Truth and "Joy" in the Art of Homiletics

I cannot help but to think of C.S. Lewis when I read about “the Fox” in Til We Have Faces. No, Lewis was not a Stoic as the Fox was. However, he was an atheist – which might be comparable in some respects, especially the common disdain for “superstitious nonsense.” Both Lewis and the Fox had a great affinity for stories, poetry, myth, music, and beauty in general, and this affinity was ultimately the Achilles heel of their atheistic philosophies. The Fox, a Stoic who’s very philosophy of life is to avoid desire because it leads to “passion” and suffering, cannot help but to become enraptured in the mythical poems he shares with his little princess pupils. Something is awakened in him – a great desire and longing for it to be true – but each time he quenches the flames of this would-be passion with his no-nonsense Stoic philosophy.

In this same way Lewis suppressed his longing for God with his rationalistic Atheism – as long as he could anyway. In his autobiography Surprised By Joy, Lewis recalls three points in his life that awakened this sense of unexplainable longing for something:

“…it is that of an unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction. I call it Joy, which is here a technical term and must be sharply distinguished both from Happiness and from Pleasure. Joy (in my sense) has indeed one characteristic and one only, in common with them; the fact that anyone who has experienced it will want it again. …I doubt whether anyone who has tasted it would ever, if both were in his power, exchange it for all the pleasures in the world.” (72-73)

All three of the events he mentions were encounters with someone’s artistic creation. The first experience was when his brother Warnie crafted a humble garden on a tin lid and then showed “Jack” (the name Lewis gave himself) his wonderful creation. Again he was enraptured with this “joy” unexpectedly as he was reading Longfellow’s poem “Tegner’s Drapa.” Upon reading the opening lines, “I heard a voice, that cried, / ‘Balder the Beautiful / Is dead, is dead!’” Lewis says:

“… instantly I was uplifted into huge regions of the northern sky; I desired with almost sickening intensity something never to be described (except that it is cold, spacious, severe, pale and remote) and then...found myself at the very same moment already falling out of that desire and wishing I were back in it.” (17-18)

Yet again, Lewis encountered this overwhelming sense of “Northernness” as he saw an illustration by Arthur Rackham:

“A vision of huge, clear spaces hanging above the Atlantic in the endless Twilight of a Northern summer, remoteness, severity...and almost at the same moment I knew that I had met this before, long, long ago, in Tegner’s Drapa, and that Siegfried belonged to the same world as Balder and sunward-sailing cranes.” (72)

Just like the Fox, Lewis was drawn to this inexplicable truth, but he fought it with his cerebral cortex. Lewis was a man torn in two directions: romanticism (not the Eros type) and logic, and his logic tied pinned him from the supernatural. Yet the romantic in him kept tugging and tugging until the pins popped. At last, it was a discussion on myth that finally led Lewis to the cross. Tolkien and others convinced him that this myth of a dying and rising God had, in fact, become a reality in Christ. “Checkmate.” He did not become a Christian that night, but when he finally laid down his defenses against Christianity, he called himself “the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England.”

In these experiences of Joy there was a powerful and compelling truth communicated to Lewis, “something,” he said, “never to be described.” It was a truth one cannot prove through logical argument or a didactic outline with three alliterative points – it was a truth that must be experienced. And Lewis, like the Fox, experienced it through art. Now, throw in the fact that both of them were tutors, and you practically have an allegory on your hands! Ha!

Art has profoundly impacted me. This is my first semester in seminary, and I have come here specifically to try to discover what role the fine arts play/should play in the Christian life and church. I am studying homiletics (preaching) this semester, and I am asking myself questions like, “What role, if any, does art play in a sermon?”

I am learning a lot from the fascinating novelist/theologian Frederick Buechner. He also sees that art can convey something of truth that cannot be explained. In his book Telling the Truth: the Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy, and Fairy Tale, Buechner talks about how the prophets would speak in poetry as well as prose, thus conveying not only “particular truths” but “truth itself which cannot finally be understood but only experienced.” Likewise, he says that the preacher should do the same. It is okay, he says, to use words to convey “particular truths,” but:

“in addition to using them to explain, expound, exhort, let him use them to evoke, to set us dreaming as well as thinking, to use words as at their most prophetic and truthful, the prophets used them to stir in us memories and longings and intuitions that we starve for without knowing that we starve.” (23)

This sounds eerily similar to Lewis’s description of “Joy.” Indeed, I think that is what Lewis would call what Buechner is describing. This Joy, this longing, this desire is itself an experience of truth that, at least in my experience, has largely not been provided from the pulpit or from Church itself. Instead what we get are only sermonic points, arguments, exegesis, and apologetics.

