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Dear friends,
What is a minister, Asking that question about 40 years ago would probably have produced the answer, 'someone who preaches God's word and leads worsip'. But nowadays the second part of that answer is in doubt. In many churches the responsibility for leading worship has been passed to worship leaders or a music group.
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Having separate worship leaders has the advantage of using all the gifts the Lord gives and saves the church seeming like a 'one man (or woman) band'. On the other hand, worship may be light if led by those who have not been suitably trained. The boring old 'hymn sandwich' led by the minister can develop into a more enticing, but possibly less nutritious, worshio trifle.
One of the leading Baptist thinkers and authors, John Colewell, has recently criticised a style of worship that has become popular in Baptist (any many other) churches:
'Worship is reduced to singing one song after another, often for no better reason than personal preference; there is little sense of direction, progression or journey.... Little could be more tedious than the repetitive singing of one song after another, at least when the variety of those songs from week to week tends to be so limited. Any sense of movement from praise, through confession and thanksgiving.... intercession and petition has been abandoned in the attempt to create an atmosphere. What may initially have all the attractions of the lively and the contemporary.... quickly degenerates into the dull and predictable'.
Colewell blames this state of affairs on 'the abdication by so many free church ministers of any direct responsibility for worship'.
It seems to me that it should be possible to get 'the best of both worlds', by combining the talents and insights of several people who have real gifts in leading worship, with the involvement of the minister, whose life must be dedicated to exploringthe height, depth, length and breadth of the word of God. I have aimed at this combination at Central. The goal is to have worship that is thoughtful, content-full, lively, varied, deep, wide-ranging and accessible to all sorts of people.
But what do you think? How far is it the minister's role to 'lead worship'?
Yours in Christ's service
Mike
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