Sunday
Jan282007
So last night I wrote about distraction...
Sunday, January 28, 2007 at 01:28AM
Everybody knows I love U2. Well, apparently not as much as the folks at this church. They had a U2 Christmas Show!!.
Check out the clips, and let's discuss this. I have a hundred thoughts and I don't know where to begin...
Check out the clips, and let's discuss this. I have a hundred thoughts and I don't know where to begin...
Reader Comments (24)
I think any thought about this has to begin with the question, "Why? What's the motivation?" Whenever I see this, I have to wonder what makes someone want to do something like this in their heart of hearts. The true reason.
wow. incredible. my fav is beautiful day. or maybe vertigo where the dude is dressed up exactly like bono.
wow.
This has got to be just a show, right? It doesn't look like worship to me. Personally I have a big problem with the "showmanship" that we see in the church these days. I am all for a good band and a rocking sound, but when you start adding big light shows and songs that are stretching it WAY too far, you lose some things. Passion, honesty, and a true connection, just to name a few.
I am kind of with Joe on this one. IT was not badly done, I just wonder why? I mean, especially why for a Christmas thing? I didnt really see the connection. Well done I guess with most of the covers... just dont know if that is what I would hope to see in a church. Not because it is a church but because is that show really trying to give God glory? Maybe, but once again, the connection is hard to find.
Yeah, I have to say I'm a little dubious about this. What was their motivation? It seems like too many churches are looking for gimmicks as a way to pull people in, and often I feel like that just competes too much with the Gospel. I wonder if people who went walked away thinking, "God is so amazing" or just, "U2 has got to be the best band ever." Not that God couldn't work through it because God can work through whatever He chooses, but it leaves me a bit uneasy, although I don't think I'm really articulating why it does so.
I am strugling with the others to find the Christmas connection. But excellent covers. Where The Streets Have No Name is very well done.
That is one sweet church website and I am actually going to give them the benefit of the doubt because it does look like they are doing a lot of good things.
this is the epitome of our culture's influence on the church. I really hate the pop-entertainment theology that is everywhere...although I do love U2 as well. I don't know where to begin as well..
some episcopalians are right there with ya:
http://www.e4gr.org/pray/u2charists.html
Let me throw this question out there, though...
What is wrong with using technology and "pop culture" to get the attention. If what is being taught is the Bible, what difference does it make if it is bluegrass, hyms or U2?
"The connection with Christmas" isn't hard to find if you just use your imagination. But that's a bit beside the point, I think.
The last commenter mentioned "teaching the bible". I wrestle with the exact question he asked. I have tended to answer it simply by saying that style isn't neutral, but communicates volumes, as we postmoderns should be extremely aware by nature.
I run in circles where some people insist that psalm-singing is the only appropriate worship music in public worship. I don't tend to buy their arguments, but boy does this U2 thing push me more toward a pragmatic argument for something approaching psalmody. I just think that even "cool people" like we all aspire to be can both have a love for and a creative engagement with even the most popular cultural expressions of our day and at the same time demand that our worship assemblies have a good bit more of an element of other-worldliness than U2 Church is putting forth.
excellent cover of Baba O reilly in there too....this is quite a progressive church
Man, I'm not sure what to think. Very well produced, for sure. Very slick. Very trendy. Very cutting edge. Before I pronounced judgement, as this was evidently a special service, I checked out a couple of songs that I know as more "worship" oriented. It all looked like a performance. I don't know their hearts, and I pray that they are reaching people for Christ. That's the point. But I just don't know. I did the "seeker" thing for a while, and it just left me feeling like I just ate Chinese food...filled me up, but I was hungry again in an hour.
Like Steven said, if it's reaching people for Christ, I say "Amen." However, the greater question is: what Christ are they being reached with? The Christ who bled and died and rose again so that we might have new life? Or is it the christ of cheap grace and pop culture that reinforces our American identity? I'm not going to judge them, because I haven't been there, and I think you have to sit with a people and worship with them to get an idea of their heart. Jesus said the world would know us by our fruit. I pray their fruit is visible to those they're ministering to.
I actually work at that church on Thursday nights, but I don't attend there, so although I got all their ads about the U2 Christmas thing they did, I did not attend.
Interesting...I played at that church a couple of years ago. We attended the Sunday morning service and they did "Bad" by U2. It was the first time I had heard it. Now when I listen to the original version I think, "Man, Bono sure does sound like that guy at that church!" They did it well. They must really love U2. As for the service and format, not my kind of thing.
I think that if they are really reaching people for Jesus while using more contemporary songs by various artists, then more power to them. Most of the songs that they have used relate to serious needs that people have, and the church can show how Christ can fill those needs. I also hope though that Christ is being revealed to non-believers and they are going away with more than just a concert experience....
