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Exploring the Worship Spectrum: Six Views by Paul Basden [Zondervan, 2004] (Paperback) [Paperback]
Exploring the Worship Six Views by Paul Basden [Zondervan, 2004] (P...
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July 3, 2024
This book was written at the end of the “worship wars,” that battle of perspectives between old-time (i.e., 1950s) hymn singers on one hand and contemporary worship music on the other. Although the dichotomy still remains, aspects of the debate have shifted. Some contemporary worship, though still banal, has gotten a bit more substantial. At the observational level, contemporary worship promotes drums and bongos while traditional worship does three hymns and a lecture. This book, however, demonstrates the issues behind the scenes. The contributors represent liturgical (Zahl), traditional (Best), contemporary (Horness), charismatic (Williams), blended (Webber), and emergent (Muhlenberger). Robert Webber’s approach wins hands-down. That does not mean I agree with everything he says, but his position best represents the Bible.
And that raises another point. For those of us in the Reformed tradition, we begin with the question “How does God tell us to worship?” The contributors to this book do not. Webber comes the closest. His position is labeled as “blended,” but that is not entirely accurate. He does not advocate a blend of “guitars” and “organ,” which is what blended services usually advocate. Because none of these contributors hold to the Regulative Principle of Worship, I cannot fully endorse any of them. The book is still valuable, though, if only as a historic reference point.
Because I despise everything about the emergent church and postmodernism, one would expect me to think the emergent contributor was the worst. Far from it, actually. The worst take was not even the charismatic (who, ironically, actually came closest to approaching the Regulative Principle); it was the contemporary perspective, but that should not come as a surprise.
Formal-Liturgical
Zahl begins on a good note: worship is vertical before it is horizontal. It “looks up first before it looks out.” It has the advantage of not depending on the preacher or the bongos. Although he represents a liturgical perspective, Zahl rightly keeps us centered on the primacy of the Word, noting that the “Word creates the sacrament, but not the opposite.”
In response, Harold Best (contemporary) takes issue with Zahl’s claim that other approaches “make it up as they go along.” He says “Almost nobody does this.” I disagree. That is literally what most do. Some of the other contributors even say as much.
Traditional Hymn-Based Worship (Harold Best)
Disclaimer: I grew up in this setting and I appreciate it. Second disclaimer: none of the contributors, except perhaps Webber, are even vaguely aware of exclusive psalmody. Nonetheless, since most psalms follow the cadence you would find in hymns, this is probably where EP advocates would end up.
Best’s argument is straightforward, if not profound: hymns allow for “thinking biblically…alongside the Scriptures.” Unfortunately, Best’s position comes very close to what contemporary advocates want: “The very existence of hymnody is tantamount to God saying, ‘Now that I have said all that I need to, let me hear you sing back to me on my terms.” Except he does not actually ask what God’s terms are. This line is simply a more intellectually defensible (and aesthetically pleasing) variant of the same bad theology of contemporary worship music.
To his credit, Best understands that traditional worship cannot be reduced to hymns versus choruses. I think all of the contributors intuit this.
Not surprisingly, in response, Horness complains that such an approach “causes us to miss the explosion of God’s creativity and the movement of his Spirit that is ongoing in the world.” Of course, at no point does Horness give us any guidelines to discern what is God’s Spirit and what is not.
Contemporary
This is a valuable chapter even if it is a very bad chapter. Horness is very clear on what he thinks worship is. Unfortunately, everything he thinks is wrong. In his response to Paul Zahl, he defines worship as “giving.” It is “the response we offer to what we have received.” The second part of that is not completely wrong. Worship includes our response to God, but that is not what worship is about.
Far from asking what God requires in worship, Horness exults, “We love the freshness that creativity brings and the authenticity that contemporary worship inspires.” Sounds a lot like making it up as you go.
To his credit, Horness at least tries to begin with the Bible. Noting with Isaiah that “these people’s hearts are far from me,” Horness sees the goal of contemporary music as to move hearts by who God is, otherwise we are going through the motions. Contemporary worship seeks further justification as “people of this generation are longing to experience the genuine presence of God.” And as is common with this approach, worship is evangelistic and must be meaningful to the unchurched.
Although he does not realize it, he captures a truth that liturgical approaches have long known: worship trains the body. For him, it “teach[es] our people to emote and express their love for God freely as well.” The rest of the chapter contains such platitudes you would hear in that moment of the service where the music has ended and the sermon is about to begin, but the worship leader is not quite ready to give up control.
