about blendingworship
Robert Webber coined the phrase blended worship to describe an approach to worship that combines the old ways with the new, the hymns with the contemporary. In Planning Blended Worship, he defines this style of worship as being characterized as:
- rooted in the biblical and early church tradition
- drawing from the resources of the entire church
- a radical commitment to contemporary relevance.
Although blended worship can be difficult to balance, it can be fitting for many churches wishing to bridge the generational gaps among churchgoers.This is why I decided to write this blog. I am currently serving as “worship leader” in a small church in New England that has recently decided to make some changes to keep the church from dying off (literally). A few years ago, a new pastor introduced praise choruses into the service. The worship style has evolved from there, but we have not given up on our favorite hymns — and occasionally grab the hymnals to sing!
So, I jumped on board to help facilitate the process of “blending” — we haven’t quite “blended” yet!
Some of you know me as Mandy Thompson from Georgia — some of you know me as Mandy Thompson from Massachusetts, but most of you probably don’t know me at all.
Either way, this blog will hopefully offer you a perspective on this “blending” experience, as well as tips and lessons learned to make sure things blend smoothly
Blessings in blending!
When you are ready to move again let me know
i appreciate the comment =) i love hillsong + united. i lived in Australia for 5 years during my high school years. I love your blog, and hope to look around some more. I’m curious if you went to college and if it is related to your current worship leading. I studied “church music” in hopes of becoming a worship leader, but i haven’t gotten that far yet. I call myself a worship leader in training. Even started my MA in Worship, but am taking a break from studying because not much of the material is new. I find that so much of worship seminars, and courses are the same material. Anyways. all that to say thanks, and i look forward to reading more. =) lorijo
bamboosong:
i did attend college… majored in Sociology and minored in Religious Studies. The Sociology gave me a great understanding of group dynamics, which definitely helps me now as i minister to groups! i haven’t had the opportunity, yet, to get a degree re: Christian Worship. but i have had the chance to take a few seminary classes that speak to that ministry to the Body, i.e.: History of Christian Worship.
outside of classes, i’ve been involved in leading worship for over ten years. i started in highschool, and am in my late 20s now. i’ve been a part of small groups with worship, women’s retreats, youth retreats, large youth rallies, college ministries, traditional churches with the token “contemporary” service, charismatic services, and full-out contemporary churches… my role has always involved singing & a guitar, or playing the drums, or something in the middle! i’ve been a member of the team & i’ve also led the team.
i’m currently serving in a small Baptist church in New England….. its an older congregation with a desire to continue on for the next few years. so they are introducing a more “contemporary” style service, which is where i enter the picture.
needless to say, its a challenge!
I’m curious to hear where you’ve started your MA. Is it a great program? And what are some of the recurring themes that are taught again and again (the same material)?
thanks for the comments!
wow, that is really cool. I started my MA in Worship at Hope International University (hiu.edu) where I work. It is a very small school. I actually may not continue this program. I did not like the structure of the program, and I needed a break from the craziness of working full time, commuting and studying, writing ten page papers, doing research and reading every two weeks. I learned a lot. But I also learned that I neglected other things that were more important. My relationship with a church body, and being in a small group was neglected. I felt guilty if I wasn’t at home studying. I am at the complete opposite place of where I was less than a year ago when I first looked into the program. I wonder if I was doing it just to have an MA in worship… Some of the other reasons include the fact that as one of the younger students in the program alot of the assignments are tailored to those who have been and are currently involved in ministry, which I would like to be, but am not, so it made it challenging. I’ve looked at several other programs such as Moody Bible Institute, and my own APU, but it just hasn’t appealed to me. I even considered studying in Australia, and as appealing as that is, it just never came to be.
here is the rest of my answer. this is my experience in grad school: My first ten week course consisted of 5 classes and we started by meeting for an intensive 8-day classroom teaching and discussion followed by ten weeks of online discussion, with two weeks allotted to each class to write a ten page paper, do research and the reading. Two of the classes were not related to worship at all, though World Religions was interesting. The Worldview(s) class was incredibly dull and he used extensive academic language to talk about a subject I was very familiar with, having covered that in an entire semester my senior year.
The third non-worship class was on Spiritual Formation for Leaders and I loved it. We talked about Henri Nouwen, we had a professor from Fuller, and talked about the importance of the spiritual life and rest of our life being more connected, less compartmentalized. We talked a bit about Gary Thomas’ book Sacred Pathways, which I loved and also a book by Eugene Peterson.
My two worship classes were my favorite, and we had Buddy Owens from Saddleback talking about his book “The Way of the Worshiper: Discover the secret to a friendship with God.” He emphasized the importance of having a strong personal worship life. And our assignment was to write about how we planned to deepen our personal worship life, how to distinguish between talent and anointing, and how to function more intentionally as a teacher and mediator in the congregation’s life. The best resource we had for this class was Andy Park’s book “To Know You More”
The second worship class was called Platform Leadership and the Culture of Worship. We had Curt Coffield and Martin Allen as our presenters. We talked a lot about basic stuff, planning services. The last session we spent talking about developing a culture of worship that extended through the church throughout the week. A challenging subject.
As I skimmed my papers to answer your question, I realized it doesn’t really look like it was a lot of material repeating itself. But when I considered registering for the next course, none of the classes really struck me or stuck out. Taking that into consideration and the fact that last several courses in my emphasis dealt with a lot of material, from hymns, to music in worship, to church music administration, to planning services, talking about the different types of music programs at different churches (Exploring the Worship Spectrum: Six views & Counterpoints edited by Paul A. Basden) and an entire course on Emergent Worship (now that was interesting and I still have trouble explaining it!)
As an undergrad I had a great variety of teachers from a conservative former Presbyterian church music director who emphasized the importance of choirs and hymns, to an unusual (emergent?) music director from a very large Presbyterian church in L.A.
My studies as a music major were very challenging, but it was the last two years when I started taking my emphasis classes that I thrived. I also loved my Bible classes and considered getting a minor until I had a few issues with their theology and my dad graciously pointed out that he had been concerned that I had chosen to attend APU because of their ‘liberal’ theology. At least he waited until my junior year to tell me this.
I have also looked into graduate theology/Bible/ministry programs. For now I guess I’ll just wait, and do my own research. =)
this is all very interesting and very helpful… ok, one last question: can you give us a type of reading list based on the classes you took as you started the MA in Worship degree?
you’ve already mentioned a few:
Henry Nouwen’s stuff
“Sacred Pathways” by Gary Thomas
A Eugene Peterson book
“The Way of the Worshipper” by Buddy Owens
“To Know You More” by Andy Park
great stuff!!!!
give us more books to read.