Leading with foresight when worship cultures collide
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ChatGPTDo you struggle with attendees who have been doing church for over 50 years, with thinking from 50 years ago?
Many leaders do.
One of my DMin students described it this way, "… the church wasn't so mission-minded (50 years ago) because everyone was in church, and it was more about traditions and helping people feel a need for church in their lives …
Today, people are less focused on their sinful nature and more on how God can help them in their lives and how they can make a difference. I am trying not to ignore anyone in my congregation. I want everyone to be seen, heard, valued, belong, and make a difference."
To help everyone to be seen, heard, valued, belong, and make a difference begins by helping the church board, teams, and staff see older and younger generations as different "cultures."
A culture is the invisible operating system of an age group. At church, it is largely reflected in their view of "this is how we do church."
One of the strongest indicators of culture is the artistic styles they prefer in Sunday morning music, liturgy, and the structure of the worship service. These elements are influenced heavily by artistic preferences.
Each generation grows up with different artistic preferences. In church, this is exemplified by the style of music, the musical instrumentation, the language used in the liturgy, and how the audience participates.
All these artistic expressions go together to form different types of "generational, age cultures" in a church.
Older cultures were developed in a period when going to church was accepted, and churches needed only to be accessible to grow.
But today, where going to church is the exception rather than the rule, younger generations want to begin with meeting the needs of people who don't go to church.
Yet, trying to get older people who've grown up in a culture that sees things the first way is very difficult, because changing a person's invisible operating system is difficult and takes a lot of time.
Have you ever considered that trying to change a person's culture has an element of colonialism, that is to say, we want the older culture to embrace the music, aesthetics, and style of our generation, or vice versa?
Note, I'm referring only to artistic styles, not referring to theology. I believe theology should be biblically orthodox and unalterable across cultures. But artistic expressions aren't binding in the same manner.
I have found it helpful to start by allowing an older culture to have its own worship service with its own artistic aesthetics, separate from the contemporary service.
That way, they can worship with the artistic and cultural styles with which they feel most comfortable. We are more likely to forget about the artistic medium and move into a supernatural connection with God.
After all, the Hebrew word for "worship" means drawing close to God, not to each other (Psalm 95:6-7).
But people ask, "Where does unity come from in a church that has different services? Should we worship together to be united?" Not necessarily.
Worship is not about creating unity, unless it's a special service designed to acquaint people with different styles of worship.
Usually, weekly worship is designed to connect us regularly to the unseen God. And people do that best in the artistic forms with which they are comfortable.
I know this, having married my college sweetheart who grew up in a vibrant Lutheran church culture. To this day, she sometimes listens to a Lutheran Sunday worship service to hear some of the songs she enjoys and because of the familiarity. For me, who grew up in a church where the Bill Gaither Trio attended (a Gospel Quartet), I like more contemporary music, needless to say.
That still begs the question: how does the church of multiple worship cultures get unified?
My work as a foresight professor has led me to believe that in the future, unifying a church will best be accomplished by leading the church together, not necessarily leading worship together. Worship is artistically biased. And trying to force another artistic group to embrace your artistic preferences goes against respect and accommodation for different artistic styles.
Some of the more important ways that churches learn to work together are running the church together, being on the boards together, making long-term plans together, looking at the future together, creating mission and vision statements together, organizing church-wide picnics, outreach events, and prayer meetings.
However, some leaders will view the Sunday worship service as the time when they want to bring people together in unity.
And if that's your number one goal on Sunday morning, then it's best to have a culturally blended service, but theologically, you might not foster as much worship.
Remember, different generations in a church function as different cultures with distinct worship preferences, and unity is better built through shared leadership and mission than by forcing everyone into the same worship style.
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Bob Whitesel (D.Min., Ph.D.) is a foresight coach, professor, and award-winning author of 14 books. For over 30 years, he has guided leaders and churches to pivot and engage what’s next. He holds two earned doctorates from Fuller Theological Seminary and teaches on leadership foresight, church health, and organizational change. His website is www.ChurchForesight.com. Learn More » |
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