As we can expect (and indeed, enjoy), the other contributors have a field day with this chapter. Zahl notes, as many of us have experienced, “Contemporary worship is almost always held hostage to its musicians, who happen to love the sound of their own performance….This is the reality.”
The charismatic responder makes a somewhat surprising and perceptive point: “is it really the case that where feelings are dead, worship is dead. Feelings change. Affections are not constant. Many psalms reflect this.”
Robert Webber notes that this chapter is “too much about what I ought to do and do little about what God has done for me.”
Charismatic Worship (Don Williams)
I will say this for him: he is the only contributor to actually work through the Bible. I just disagree that some of the gifts are operative today. Most of this chapter is an interesting and informative historical survey of the charismatic movement. Williams’s argument, however, depends on whether one is a cessationist or a continuationist.
In response Webber asks an obvious question: Horness did not mention the role of the Eucharist. Of course, this fatal omission is part of the contemporary worship problem as well.
Blended Worship (Robert Webber)
I am not sure why Webber titled his chapter “Blended Worship.” His argument is simple and fresh, much of it later echoed Michael Horton’s fine A Better Way: “The content of worship is inseparable from its structure or order.” This order reflects a pattern where God gathers his people, they proclaim his story in word and song, they enact that story in sacraments, and they are sent into the world.
Webber’s approach, strictly considered, is indifferent to particular styles. True, his appropriate emphasis on God’s transcendence means bongo drums and interpretive dance are probably off limits. On the other side of the coin, this illustrates why traditional and contemporary approaches are often saying the same thing: both see worship as “done to the people and for the people, but seldom by the people.”
Many of the responses to Webber miss the point. They ask how such a structure could minister to the man in Papua New Guinea. What they fail to miss is that this structure, in some form or other, ministered to the peasant in England and the man in southern India in the early church. And the sword cuts both ways: will the tribe in the jungle really respond to organ music?
Emergent Church (Sally Morgenthaler)
I disagree with everything she says in this chapter, but it was not a bad chapter. True to the emergents’ fascination with narrative, she begins with a story of a fictional worship leader whose wife is a drunkard and daughter a Brittney Spears fan. Have you ever walked into a store and they had the Jerry Springer show on in the background? That is what the chapter is like. It is like a horror movie for your emotions. Whatever it was, it was not boring.
Emergent worship, reacting to traditionalism and the Boomer over-reaction, can best be described as a pastiche of low, grunge culture loosely telling a story somewhat related to Jesus. As bad as her proposal is, she makes a number of telling points against Boomer contemporary worship. After 9/11, “the feel-good choruses we’d been singing for the past decade and a half were not going to fit very well with images of jetliners slamming into buildings.” True enough. In response, Horness protests against contemporary worship described as “enforced-happy,’ vaudevillian style, outfits, and ‘church logo.” Methinks he protests too much.
Conclusion
The book represents the state of the discussion in the early 2000s. Grunge and emo versions of emergent church never really captured the culture in the way that Boomer contemporary worship did from the 1970s to 1990s. Even if one likes pastiche artistic productions, coming up with fresh displays each Lord’s Day can only work if one has a big budget and lots of time.
A better work representing early 2000s worship from a Reformed perspective is Michael Horton’s A Better Way.
And that raises another point. For those of us in the Reformed tradition, we begin with the question “How does God tell us to worship?” The contributors to this book do not. Webber comes the closest. His position is labeled as “blended,” but that is not entirely accurate. He does not advocate a blend of “guitars” and “organ,” which is what blended services usually advocate. Because none of these contributors hold to the Regulative Principle of Worship, I cannot fully endorse any of them. The book is still valuable, though, if only as a historic reference point.
Because I despise everything about the emergent church and postmodernism, one would expect me to think the emergent contributor was the worst. Far from it, actually. The worst take was not even the charismatic (who, ironically, actually came closest to approaching the Regulative Principle); it was the contemporary perspective, but that should not come as a surprise.
Formal-Liturgical
Zahl begins on a good note: worship is vertical before it is horizontal. It “looks up first before it looks out.” It has the advantage of not depending on the preacher or the bongos. Although he represents a liturgical perspective, Zahl rightly keeps us centered on the primacy of the Word, noting that the “Word creates the sacrament, but not the opposite.”