I LOVE U2. They are the best band in the world right now by most measurable definitions. They are, however, not a band whose primary mission is the glorification of Christ. Some of their songs point to God as the hope and salvation of mankind and I can see the song's use in a church service. But a whole Christmas service? It sounds more like a glorification of U2 than a glorification of God. Maybe I'm too judgemental but then again maybe these guys need to find an open mike night at a local establishment as an outlet for their love and admiration of Bono. Sorry for the sarcasm I just fear this direction in our churches.
One note to clarify...it looks like it wasn't one Christmas concert, but a sermon series from the month of December. The songs seemed to be used as sermon illustrations--not worship or as a stand-alone Christmas show. I'm not much of a U2 fan, but this would, at the very least, grab my attention and help me relate to the message.
"It doesn't matter whether you're selling Jesus or Buddha or civil rights or 'How to Make Money in Real Estate With No Money Down.' That doesn't make you a human being; it makes you a marketing rep. If you want to talk to somebody honestly, as a human being, ask him about his kids. Find out what his dreams are--just to find out, for no other reason. Because as soon as you lay your hands on a conversation to steer it, it's not a conversation anymore; it's a pitch."
--Danny Devito (Phil), from "The Big Kahuna"
Why must everything on the church docket be related to explicit evangelism? Isn't there room for art/ideas/teaching that is beautiful and true, just because it's beautiful and true? We cloak the four spiritual laws like a spiritual dagger, ready to attack.
From day one, Bono/U2 have demonstrated--more with actions than words--the truth that it is better to give than to receive. To boot, evangelicals should make careful note of the fact that unlike any other band since the inception of Jesus music (the music that predated CCM), U2's catalog has brought the gospel message into the mainstream culture with little compromise to message or ethics. The gospel has a broad, world-wide stage and we have U2/Bono to thank for it. Like the music of Bono, I applaud Granger Community Church for reaching out to the community with something that resonates ... not with words that make the group sound like they are from another planet, but with the common ground of music.
This church, like Bono--shatters stereotypes that non-Christians inevitably hold of Christians. The gospel can be woven into the fabric of our lives, our hearts--indeed the Church without making us walk and talk like space creatures. Human beings tend to run from Martians, but tend to be attracted to beauty.
"Without compromise," like Keith Green said--of course. But when we speak congruently in a language only we understand, what's the point?
Isn't this discussion little more than the, "Hymns or contemporary music" argument? And further, like that argument, doesn't it really miss the point?
I would say that although we are called to spread the gospel, we are also called to glorify God. The problem I see, styles aside, is that the church today does not focus on what is the proper way to give God glory. We do not have the authority to say that this or that glorifies God. We have only the guidelines in Scripture to follow. So, we cannot pick whatever it is that we like or is cool or will bring the masses to our church doors just becsue we think it will give God glory. If it seems questionable, why risk offending our Savior?
Kurt,
Good, true and beautiful should be the marks of everything we do, no doubt. But our activities in public worship of God are of a different character in some significant ways than our activities outside these assemblies of worship. Art for art's sake (i.e., good, true, beautiful art) is inherently glorifying to God, even if it's done by a pagan, I might add. And it's especially the calling of Christians who do their work-as-neighbor-love as a grateful response to the gospel. But the church's public worship is not the place for "art for art's sake." It's the time to gather and perfect the saints by calling and nurturing them in the Word and ratifying the new covenant in Christ's blood through the church's sacraments. This all sounds churchy, of course. But that's just the point. The church's public assemblies of worship should offer something that the world can ONLY get there. Nobody else is in this peculiar business but the institutional church, so lets leave the true and good and beautiful neighbor-love for the rest of the week.
Some thoughts on this subject, but if I have my facts wrong, I'm open to correction:
Quite a few years ago I read an interview with either Eddy DeGarmo or Dana Key, can't remember which guy, who voiced his frustration over a poll that was taken asking people to name their favorite Christian rock band. U2 was #1. This was maybe 20 years ago. Of course, DeGarmo & Key had a difficult time, only getting air time on Christian radio and way back then, not very many Christian radio stations would touch rock music of any kind. My understanding is that in the UK, there is no such thing as Christian radio. You either get played on radio or you don't. So there is U2 getting air time because they are a good rock band that happens to have some religious overtones in some of their songs. DeGarmo & Key is a Christian rock band just trying to make ends meet in the US. Regular rock stations didn't want to play Christian music no matter how good the music was. Sort of like when you can't get a gig in a club because you played in a church.
It was a big stink when Michael W. Smith and Amy Grant had songs playing on SECULAR radio for the first time, because they had CROSSED OVER (to the dark side, I guess).
