Pray and Pay Attention in Church Again
December 2018
Paying Attending in Worship
December 2018
Unlock the Archives for Free
Asking your free, three-month trial to Tabletalk magazine. You'll receive the print issue monthly and proceeds immediate digital access to decades of archives. This trial is risk-free. No credit card required.
Attempt Tabletalk Now
Already receive Tabletalk mag every month?
Verify your email address to gain unlimited admission.
{{ mistake }} Need help?
A beloved friend took my married woman and me to dinner last calendar week. We went to an expensive eating place that served a fabulous repast. But that is not why he chose it. Rather, it was a place peculiarly suited for conversation. There was no loud music clarion, no televisions with ESPN highlights and scrolling baseball scores. Undisturbed, we dined and talked for nearly five hours, and it was a delightful time.
Reflecting subsequently on the experience, I was struck past how the conditions for fine dining can differ so much from our expectations for public worship. My ain congregation promotes its worship as simple, avoiding the worship bands, big screens, and other common features of many churches today. But any pride that I may be tempted to experience is dispelled when I read how the Westminster Assembly, in its Directory for Public Worship, prescribed the proper fashion to approach worship:
The people are wholly to nourish upon [worship], forbearing to read annihilation, except what the minister is then reading or citing; and abstaining much more from all private whisperings, conferences, salutations, or doing reverence to any person present, or coming in; as likewise from all gazing, sleeping, and other indecent behavior, which may disturb the minister or people, or hinder themselves or others in the service of God.
Whispering, gazing, sleeping—if I am honest, I must plead guilty to these and other "indecent behaviors" that hinder my worship and disturb others. The Westminster Larger Canon reinforces a demand for reverent attending in worship. Pew sitters are to
nourish upon [the Word read and preached] with diligence, preparation, and prayer; examine what they hear by the Scriptures; receive the truth with religion, beloved, meekness, and readiness of listen, every bit the Word of God; meditate, and confer of information technology; hide it in their hearts, and bring forth the fruit of it in their lives. (Q&A 160)
An unattainably loftier bar, we are liable to remember. But the Westminster divines wanted u.s. to understand that it is largely through public worship that God meets with His people. These standards serve to deliver God'south promise that the Word and the sacraments are effectual to the elect for salvation. Reformed worship is most guarding the pulpit and fencing the table. The Westminster Assembly goes even farther and asks, How are nosotros to eliminate the distractions that beset u.s. in worship?
For one, we might rethink the logic of "seeker-sensitive worship." We should be concerned about visitors in our worship, merely our concern for them should not prompt us to maximize their condolement and pleasure over the worship of God.
Traditional church practices refocus our attention on the gospel and enable our worship of the transcendent God.
Second, focused attention warrants a measure of withdrawal in order to properly reflect on the things of God. This requires that we filter out some senses that might backbite from our attending to the Word, such as being distracted past java or looking effectually. Fifty-fifty our Bibles themselves require caution; the Westminster Directory warns confronting Bible reading during worship if it extends beyond the text of the sermon.
What about reading from the Bible app on our smartphones? Circumspection is again needed. Our phones are a pathway to many distractions—there is texting and tweeting and much more than. Even if we think we are disciplined enough to practise restraint, nosotros should consider how we are encouraging others who lack our cocky-command. (Think, we are engaged in public worship.)
Single-minded attention is strange to us, even in worship, because we accept pride in our ability to navigate our busyness with speed and nimbleness. In a multitasking world, Marva Dawn rightly concedes that worship is a "royal waste of time" considering we are focused on something that our corybantic culture dismisses every bit inefficient. And yet, neuroscientists take come up to the consensus that multitasking is a myth. We attain far less when we juggle several tasks than when we focus on one thing at a fourth dimension. What is worse, our digitally enhanced distractions are becoming addictive: our brains crave constant stimulation and instant gratification. How ironic, then, that we program our phones with "alerts" and "notifications" for and then-called breaking news when they take the result of diminishing our alertness, prompting thoughtlessness and negligence to the task at mitt. In sum, the spirit of our historic period is inimical to the careful and sustained attention that public worship demands.
Is it possible anymore to resist the persistent distractions of our digital historic period that obscure the message of the gospel? We need not abandon such a hope. Traditional church building practices refocus our attention on the gospel and enable our worship of the transcendent God. Public worship and Sabbath keeping are the most culturally confusing witnesses for Christians to practice. On a 24-hour interval designed for the soul to feast, we must resist habits that distract united states of america and others. I am trying to go completely offline during the day. It is proving to be a dandy struggle, but I trust that it will awaken me from the daze that tin come from living in a culture that prizes distraction.
The stakes may be college than we think. As distraction dulls our senses, information technology can lead even believers to indifference about heavenly matters. The book of Hebrews (which many commentators believe was originally a sermon) speaks powerfully to our digital historic period when it warns, "We must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from information technology" (Heb. two:1).
If we can carve out undistracted time and space for a fine meal, why not also for public worship? Later all, the conversation is even amend, and then is the food.
John R. Muether is professor of church history and dean of libraries at Reformed Theological Seminary in Orlando, Fla. He is author, coauthor, or editor of several books, including Seeking a Better Country: 300 Years of American Presbyterianism.
Source: https://tabletalkmagazine.com/article/2018/12/paying-attention-worship/
0 Response to "Pray and Pay Attention in Church Again"
Post a Comment