low.
more to say on this ... maybe later!
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