Hi Brian,
Thanks for the good word. Really. I appreciate it.
I hope you really don't feel
I'm being combatitive, or insincere in my manner. For what it's worth although someone else did, I never called into dispute either you questions themselves, or your manner. At the top of one of my other posts I wrote what I'll repeat: Feel free to comment or ask questions however you like. I'm direct in my comments, but I hope never obnoxious. Please tell me if you feel I'm ever talking down at you, even in disagreement.
Regarding some of your responses:
The reason I want you to define the language "decently and in order" for me, is 1) because if you become a pastor, or even a teacher, you will need to nail down an agreed upon meaning for the terms you use so that your listeners will not think "abc" when you mean "xyz"; and 2) although I too want things done decently and in order, its clear that if we don't agree on how to apply those words, I might apply them to something that you think is not decent or orderly.
So, while I don't really think simply one dictionary defintion of "decently" is especially helpful (because it says nothing explicit about worship), I can start by assuming that you are satisfied for the time being by replacing the word "decently" with " in conformity to recognized standards of propriety or morality." I would say that "orderly" also needs its own defintion. Paul didn't use two words where he could have used one.
Now, where do these "standards" come from? How do we "recognize" them? If they are "recognizable," are they consistent from place to place? Can we agree on them from Ontario to Ohio? How about from Africa to Mexico? If you happen upon an undefined assembly in Uganda, should you be able to immediately recognize the gathering as worship, whether they have a building (with or without a cross on it) or not?
Who defines the bounds of propriety? I'll assume that by "morality" we are agreed that the Bible
alone gives us the standards of right and wrong. Are we obliged to also derive our standard of propriety from the Bible alone? Should Paul (if he were alive) be able to walk into any worship, world over, and recognize the propriety of it, be comfortable and at ease in it? I think so, because we have one Lord, one faith, and one baptism. And worship is essentially an act of heaven (I am simplifying) intersecting with earth. This is Spiritual worship.
Does it even make sense (?) that you might NOT be able to go to a church in Papua New Guinea, and with the exception of needing a translator (see 1 Cor. 14:5) feel at home in worship? But if everything in church is just "culturally relative" then if you feel awkward and humiliated, that's your problem? "Nothing wrong with what we're doing!" This is the recipie for Babel, not the Kingdom of God.
I happen to believe musical accompaniment
(instruments) is not inherently objectionable in worship according to the Scriptures, which shows there is some intramural disagreement on this score, even among those on the board who are likeminded regarding the basic law of worship. But how do you respond to someone who challenges every one of your "alowable" or "objectionable" items, especially the latter. He turns around and says for example, "That's not a 'butt-slap', that was just our cultural "hello". We think shaking hands is pretty disgusting"?
Swinging from the ceiling? Sounds like a stage show. "There's nothing disorderly about that! Do you know how much choreography goes into that? We have 20 floor managers (worship leaders), 6 deacons who are Paramedic qualified and drilled like Delta Force, and a closed circuit radio-network in our facility like the Secret Service. Our operations are mapped out like a football playbook." Sounds orderly and organized to me!
So much for subjectivity. We need more than "this behavior fits
my recognized standards; that behavior doesn't."
Re: Nadab & Abihu.
"Maybe it was ..." Stop right there. This isn't a response to what I wrote, it is a
dismissal of what I wrote, and a hasty generalized one at that. If you think that this incident is "OT, therefore irrelevant," then say so. Would you say the same thing about everything before the book of Matthew? If not, what consistent rule do you use to determine what is and what isn't relevant.
If you "don't know if it's relevant," then study the matter, or at least offer what you think is wrong with the analysis I offered. But please don't opine about "maybe" as if that off-the-cuff suggestion had as much merit as my exegetical labors. Even if they were a waste of energy, and nonsensical conclusions, at least I was dealing with the text of Scripture. When God speaks, we need to figure out what it means and why or in what manner it's relevant to us.
"Why did God command stoning..." is a question about civil polity, not about worship. The irony is that some people even think that such civil questions aren't even debatable, and that they should be implemented (in fact, if not in manner).
I'm not even interested in that aspect of debate. That we don't worship in the outward manner of the OT rites is explained
in detail in the NT book of Hebrews. But it is still the same God we worship, not some alternate deity.
Perhaps you could have appealed to a
ceremonial command instead, and asked what is the difference between a command (e.g. Ex. 30:34-38) and what I'm proposing about a trancendent law of worship behind all the outward display in every age.
