Alternative Worship: Not Just Kids' Stuff
Educational institutions for disabled children have acknowledged the importance of multi-sensory learning since, like, forever - well, at least since the developmental psychologist Piaget. Maybe it's not surprising that this morning I'm asking myself whether - in all the times I was staring at blinking lights, waving glowsticks in the air, and lying back in awe at the 'spacious firmament' projected onto the ceiling as a young child - perhaps, God was speaking to me.
Flash forward to 2006: I've just been perusing blogs all over the net about alternative worship. And by Jove, I think they've got it. What massive potential alternative worship has - non-prescriptive, thought-provoking, varied, sacramental, experiential, multi-sensory - to be a fantastic leveller. We are not all predisposed to sitting and listening to sermons, however well they are preached; it is more of a fundamental issue than that. We are not all chiefly cognitive - accepting analytical brain-feeding as the only path to spiritual enlightenment (with a small-case 'e', or a large 'E', take your pick). The only thing that we as people have in common: we are all on a spiritual journey, and none of us have arrived at our destination yet. Yep, it's true: all those in the 'all-that's-just-a-bunch-of-trendy-postmodern-claptrap-isn't-it?' camp, read Hebrews, if you don't believe me. We are in awe of God, yes; we are captivated by him; but also confused and spoon-fed cognitive philosophies everywhere. Ecclesiastes is in our canon for a reason. Yeah, Ecclesiastes - I bet you forgot about that one didn't you.
Children have been doing it for years in Sunday kids' church - cutting out paper, glueing, fingerpainting, acting out stories, walking. In short, they know a bit about 'placing ourselves in the stories.' Let's face it: we are players in The Big Story of salvation history, which (possible heresy ahead, cover your ears/eyes) didn't finish with the Bible. We all want to learn experientially: don't just tell us about an interesting concept, we want to get our hands dirty and grab hold of it.
We are kids, grown ups, black, white, Asian, male, female, disabled, able-bodied, sporty, arty. Multi-sensory, creative worship is a way forward for everyone. It is a great potential leveller, disciminative to no-one, welcome to all. It's D.I.Y.
Alternative worship: it's not just kids' stuff.
Flash forward to 2006: I've just been perusing blogs all over the net about alternative worship. And by Jove, I think they've got it. What massive potential alternative worship has - non-prescriptive, thought-provoking, varied, sacramental, experiential, multi-sensory - to be a fantastic leveller. We are not all predisposed to sitting and listening to sermons, however well they are preached; it is more of a fundamental issue than that. We are not all chiefly cognitive - accepting analytical brain-feeding as the only path to spiritual enlightenment (with a small-case 'e', or a large 'E', take your pick). The only thing that we as people have in common: we are all on a spiritual journey, and none of us have arrived at our destination yet. Yep, it's true: all those in the 'all-that's-just-a-bunch-of-trendy-postmodern-claptrap-isn't-it?' camp, read Hebrews, if you don't believe me. We are in awe of God, yes; we are captivated by him; but also confused and spoon-fed cognitive philosophies everywhere. Ecclesiastes is in our canon for a reason. Yeah, Ecclesiastes - I bet you forgot about that one didn't you.
Children have been doing it for years in Sunday kids' church - cutting out paper, glueing, fingerpainting, acting out stories, walking. In short, they know a bit about 'placing ourselves in the stories.' Let's face it: we are players in The Big Story of salvation history, which (possible heresy ahead, cover your ears/eyes) didn't finish with the Bible. We all want to learn experientially: don't just tell us about an interesting concept, we want to get our hands dirty and grab hold of it.
We are kids, grown ups, black, white, Asian, male, female, disabled, able-bodied, sporty, arty. Multi-sensory, creative worship is a way forward for everyone. It is a great potential leveller, disciminative to no-one, welcome to all. It's D.I.Y.
Alternative worship: it's not just kids' stuff.
posted by Mark Burnhope | 9:44 AM
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