Your Prepare for Worship thought for this week is written by Mark Lautenschlager, Director of Communications.
Ryan Brasington is taking a few days off after all his hard work on Holy Week, so he asked me if I’d fill in writing the Friday newsletter. Because I’m teaching the next installment of Essentials beginning this Sunday morning at 9 AM over Zoom, Will Buschmann, our Co-Director of Student Ministries, is filling in for me on writing the Personal Worship study notes this week and next. So I was able to cover for Ryan in what seems like a game of musical chairs.
My thoughts regarding worship lately have been on the dynamic tension between online worship and in person worship. It is hard to give attention to one without feeling like you’re somehow diluting the other. The more you talk to the camera, the more those worshiping in person wonder if they are the studio audience, and the more you pretend the camera isn’t there, the more those worshiping at home wonder if anyone cares they exist. It’s a catch-22.
During this pandemic, I’ve been one of those worshiping from home. I’m 60 years old, I’ve had a history of heart problems, and I am (to use the proper medical term) morbidly obese. In other words, I am the poster child for the one who definitely should not catch COVID-19. So I’ve been hunkered down, which is a word Floridians are all too familiar with, waiting for the pandemic storm to pass.
But now I’ve been fully vaccinated and it’s time to reconsider in person worship. I still find masks difficult to wear for any extended period of time, so that may be in the way for a bit yet, but I’ve been thinking about what it will be like to be among the congregation in worship. I believe that I have received just as much from the messages as if I was sitting in the room with the preacher. If anything, there are fewer distractions at home than there are in the worship center. But there is no question that I have missed the corporate worship in singing and fellowship.
We’ve sung along from home, in our pajamas, holding our coffee cups. It’s comfortable. But it’s also not the same as being around others who are doing likewise (minus the pajamas and coffee cups…probably). Thank heaven for my sweet wife, who is there with me faithfully week after week, but she will tell you the same thing.
The value of the technology that allows us to watch the church service from home is enormous. For those who cannot be physically present due to illness, travel, or some other circumstance, it is a tremendous blessing to look in on what is taking place. And with all due respect to those church prognosticators who say the future of church is online, they’re missing the point of corporate worship. I can make the band just as loud at home as it gets in the worship center (read that: loud enough to drown out any off-key singing). What I can’t do is replace the joy that comes from the shared praising of God in a roomful of fellow believers.
Just imagine for a moment, if you can, what it will be like someday in heaven. We will be praising God together with every believer who has ever existed—an experience no camera could ever adequately capture.
Grace and Peace,
Mark