In response, Harold Best (contemporary) takes issue with Zahl’s claim that other approaches “make it up as they go along.” He says “Almost nobody does this.” I disagree. That is literally what most do. Some of the other contributors even say as much.
Traditional Hymn-Based Worship (Harold Best)
Disclaimer: I grew up in this setting and I appreciate it. Second disclaimer: none of the contributors, except perhaps Webber, are even vaguely aware of exclusive psalmody. Nonetheless, since most psalms follow the cadence you would find in hymns, this is probably where EP advocates would end up.
Best’s argument is straightforward, if not profound: hymns allow for “thinking biblically…alongside the Scriptures.” Unfortunately, Best’s position comes very close to what contemporary advocates want: “The very existence of hymnody is tantamount to God saying, ‘Now that I have said all that I need to, let me hear you sing back to me on my terms.” Except he does not actually ask what God’s terms are. This line is simply a more intellectually defensible (and aesthetically pleasing) variant of the same bad theology of contemporary worship music.
To his credit, Best understands that traditional worship cannot be reduced to hymns versus choruses. I think all of the contributors intuit this.
Not surprisingly, in response, Horness complains that such an approach “causes us to miss the explosion of God’s creativity and the movement of his Spirit that is ongoing in the world.” Of course, at no point does Horness give us any guidelines to discern what is God’s Spirit and what is not.
Contemporary
This is a valuable chapter even if it is a very bad chapter. Horness is very clear on what he thinks worship is. Unfortunately, everything he thinks is wrong. In his response to Paul Zahl, he defines worship as “giving.” It is “the response we offer to what we have received.” The second part of that is not completely wrong. Worship includes our response to God, but that is not what worship is about.
Far from asking what God requires in worship, Horness exults, “We love the freshness that creativity brings and the authenticity that contemporary worship inspires.” Sounds a lot like making it up as you go.
To his credit, Horness at least tries to begin with the Bible. Noting with Isaiah that “these people’s hearts are far from me,” Horness sees the goal of contemporary music as to move hearts by who God is, otherwise we are going through the motions. Contemporary worship seeks further justification as “people of this generation are longing to experience the genuine presence of God.” And as is common with this approach, worship is evangelistic and must be meaningful to the unchurched.
Although he does not realize it, he captures a truth that liturgical approaches have long known: worship trains the body. For him, it “teach[es] our people to emote and express their love for God freely as well.” The rest of the chapter contains such platitudes you would hear in that moment of the service where the music has ended and the sermon is about to begin, but the worship leader is not quite ready to give up control.
As we can expect (and indeed, enjoy), the other contributors have a field day with this chapter. Zahl notes, as many of us have experienced, “Contemporary worship is almost always held hostage to its musicians, who happen to love the sound of their own performance….This is the reality.”
The charismatic responder makes a somewhat surprising and perceptive point: “is it really the case that where feelings are dead, worship is dead. Feelings change. Affections are not constant. Many psalms reflect this.”
Robert Webber notes that this chapter is “too much about what I ought to do and do little about what God has done for me.”
Charismatic Worship (Don Williams)
I will say this for him: he is the only contributor to actually work through the Bible. I just disagree that some of the gifts are operative today. Most of this chapter is an interesting and informative historical survey of the charismatic movement. Williams’s argument, however, depends on whether one is a cessationist or a continuationist.
In response Webber asks an obvious question: Horness did not mention the role of the Eucharist. Of course, this fatal omission is part of the contemporary worship problem as well.
Blended Worship (Robert Webber)
I am not sure why Webber titled his chapter “Blended Worship.” His argument is simple and fresh, much of it later echoed Michael Horton’s fine A Better Way: “The content of worship is inseparable from its structure or order.” This order reflects a pattern where God gathers his people, they proclaim his story in word and song, they enact that story in sacraments, and they are sent into the world.
Webber’s approach, strictly considered, is indifferent to particular styles. True, his appropriate emphasis on God’s transcendence means bongo drums and interpretive dance are probably off limits. On the other side of the coin, this illustrates why traditional and contemporary approaches are often saying the same thing: both see worship as “done to the people and for the people, but seldom by the people.”