Even though Lewis was one of the greatest apologists of the twentieth century, he too saw that argument has its limitations and is even sometimes dangerous. He once commented in a letter to Dorothy Sayers that he was frequently uneasy because, “…apologetic work is so dangerous to one's own faith. A doctrine never seems dimmer to me than when I have just successfully defended it." Indeed, the Gospel that has been presented to us has been a feast of fact, but a fast of fiction along with this longing Lewis calls “Joy” and Buechner calls “Truth.” How sad. No one here is advocating that we throw aside the importance of logic, facts, and loving God with our minds, but to do that and neglect the rest of what composes us makes our faith and our love anemic, not compelling.

We need to experience and feed in a way we have largely not been fed from the pulpit, fed not with mere points, arguments, and propositions, but with joy, hunger, and longing: truth itself. Many people who are not Christians experience truth in this kind of joyful way, but they do not know where it comes from. In this kind of truth God only whispers and He never uses His name, so they put the best name to it that they can – whatever that may be. We Christians say that we know where this slippery and joyful truth comes from, the same place all other good gifts originate – God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We need to know God experientially with that really indefinable part of us that is so hungry, a part of us that is fed through well-done stories, paintings, songs, and movies.

And I’m left to wonder, “Can this happen at the pulpit?” Buechner seems to think so. Indeed he made it so in his own spellbinding sermons that dripped imagination, imagery, poetry, narrative. Brian McLaren describes Buechner’s sermon narrative as “a far cry from telling little anecdotes to illustrate points… the story is not like an orange rind, but … is itself the point, or at least the thing that points beyond itself to something more….”

I cannot help but to desire to see this Joy happen more frequently through the efforts of the church and at the pulpit -- whatever that looks like. And although I am not exactly sure how it should be done, I am eager to keep exploring and reading and listening and learning. Maybe I’ll figure it out. Maybe not. Whatever the case, I think there is a need that cries out to be met: many Christians have the opposite of what we see in Lewis’s and the Fox’s battle between joy and intellect. Lewis and Fox were compelled by joy, but could not intellectually assent. Many pew warmers on Sunday mornings intellectually assent because their intellect has been fed, yet they never have this evoking experience of truth that compels them to Joy. We have been cheating, in a way, stuck in our heads, reading the Cliff's Notes instead of the novel. Like Buechner said, we are starving for this truth and we don’t even realize it. We are in a mansion on a hill with many rooms. The banqueting table of Christ is abundant and His breadbasket is bottomless, but we are having trouble finding our way from the study to the dining room.

"We are his Body" ...So What Do We Wear?

I wrote this over a period of days following a class period in which the professor and students talked for about ten minutes about how Christians should always dress up to go to church on Sunday. People who do not dress up for church on Sunday, they said, are not showing respect to our Lord and King. "If you were to meet the Queen of England you would dress up, and Jesus Christ deserves no less courtesy than that." Well, I tried -- very unsuccessfully -- to explain to them some of the very sound theological reasons for coming to church "as you are," but alas my voice was drowned out in the crowd. And so I wrote what I could not say. And here it is:

I began writing this as an apologetic or "defense" for coming to church in ordinary clothes. It was meant not as a thrust to tear down dressing up for church, but rather as a parry, but it was still meant aggressively and defensively. I spent over ten hours working on this, reading, writing, researching, defending. But then I set down the laptop, and stopped. I couldn't believe that I had just spent ten hours doing this! I had so many other things much more pressing that I needed to do. I was so zealous to defend not just myself, but this idea that God has used so obviously to bring so many thousands of people into a relationship with Him. You must understand, I go to a church where I look to my right, and I see a single mom wearing a biker outfit who just recently almost died in a car accident, and I know that the only reason she is now a child of God is because this crazy church said, "Come as you are," and was thus a comfortable place for her to come and check out the Christian faith. I look all around me, and I see hundreds and hundreds of people – from dapper to casual – who came here for the exact same reason: because our church is approachable and not intimidating. One of the key factors to that approachability is that people feel free to come in their ordinary clothes. It pains me deeply to hear people chastise so harshly what I have seen God so abundantly bless.

Yet in this process of making a defense, I also found myself very concerned about defending myself and my own contempt for having to dress up for church as a child. This weekend, God has revealed to me a glimpse of just how far I have yet to grow in my walk with the Lord, how self-centered I am, and how much I really need to learn the discipline of "submission" – not having my own way. And I told the Lord that I was ready and willing to practice "submission" with this "apologetic," to leave it unspoken. But that did not seem to be what he was pointing me to do. As I listened to Him, I realized that he does not want me to parry; he wants me to parley. He does not want me to defend, but rather to humbly plea for you to understand where this "ordinary clothes" idea comes from practically, culturally, and theologically. And it is my hope not that you be converted to my way of thinking, but that you can recognize this as a "disputable matter" (see Rom 14:1-11), and learn to praise God for this approach as much as your own approach.