Brace yourself for a strong criticism here: saying "decently and in order didn't apply back then, they weren't the church," shows that you really never got your definiton of "decently and in order" out of the Bible, but is mostly an importation of your own idea of the concept to the Bible. That's just a fact. Heb. 8:5 is a quote of Ex. 25:40, and that passage proves beyond any question that doing things decently and in the order that God prescribed was unquestionalby a vital aspect of OT religion, and is the
biblical background to the NT concept as Paul expresses it in 1 Cor. 14:40.
As for Israel not being designated a church, while the NT does call them a church (Acts 7:38), this line of discussion is not directly relevant, so I pass over it.
Re. my outrageous example of church allowance (which was and is totally indefensible)
You ask
me, "why not?"
(I know you just want to hear my answer, you aren't advocating this behavior)
According to our rule, that behavior is not an element of worship, God doesn't authorize it, therefore we can't sanctify it by figuring out a way to include it in worship.
But you just say "its supposed to be done in private, therefore not in corporate worship." I don't disagree with the sentiment, but may I have a Scripture reference, please? Why doesn't the "privacy tent" I suggested (tongue-in-cheek) work to meet this criteria? You offer that God "isn't our focus" during s#x. Shouldn't he be? 1 Cor. 10:31.
But when a man has his rule under the direction of the Holy Spirit would He do something that God would not approve of? I believe that God gave us minds to reason with and when you are submitted to God, you will think the way He does.
Is everyone in the process of whatever he calls "worship" definitely and clearly under the direction of the H.S.? Plainly this is false, for even Christians frequently think they are doing well when they are sinning. So how do you know if you are following the H.S. and not the imaginations of your heart? How do you know if your mind is in fact submitted to God? How do we compare what your thinking with what I'm thinking? Which of us--one thinking "A", the other "anti-A"--has the mind of Christ on the matter? God isn't schizoid in mind, so we both can't be having the mind of God on the same issue if we are opposite. Is my rule of worship wrong then? Could your's be wrong?
Don't forget to differentiate between manners of doing the same thing, and doing different things but calling them the same thing. The first is circumstancal, the second is substitutionary. But for the most part, none of the questions I offered to stimulate you to think critically about your current doctrine or practice or seems to have done its job. Ho hum. Here's one of the same questions again: How do you propose to criticize Roman worship? What do they skip that's commanded? What do they include that's not allowed? What about all the other things they do that are neither commanded nor forbidden? That church sure is decent and orderly!
Re. preaching
I can "agree to disagree" on the definition as soon as you defend your view with reference to Scripture. My definition is based on Scriptural use of the term, so if yours is different (but Scriptural) I need your information in order to check mine, maybe fix it.
What
precisely does the Bible say we are all--old, young, officer, pew-warmer, male, female--supposed to do? I agree that everyone has a general responsibility to be a faithful witness to God's truth, but how do you define "preacher" and "preaching", according to the biblical use? Do you have some examples of non-officers preaching?
If preaching is a specific
something according to the Bible, and its supposed to be a part of worship, then we need to stick to whatever the Bible calls preaching. If you think that a general witness is supposed to be a part of worship (like perhaps "testimony time"), just defend that from Scripture. It doesn't help when you decide ahead of time that dozens of different things can be "preaching" and then justify them by including them in the definition of preaching, whenever you find the term in the Bible.
If everyone in the church is a "preacher" then (remember, I disagree with your premise) anyone can get up in the pulpit and preach. You are absolutely correct. This would include women. And children. And therefore, if ANY says "God gave me a message to preach," you are obliged to sit in obedient attention. Listening to the herald give GOD's message is your moral duty. When God speaks via his messenger, everyone else shuts up and listens. The church leadership doesn't really have a choice either, whether to let this one speak or not, as long as he or she is a member. Every one of them is a member and a preacher. The church is obligated to make space and time for them. If you say, "women are forbidden to preach," (true) what has happened to your definition of preacher, and of what is allowable in worship?
Now maybe this isn't what you see at your church, in which case I'm glad. But I assure you that where the doctrine you are espousing is consistently held, this is exactly what you find. The mixed up Corinthians had this problem too. Lots of chiefs, few indians, 1 Cor. 15:26.
You are not willing to establish a "preaching" definition solely by the biblical data, so pretty much anything goes, as far as what you will allow. On the other hand, I find from beginning to end in the Bible a sharp contrast established between what we "hear" and what we "see". Seeing is always subordinated to hearing in God's economy, and all kinds of restrictions established around it.
Idol worship is the reverse of Biblical worship. It is dominated by sights and smells. Biblical religion is about the Word. The Israelites were to visit the Temple on occasion; they were to eat, breathe, and sleep in the atmosphere of the Law. They were to "listen" to the prophets and priests who lived and walked among them in their towns and villiages teaching them God's Word.