Many of the responses to Webber miss the point. They ask how such a structure could minister to the man in Papua New Guinea. What they fail to miss is that this structure, in some form or other, ministered to the peasant in England and the man in southern India in the early church. And the sword cuts both ways: will the tribe in the jungle really respond to organ music?
Emergent Church (Sally Morgenthaler)
I disagree with everything she says in this chapter, but it was not a bad chapter. True to the emergents’ fascination with narrative, she begins with a story of a fictional worship leader whose wife is a drunkard and daughter a Brittney Spears fan. Have you ever walked into a store and they had the Jerry Springer show on in the background? That is what the chapter is like. It is like a horror movie for your emotions. Whatever it was, it was not boring.
Emergent worship, reacting to traditionalism and the Boomer over-reaction, can best be described as a pastiche of low, grunge culture loosely telling a story somewhat related to Jesus. As bad as her proposal is, she makes a number of telling points against Boomer contemporary worship. After 9/11, “the feel-good choruses we’d been singing for the past decade and a half were not going to fit very well with images of jetliners slamming into buildings.” True enough. In response, Horness protests against contemporary worship described as “enforced-happy,’ vaudevillian style, outfits, and ‘church logo.” Methinks he protests too much.
Conclusion
The book represents the state of the discussion in the early 2000s. Grunge and emo versions of emergent church never really captured the culture in the way that Boomer contemporary worship did from the 1970s to 1990s. Even if one likes pastiche artistic productions, coming up with fresh displays each Lord’s Day can only work if one has a big budget and lots of time.
A better work representing early 2000s worship from a Reformed perspective is Michael Horton’s A Better Way.
April 11, 2019
As has been said in other reviews of this book, i was surprised by the unity amidst diversity of the writers. There was pretty much unanimity on the definition and goal of worship. An encouraging and challenging evangelical (even charismatic) focus on the vertical aspects of worship: drawing into the presence of God, using music and song to speak the language of love and thanks to God.
The difference of opinion was largely one of stylistic preference, justified by different priorities and contexts.
Lots of mutual respect between the authors. Perhaps too much. I would have liked to see more sharp critiques from the dissenting parties to bring into sharper distinction the difference of opinion/position.
I’m not quite sure when one position ends and another one begins, and I’m not sure the authors are either.
Here lies the problem with this book. It’s just not adversial enough. The positions are just not distinct or incompatible enough. Even the liturgical advocate is a self-confessed charismatic! (Page 154).
Here’s some golden quotes.
Zahl:
“The fact is, theology has to precede the act of worship. You pray what you believe, not vice verse.”
“Where liturgies cannot pass Bible scrutiny they are worthless and worse than useless.”
“If our forms chain is to the appearance and not the reality of intercourse with God then the forms must go!”
“There is no decisive absence of the Sprit within the form if the form is presented in Pentecostal sincerity.”
“When the church uses these old tunes and texts, we are making a radical emotional catharsis available to returning POWs from the secular world’s aggressive superficiality.”
“Contemporary worship is almost always held hostage to its musicians, who happen to love the sound of their own performance.”
“The core problem with the charismatic renewal movement was its emphasis in victory rather than on the dereliction of the Cross, on sanctification rather than redemption, on victorious living rather than simul iustus et peccator... The Charismatic Movement blew it because it wanted to pole-vault over Calvary on the way to Pentecost.”
Harold Best:
“Individuals live long enough within an ecclesiastical tradition to become one with its particular dialects and to hear and respond easily within its constraints.”
“The hymn book is a temporal and artifactual servant of the Word of God... a comprehensive exegetic work; metrical theology.”
“Composition is really improvisation slowed down and codified. Improvisation is composition sped up and on the spur of the moment... Only the Holy Spirit, the Infinity Trustworthy Improviser, is capable of breaking patterns of so called spontaneity. Spontaneity of this kind can appear within fixity, so as either to confirm or disturb it, and spontaneity, so as to fix and control it.”
“To defend a particular style as being the answer to dead worship or the open door to live worship can all too easily make way for the belief that authentic worship is style-based before it is Spirit-driven.”
“There is, however, a bit of ambiguity as to whether charismatic worship rests in a Pneumocentric Christology or a Christocentric Pneumatology... If the role of the Spirit is to bear witness to the Son and to bring him forcefully, continually, and pedagogically into our fullest spiritual purview, then it becomes critically important for us to keep our attention on the Christ.”