Things are a little different now, but not that much. My guess is, it depends on how good of a marketing agent an artist has.
On a totally different line, my understanding is that some of the hymns we sing today are old drinking songs with the lyrics replaced. So in the olden days, folks took melodies that would be familiar to the people and gave them spiritual lyrics to sing. So a bit of the "world" seeping into worship is nothing new. But I'm guessing folks were not inundated with all the styles of music like we are today.
A going theme here seems to be the question, "What's wrong with using pop culture to evangelize?" While I think it's dangerous to harbor the separation of heart (a 'sacred' vs. 'secular' approach) that this question seems to sustain, I also think that "they will know you by your love". In a world (specifically in the 'west') that is admitting that abject materialism is not correct (and that even that is a spiritual worldview), U2's message has the great potential, among millions of fans, to lose the specific focus of the band members' convictions in the translation. Doctrine is still important. Yes, I think Bono and the others are living out the lifestyle dictated by their worldviews, but other folks can live out that lifestyle without the specific worldview, thus being without a root (I seem to remember Oprah being discussed on here long ago). All told, merely U2's music (which I love, by the way) isn't necessarily going to draw people in for anything more than a good time, and I agree that the 'cloak & dagger' approach isn't right. But also, a good time isn't a bad thing, especially one that puts believers in proximity with nonbelievers and allows that connection that fosters relationships (a great evangelistic tool) and that goes beyond 'Christianese'. I don't think this offends our Lord, as long as it does not go, as Paul says, against your conscience. Specifically, though, this tends to worry me simply because it limits a church to what they can do with people who will come in because they're playing U2 (or, as I recall, I saw some Blue Man Group in there). In a church where music matters stylistically, no matter what style that is, there are limits as to what can be done in this community of believers. It's kind of like eHarmony.com. If you agree with your spouse in everything at the outset (that's an exaggeration, but for the sake of example...), then you'll never grow and you'll never sacrifice - two things which are a huge part of Love. There's a time for everything.
Without being overly simplistic, what we are discussing comes down to personal preference—not essential theology. The point of my Danny DeVito quote, which may have been lost on Andy Stager (not your fault Andy, I wasn't very clear)—was not that one approach to worship is right or wrong. To the contrary, whether it’s music selection, jeans or no jeans, art or no art, and other more trivial issues, most of it comes down to what we “like.� And we should closely guard against selling such personal inclinations as essential tenets of our worship from afar, particularly when the local Body is far more connected to the local community than a believer that lives in another place (literally and figuratively).
Paul spends a lot of time in I Corinthians 9 talking about liberty and I think the context is relevant to this discussion:
19 For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I may win more.
20 To the Jews I became as a Jew, so that I might win Jews; to those who are under the Law, as under the Law though not being myself under the Law, so that I might win those who are under the Law;
21 to those who are without law, as without law, though not being without the law of God but under the law of Christ, so that I might win those who are without law.
22 To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak; I have become all things to all men, so that I may by all means save some.
23 I do all things for the sake of the gospel, so that I may become a fellow partaker of it.
While Paul isn’t discussing worship per se’, he is teaching evangelism. And while he isn’t writing of altering or compromising the integrity of the gospel, he is advocating something that all great leaders understand; acting with sophisticated nuance based on the audience at hand. In leading America through the abolition of slavery, Abraham Lincoln used the same mode of communication and leadership. That’s one of the characteristics that made him great. I suspect Granger Community Church is walking a similar path. Doesn’t it seem as if they are bearing fruit? Honestly?
G.K. Chesterton was once asked by the London Times to answer the question, "What is wrong with the state of the world?" His answer was surrounded by high and mighty quotes from scholars, statesmen and other famous people who expounded on economic inequalities, ineffective political leadership, and more. In stark contrast, Chesterton offered a two-word answer that rang loud and clear: "I am," he said. Chesterton was what was wrong with the world.
What's wrong with the worship at my church? That's simple. Me. I am what's wrong with worship. Every time I allow my prejudice, my past, my own history—indeed, my own personal likes and dislikes to rule the roost and cloud my judgment—I miss out. Am I viciously concerned about every body else’s motivation—while ignoring the persistent black in my own heart? Is my attitude of worship consumer driven, as in “I don’t like the music,� or “I don’t care for the preacher?� Isn’t worship really more about giving than receiving?
Something that really annoys me about myself and other believers is the implicit arrogance with which we spout our beliefs. “Seek to understand� is a Steven Covey phrase which, though not necessarily intended that way, is in fact biblical. We must learn to understand the worldviews of those around us and not be so smug in our beliefs. We must seek to understand why the world believes the things it believes. We must go beyond the point of simply condescending and confirming the sin of every man, acting as the silly tattletales of the world. Is it any wonder we lose the world’s respect?