Jesus was the living
Word. And that Word was put into writing once for all time. "That which we have seen
and heard (!), and our hands have handled,
declare we unto you." So the apostles
to a man practiced a ministry of declaration. Not a single example do we find of some other "mode" of declaration beside verbal. In fact, to "declare" differently from verbally really involves re-interpreting the word "declare" in a metaphorical sense.
But again, it doesn't seem to matter how often the Bible uses the language of WORDS, Brian, you keep saying that "word" language can actually be all kinds of "non-word" things. Because you have a pre-disposition to allow for that. If it's in your mind, it must be the mind of Christ, and therefore, it must be OK. But the apostle John begs his Christian followers, "little children, keep yourselves from idols." We always have to work at pulling down idols in our thinking.
Understand what I'm NOT saying: I'm not saying that all puppet shows are bad, or that drama never has anything good to convey. Dance has its place, as does cooking, and pottery, and s#x. But NONE of these things are preaching (despite your protests), and they are not all equally valuable as means of spreading the gospel, and NONE of them are permissible in the context of gathering for worship.
Some concluding thoughts:
According to the only biblical testimony presented so far, drama is not only not preaching, it is categorically different, it is essentially visual, and thus is even opposed to verbal preaching on some level, even if not diametrically opposed.
Before I can capitulate to your rationale justifying drama, or anything else, I need something from the Bible to hold on to. "Jesus used parables." I use illustrations in my sermons. How do you get from parables (verbal stories) to stories with puppets, mimes, or actors?
You suppose that Paul didn't use drama because he wasn't an actor. Of course he also may not have used it because it was not "decent." Which is it? What does the "silence" tell us? I am less interested in whether he might have used drama under certain conditions (I reckon not) as I am whether he permitted it in worship. There is not a remote ghost of its sanction for worship in the ENTIRE NEW TESTAMENT.
And then you still need to prove that Paul
might have used drama if he had been so inclined. He said, 'I have become ALL things to ALL men, so that I might by ALL means save SOME." So where did this ambassador of Jesus Christ reduce his message to a play, or a picture? So if drama were the job of a minister, surely we could find at least ONE example of ONE apostle, or preacher using it in the NT, or commending it.
Comparing "standard" preaching to a university lecture has certain advantages, and also disavantages. Since the two aren't the same thing (of course, they are the same in your definition, when lecturing may be classed as "preaching"), the dissimilarities ought to be acknowledged. Here is where they are most similar: Both are didactic, they are efficient modes of teaching or conveying information. They have the advantage of orderly presentation, of people gathered and prepared to learn. Jesus commanded the apostles: "Teaching them to observe whatsoever I have commanded you."
Now before you offer that drama is a great teacher, I want to know, "how?" When it is explained? That sounds more like teaching after the fact (or before). Or does the dialog include a "teaching" solliloquy? Where do we get out of the "entertainment" mode, and into the "teaching" mode?
"But kids need drama, or benefit from it; they don't appreciate the 'speaker'." Is this generation of children different from the last 200? How is it that Paul could preach to children (Eph. 6:1) but it doesn't work today? Worship is intergenerational. Carving up the worshippers is a travesty. No wonder children are growing up and rejecting the teaching-church. They've not been taught to sit and listen! All it took was one generation of yanking kids out of general worship (following pop-psychology) for "their own thing" to empty the churches (generally) of the youth. Youth that had followed their parents in replacing them in the congregations for centuries. And in one generation we've impoverished the church of tomorrow. Puppet-shows and drama in the worship of the church is a symptom--of a generation of children raised to assume this is normal, because they grew up on this diet. In other words, it is
childish to have drama in worship.
For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil." (Heb. 5:12-14)
We are to be brought into adulthood, Christian maturity, through worship. And we are turning the clock back, making people lazy (or else keeping them childish) by introducing entertainment features into worship.
1Co 13:11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.
But all this merely begs the original question, whether drama per se belongs in our public worship. Who is the "audience" for our worship? God is. We in the pews are all the actors--not the preacher, not a group of worship leaders. We are the actors, even when we are sitting still. We are the ones "playing a part" in worship,
which is the drama. So "drama" as we are familiar with it is a subversion of the order of worship, since it makes the actors into the audience. It is "outof order", it is "disorderly".
"Drama", as I said earlier, has a place. Worship is not that place.
I know how difficult it is to be surrounded with that. God bless you for hanging in there--I pray he will use you.
The former are very common during the children's moment.