Joe Horness
“Worship is about giving. Worship is the response we offer to what we have received. It’s one thing for a form to deliver truth. It is another thing altogether to inspire a heartfelt expression of our response to that truth.”
“Forms and methods are the tools used by the people who are being used by God. The goal is to help people fully engage their hearts in offering authentic expressions of worship to God.”
“The problem arises when the church refuses to grow and learn, when we cling to the historical at the expense of the spiritual, and when the subtle goal of using hymns is to maintain tradition, not to deepen worship. The difficulty continues when the priority becomes preserving our indigenous church culture at the expense of remaining accessible to the culture outside of church walls.”
“The instruments, and even the worship style, are only tools. They are not ends in themselves. The end is to meet with Jesus, to know his presence, to fully engage our hearts in authentic expressions of love to Him.”
“For great worship to flourish, people must carry in their hearts a great picture of God. They have to learn to love him a lot! Great worship rightly arrived at is simply a great response to who he is.”
Don Williams:
“The active exercise of spiritual gifts means that the whole congregation may be engaged in charismatic worship. Rather than passive observers, worshippers become active participants.”
“My clear bias is that contemporary worship is a way station on the road to experiencing the fullness of the Spirit and the release of His gifts for the whole congregation... this means that all worshippers come with gifts to be given, not just the up-front leadership... the priesthood of all believers is being functionally restored.”
Robert Webber:
“True blended worship is the fullness of the liturgical renewal blended together with the concern for the immediacy of the Spirit.”
“The most serious problem with both traditional and contemporary worship is that they are non-participatory. In sermon-driven, choir-driven, and band-driven worship, worship is done to the people and for the people, but seldom by the people.”
“The fundamental issue of worship style is that worship must be participatory. Worship is a synergism of divine and human activity; it is dialogic.”
“Worship is the work of the triune God, and the worship (service) that is most pleasing to God the Father is the work of the Son.”
Sally Morgenthaler:
“If sources other than classical western forms seem outnumbered perhaps it is because a strong cultural bias prevents non-western and generally non-classical sources from appearing on the formal-liturgical radar screen.”
The difference of opinion was largely one of stylistic preference, justified by different priorities and contexts.
Lots of mutual respect between the authors. Perhaps too much. I would have liked to see more sharp critiques from the dissenting parties to bring into sharper distinction the difference of opinion/position.
I’m not quite sure when one position ends and another one begins, and I’m not sure the authors are either.
Here lies the problem with this book. It’s just not adversial enough. The positions are just not distinct or incompatible enough. Even the liturgical advocate is a self-confessed charismatic! (Page 154).
Here’s some golden quotes.
Zahl:
“The fact is, theology has to precede the act of worship. You pray what you believe, not vice verse.”
“Where liturgies cannot pass Bible scrutiny they are worthless and worse than useless.”
“If our forms chain is to the appearance and not the reality of intercourse with God then the forms must go!”
“There is no decisive absence of the Sprit within the form if the form is presented in Pentecostal sincerity.”
“When the church uses these old tunes and texts, we are making a radical emotional catharsis available to returning POWs from the secular world’s aggressive superficiality.”
“Contemporary worship is almost always held hostage to its musicians, who happen to love the sound of their own performance.”
“The core problem with the charismatic renewal movement was its emphasis in victory rather than on the dereliction of the Cross, on sanctification rather than redemption, on victorious living rather than simul iustus et peccator... The Charismatic Movement blew it because it wanted to pole-vault over Calvary on the way to Pentecost.”
Harold Best:
“Individuals live long enough within an ecclesiastical tradition to become one with its particular dialects and to hear and respond easily within its constraints.”
“The hymn book is a temporal and artifactual servant of the Word of God... a comprehensive exegetic work; metrical theology.”
“Composition is really improvisation slowed down and codified. Improvisation is composition sped up and on the spur of the moment... Only the Holy Spirit, the Infinity Trustworthy Improviser, is capable of breaking patterns of so called spontaneity. Spontaneity of this kind can appear within fixity, so as either to confirm or disturb it, and spontaneity, so as to fix and control it.”
“To defend a particular style as being the answer to dead worship or the open door to live worship can all too easily make way for the belief that authentic worship is style-based before it is Spirit-driven.”
