Unique worship does not dismiss tradition

It might be assumed that if you create new worship experiences then they will dismiss tradition.  This happened with the "seeker-sensitive/contemporary" worship movement.  There was a strong effort to remove a lot of Christian language and make it easy on the ears for those who might be seeking Christianity as a faith to live into.  So contemporary worship, generally, does not have things like creeds or liturgies or litanies or the like.  As such when people think of new worship many people think that this new worship will be anti-tradition.

And when you value being efficient over being unique then that may happen.

This is not the case when you value unique over efficient.

The worship services that are truly unique are those who are able to root themselves in the past while introducing something new.  Unique worship services are difficult to replicate and in many ways are often "one and done" worship experiences.

If you have ever seen "Glee" then you know what I am talking about.  This show takes the words from common songs but puts them to new music and then you can instantly sing along.  You can instantly join in a tradition while at the same time that tradition is brought to life in a different way.

Take this clip for instance.  Notice that they build on the tradition of the song and yet bring it a new breath.

 

If you like it or not this is not the point.  Not everyone likes Glee (I do not), Glee is a community (Gleeks) and the music that is created speaks to the Gleek community.  Yet, this community, while creating unique music, it is rooted in a tradition that is much bigger than the community.  They do not betray the tradition, rather they take the tradition (in this case a Christmas song) and "Gleek it up" to be an unique expression of that tradition in the Gleek community.  

Notice that a worship community does not have to be original to be unique.  In fact, it is a bit arrogant to think that you can be original in a world of 7 billion people.  Rather, worship that values unique over efficient identifies where their community fits into the larger whole while at the same time striving for uniqueness.  

In all the efforts to make worship attractive to people, faith communities across the nation have created tract worship experiences that appeal to a broad audience but are ubiquitous and generic.  So back to the original question, "What would worship look like if it were driven by millennials and the creative class?"  

It would look unique but not original.  

It would be ancient and future.  

It would be remix and mash up.  

It would be culturally located and not difficult to replicate in other locations.

It would connect with a tribe or community but not everyone who encounters it.

It would be something that I could not wait to participate each week.  

How Millennial Are You - Survey

In case you have not seen this over your coming and goings but Pew Research Center has this little survey you can take to "determine" how millennial you are.

Like all surveys this can be taken with a grain of salt as well as speak to some generalities about current culture.  

If you find yourself at odds with these 'young whipper snappers' or do not understand those who were born after 1981, then this might be something to consider looking at.

Additionally, this might be great to take (there are only 14 questions) and see just how much you align with millennial thought/culture.

I was born in 1982 and thus find myself a little bit in both the Gen X and Millennial groups.  My score of an 88 however reflects a much stronger leaning toward Millennial culture.  Below is a screen shot of my answers and results so that I can reference them in the future.  (Note this screenshot is modified so to fit better.)

Books Ngram Viewer

In case you have not yet seen the Google project called "Ngram" then you are missing out on interesting data that is more fruitful than "Facebook trolling" all day long.  

The essence of Ngram is being able to see the frequency of words that have been published in a massive number of books over time.  So assume you wanted to see how often the words, "faith, hope, love" appear in in books since the year 1800, you will see this graph:

As you can see all three have been in decline for decades and are hovering at all time lows.  

However, if you search Faith, Hope, Love you get this graph:

The only difference is the first letter of each word is capitalized.  Love is making a strong comeback (notice the big dip in the early 1940's we have not finally recovering from) and Faith and Hope are on the up swing as well.  Does this mean there are more sentences beginning with Faith, Hope or Love then they are being used in the middle of the sentence?  Does this mean there are more books with these words in the titles?  

I believe Dan Pink posted this originally but it is worth Christians taking a serious look at as well.

Can you image that?  "hope" has been dominating "fear" for the vast majority of time and now they are in a dead heat.  

In the spirit of taking into account "case sensitivity" take a look at "Hope" and "Fear".

"Hope" is still in the lead (the 1940's dip is not nearly as intense in this situation), but "Fear" is at all time highs!

How is it that if we are a "Christian Nation" as some people would contend, then how is it that the Christian message of Hope is in rapid decline and Fear is taking more ground?  How is it that this so called "Christian nation" has forgotten that with God there is nothing to fear/Fear?  Is the current incarnation of the message of Christianity so watered down or irrelevant that Fear/fear is given permission to even have a foothold in a world full of Hope/hope?  

At the very lease it is good there is a lot of Love/love as it is said that it is the greatest of things.