Living Out Our Worship Week 5

What do Christians do?

What do Christians do?

What do Christians do?

What do Christians do?

What do Christians do? What is the relationship between mission and worship?

What do Christians do? What is the relationship between mission and worship? Luke 10:38–42, Mary and Martha, worship and service

What do Christians do? What is the relationship between mission and worship? Luke 10:38–42, Mary and Martha, worship and service Delight, Encourage, Serve. Are these things related?

Class Overview I. Foundations II. Practices Worship means Ascribing Worth Worship involves Bodily Presence Worship involves the Symbolic Worship shapes how People live II. Practices Gathering Singing Communion Prayer Confession Scripture Reading

Class Overview Please note what we will not be talking about in this class: How we should or should not change what we do in our worship.

Class Overview Please note what we will not be talking about in this class: How we should or should not change what we do in our worship. This is a class about how we should practice Christ- centered living in our daily lives in light of what we do here on Sundays.

“In the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship.” David Foster Wallace

Week 5: Gathering “Human gatherings always involve worship, and worship always implicates human gatherings” Philip Kenneson, “Gathering: Worship, Imagination, and Formation” This is the first new slide after the recap slides. I plan to track fairly closely with Kennison’s chapter here. I’m going to present this quotation and then solicit reactions to it.

This is just sort of an object example to follow up with gatherings as worship. I’ll also solicit some reaction to the image. I’ll ask them to remark on what seems reverent in this image? What parts of the image illustrate the values of those in the stands, etc.

Then I’ll ask them to consider what changes when the gathering aspect of the venue is removed? Does it seem as though the place as has lost some essential? Something powerful?

Two Obscuring Assumptions We tend to think of worship as belonging to a “religious” sphere of live.

Two Obscuring Assumptions We tend to think of worship as belonging to a “religious” sphere of live. We tend to think of ourselves primarily as individuals; therefore, we think of gathering as expressive of self rather than formative of self. Here I follow Kennion in suggesting what some ideas that make it hard for us to credit the power of gathering in worship.

Gathering Gathering shapes our social imagination When we gather, we participate in common practices that only make sense within the world of the gathering. e.g. sports metaphors

How does gathering relate to our mission? The church ” gathers to have its potentially idolatrous imagination renewed by the narratives of Scripture and the practices of the Christian tradition.” (Kenneson)

Potentially Idolatrous Imaginations Our economic beliefs Supply and demand Scarcity

Potentially Idolatrous Imaginations Our economic beliefs Supply and demand Scarcity Our belief in difference How do we apportion our concern? We relate easily to people like us. “Who am I if not not you?”

Ekklesia  assembly ”The ekklesia [is] an imperfect anticipation of what God desires for all creation” (Kenneson).

Hebrews 10: 19-25 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. I think I’ll be able to elicit some of the ideas from the foregoing slides here. Primarily, I’d like to point out that there is a kind of internal logic in this passage as to why the church must continue to meet together: 1) gathering enables common practices (baptism, washing) 2) gathering imparts the social imagination within which structuring your identity around the resurrection of Christ “makes sense,” 3) gathering becomes more urgent as we get closer to the day of reckoning. Gathering make it more likely that we will be prepared to recognize the truth when we see it.

1 Corinthians 11: 27-34 So then, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup. For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves. That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep. But if we were more discerning with regard to ourselves, we would not come under such judgment. Nevertheless, when we are judged in this way by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that we will not be finally condemned with the world. So then, my brothers and sisters, when you gather to eat, you should all eat together. Anyone who is hungry should eat something at home, so that when you meet together it may not result in judgment. I’m less sure about the discussion around this passage. I wanted to show that gathering, as Paul presents it here, is not arbitrary. It is oriented toward a reality that we embody as we meet. We can therefore fall short of the truth or draw nearer to it depending on the things we do as we gather. I’d like to make this point without getting bogged down in specifics of how we worship.

Rowan Williams tells a story about nuns who made the decision to put up a sign that reads “private” on the front door of the convent. Itself, not that noteworthy of an action, until, that is, we learn of the direction of the sign. It was placed on the inside of the front door. It points to the fact that the outside world is a world full of sin and isolation (Adam, Where are you?), while inside the convent, through prayer and self-critical contemplation, a truly public life is being lived before God and one another. That is the real world. Everything outside and opposed to the grace, love, and justice of Jesus is non-being is unreality. So, we gather in worship to hear again the gospel, the Yes of God to his creation.

What implications should our gathering today have for what we do this week?