“There is, however, a bit of ambiguity as to whether charismatic worship rests in a Pneumocentric Christology or a Christocentric Pneumatology... If the role of the Spirit is to bear witness to the Son and to bring him forcefully, continually, and pedagogically into our fullest spiritual purview, then it becomes critically important for us to keep our attention on the Christ.”
Joe Horness
“Worship is about giving. Worship is the response we offer to what we have received. It’s one thing for a form to deliver truth. It is another thing altogether to inspire a heartfelt expression of our response to that truth.”
“Forms and methods are the tools used by the people who are being used by God. The goal is to help people fully engage their hearts in offering authentic expressions of worship to God.”
“The problem arises when the church refuses to grow and learn, when we cling to the historical at the expense of the spiritual, and when the subtle goal of using hymns is to maintain tradition, not to deepen worship. The difficulty continues when the priority becomes preserving our indigenous church culture at the expense of remaining accessible to the culture outside of church walls.”
“The instruments, and even the worship style, are only tools. They are not ends in themselves. The end is to meet with Jesus, to know his presence, to fully engage our hearts in authentic expressions of love to Him.”
“For great worship to flourish, people must carry in their hearts a great picture of God. They have to learn to love him a lot! Great worship rightly arrived at is simply a great response to who he is.”
Don Williams:
“The active exercise of spiritual gifts means that the whole congregation may be engaged in charismatic worship. Rather than passive observers, worshippers become active participants.”
“My clear bias is that contemporary worship is a way station on the road to experiencing the fullness of the Spirit and the release of His gifts for the whole congregation... this means that all worshippers come with gifts to be given, not just the up-front leadership... the priesthood of all believers is being functionally restored.”
Robert Webber:
“True blended worship is the fullness of the liturgical renewal blended together with the concern for the immediacy of the Spirit.”
“The most serious problem with both traditional and contemporary worship is that they are non-participatory. In sermon-driven, choir-driven, and band-driven worship, worship is done to the people and for the people, but seldom by the people.”
“The fundamental issue of worship style is that worship must be participatory. Worship is a synergism of divine and human activity; it is dialogic.”
“Worship is the work of the triune God, and the worship (service) that is most pleasing to God the Father is the work of the Son.”
Sally Morgenthaler:
“If sources other than classical western forms seem outnumbered perhaps it is because a strong cultural bias prevents non-western and generally non-classical sources from appearing on the formal-liturgical radar screen.”
March 30, 2020
I’m not a huge fan of this series and it doesn’t help that this book is very dated. Some good stuff here, but not one that I would read again or recommend, particularly because of how old the conversation is now.
March 2, 2021
painful.
September 12, 2024
This book was an interesting read, though clearly time-stamped by the time it was written. Not really a book to look at in today’s context, as these authors were in a pre-postmodernist world, and presented their views with a mindset that it was primarily a fad, not knowing that it would catch fire in society and become the predominant worldview amongst governments and influential individuals and groups. My argument would be that the “emergent” view shouldn’t even be included. I’m not being intolerant, but at best, their perspective on what the church gathering should look like falls so far away from the fairly malleable image painted by the Bible that I would say it’s hard to imagine its relevance in the conversation. Their ideas are cool, but I would liken them to a neat exhibit that travels from city to city. I’d go to it, but I would consider it to be a meditative and worshipful exhibit rather than a worship gathering. Like a worship art show. Which, is actually a compliment. Tasteful experiences like that would be a creative art form that departs from the cringey entertainment media we have now.
March 12, 2023
Fascinating! I think this book presented all views fairly and loved to see the dialogue between views. I was left with some appreciation for each one, with some realization of the weaknesses of each one as well. Though I wouldn’t be comfortable going to a church with all of these styles, I think most of them have a place at least in a special service. Very thought-provoking.
June 20, 2020
Assigned to critique for summer class. Some really good points made, but it's so dated that entire sections barely felt relevant at all. Cohesive idea of the definition and purpose of true worship, but certain authors get snarky and others focus in on irrelevant minutiae.
November 18, 2023
briefly introduction
This is a good book for amateur worshipper I order to acknowledge the heritage of worship styles. This book also provides us a milestone for exploring the spectrum of worship and brought us a deep reflection for true worship. Highly recommended.
This is a good book for amateur worshipper I order to acknowledge the heritage of worship styles. This book also provides us a milestone for exploring the spectrum of worship and brought us a deep reflection for true worship. Highly recommended.
December 18, 2024
Skimmed the book. As many reviewers have pointed out, it's amazing how dated the book reads only 20 years later.
March 10, 2025
Dated in spots. Some of the essays are virtually useless today. Some are poorly written and not thoroughly though through. Webber’s is great and Best’s is worth the price of entry
August 14, 2025
As the kids say, “mid”
Or to be less contextualized and more traditional - “res pessima.”
Or to be less contextualized and more traditional - “res pessima.”
February 16, 2013
This book is great insofar as it highlights the range of worship styles and theories in the church today. The book is set up to take you from the most conservative (high church/liturgy), to the most informal (Charismatic and Emergent). I come from a background in contemporary/blended worship, but it was those two chapters (in addition with the emergent worship) that I wrestled with the most.
Paul Zahl (liturgical) and Harold Best (hymn based) steal the show in this counterpoint piece. While I found Zahl's chapter a bit lacking (he offered little benefit for liturgical in terms of the theology backing it), he was incredibly solid and thought provoking in his responses. Best was easily the most engaging author to me. Much of what he said resonated deeply in the confines of scripture, and he offered fair praise and balance critique for all the other streams.
It also seemed that Best ans Zahl were the only ones to not attempt to make exclusive claims in their feature chapters. Both freely admitted that there is no "right way" to worship, and they are merely providing a perspective that they think works best.
Paul Zahl (liturgical) and Harold Best (hymn based) steal the show in this counterpoint piece. While I found Zahl's chapter a bit lacking (he offered little benefit for liturgical in terms of the theology backing it), he was incredibly solid and thought provoking in his responses. Best was easily the most engaging author to me. Much of what he said resonated deeply in the confines of scripture, and he offered fair praise and balance critique for all the other streams.
It also seemed that Best ans Zahl were the only ones to not attempt to make exclusive claims in their feature chapters. Both freely admitted that there is no "right way" to worship, and they are merely providing a perspective that they think works best.
April 11, 2014
Typically I like books from this Counterpoint series. But typically the editor sets an agenda and framework for the subsequent discussion by presenting questions that the various authors must answer. This provides a certain amount of unity to the discussion and essays. This sense of unity is completely lacking in this book, except for the fact that they are all in some what talking about worship. The result is a collection of loosely related articles and responses that makes for a somewhat confusing and rather unhelpful read. It's hard to compare the views because the different authors come at the discussion from very different angles and talk about very different things. In short, it's not organized.
-- Not very impressed this time.
-- Not very impressed this time.
July 27, 2016
Good introduction to understanding six broad worship traditions. The authors each approach their assignment from a different angle, so the comparisons are not necessarily clear, but you can still discern the essence of each approach. No matter which side you are on, you can find truths reflected in the opposing side that are ideally lived out across all six. This provides a common thread of agreement as to why worship is important.
September 29, 2012
This book is very dated and doesn't reflect the current spectrum of worship. Worship music and liturgy has become more eclectic in recent years that many churches in their worship practices don't fit any of the categories. Also, much of the discussion deals with musical genre, but worship goes beyond music.
April 18, 2016
Some good insights interspersed throughout this book, but in the end I walked away simply thinking the book would be better named "Fighting About the Worship Spectrum: Five White Men and One Woman Exchange Insults About Why Their Opinion is the Only Right One and Everyone Else's Basically Sucks"
Not much there that appeals to a millennial like me.
Not much there that appeals to a millennial like me.
March 9, 2014
A little dated. It was written in 2004. Also, I felt like the responses went out of their way to praise the other authors. That got old fast. But the different authors provided a short history of their views. And I took some good principles from the different positions.
May 25, 2016
Great introduction into the 6 categories of "Worship Style."
1. Formal-Liturgical
2. Hymn Based
3. Contemporary
4. Charismatic
5. Blended
6. Emerging
This book gives you a basic understanding to each of these Worship Styles.
1. Formal-Liturgical
2. Hymn Based
3. Contemporary
4. Charismatic
5. Blended
6. Emerging
This book gives you a basic understanding to each of these Worship Styles.
July 20, 2007
Dry at times, but effective in message.
May 15, 2014
whatever
December 8, 2015
This book gave some thoughtful insight into some of the different kinds of worship that are used in churches today. Worth a quick read for people working in ministry.
Read
February 20, 2016read for school
July 7, 2016
I agree with Kirk Miller's thoughts.
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