I begin by acknowledging the cultural climate in which we live. As we have discussed in class, we live in a materialistic society of rabid consumerists, a plastic jungle in which brand names and Who's Whos prey upon the gluttony of the "haves" and the envy of the "have nots." Wherever we go, we cannot seem to escape the unholy chant, "Buy. Buy. Buy. Buy." The "dress up for church" requirement can sound to many just like another voice in the chant, giving many "haves" another reason to indulge in garment gluttony, and giving many "have-nots" a cause for envy as well as the inadequate feeling of being out of place.

Many of us see a very real danger in this external emphasis on "dressing up." In a culture that is already demonically and obsessively focused on the external and temporal, dressing up for church can be just another point at which the demonic Uncle Screwtape can easily twist the holy into the profane. For those who can afford to buy such clothes, "respecting the King" can very easily be twisted into "impressing the King" and "impressing the Court." For some, this may be even more of a temptation than others, and if it is an unnecessary temptation it would be prudent and wise (perhaps necessary!) for those people to flee from that temptation by not dressing up for church, even if they can afford it.

Concerning those who cannot afford to dress up many say, "But the church will understand that. They will not judge the person who cannot afford nice clothes, and exclude them from fellowship." Ideally, no they wouldn't. Yet it has happened. Also, the problem is that while that approach may be a platinum theory, it is rubbish in practice because it is not only the mind of the dressed-up church that is in question, but also the mind of the casual newcomer. As the only one not dressed up, that person will most often feel out of place even if nobody says so. Sometimes this feeling of inadequacy can be severe in a person, especially in a person who has grown up being mocked and ridiculed by adolescent classmates because he does have the right clothes, the right shoes, or the right backpack. It is easy for Screwtape to work in this person as well whispering, "This is just another place in where you don't belong, another place where you don't meet standards. Just give it up." And that is exactly what happens most of the time.

Of course Screwtape can just as easily bend "dressing casually" to his appetite, but that will inevitably be harder to do in some than others. Thus, it is my conviction that there should be room in the Christian church for both people who want to dress up and for those who do not – each according to his or her own conscience. In my church, people "come as they are," meaning "dress however you feel like dressing today." There are many people who dress up as they would to any other church, and there are many who come wearing shorts, flip flops, and even (horror of horrors!) hats. And surprisingly enough, even though over 55% of the people who come were previously unchurched before they became a part of our church, in the three years I've been there, I've never seen anyone dress vulgarly. I suppose it may be an anomaly that both kinds of people can be comfortable in the same place, but if it is, I think it is a wonderful anomaly. To have an exclusive policy that leads in either direction would, I think, most likely lead to the temptation of "Christianity and…[dressing up, dressing casual, etc.]." This is something I think we should be very careful of.

I now move to more theological reasons for coming to church in ordinary clothes. One of the major themes in Jesus teachings was a shift of focus from external to internal. The Jews were expecting an external Kingdom of God – deliverance from the Romans – but Jesus showed them instead an internal Kingdom, telling Pilate, "My kingdom is not of this world," (Jn. 18.36). He reveals a God who looks at the heart and what is done in secret, not just on what is seen. In Christ, we see the age-old indictment against Israel: "These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men," (Matt 15:8-9).

This shift from external to internal shows us that appearances can be deceptive. One can look holy on the outside, but not on the inside. Paul picks up on this and even flips it around: one can look holy on the inside, and not look holy on the outside – one can have a "circumcision of the heart" and not have a "circumcision of the flesh." (Rom. 2.29) In Romans 14, Paul points out how two people can do the same external deed (e.g. "eating meat"), and one would be sinning in his heart while the other is not. What is holy for one can be a stumbling block for another. In this same way, I believe that requiring a person to dress up can be a stumbling block. For some it can be a stumbling block into materialism, as I mentioned earlier. For others it can be a stumbling block into vanity – impressing others. Still, for others it can be a stumbling block into legalism. Someone who has grown up in a very legalistic church may associate "dressing up" so strongly with "earning righteousness" that it could be a sin against the conscience for this person to dress up, just as it was a sin for the Christian from a pagan background to eat meat sacrificed to idols.

Coming to church in ordinary clothes can also be a way in which that person represents Christ to humanity. We are the church, the image and body of Christ in the world, and thus we are to look like Him. So what does He look like? In the Gospels we see a man, Jesus of Nazareth, the very essence of humility who was at the very same time also Lord and Christ – a paradox of imminence and transcendence, humility and glory. The Gospels reveal a King who was completely approachable. Children, lepers, tax collectors, the infirm, prostitutes, and "sinners" as well as doctors, Pharisees, and soldiers all approached him freely and without intimidation. In fact, he seemed to relish when people would come to him and to God as they are, and detest when they tried to be something they were not. He was the very embodiment of Grace. He does not tell people to go straighten themselves up before he would accept them; he simply says, "Come." Wearing ordinary clothes to church can help a person to be an embodiment of this utterly approachable King.

In his book What's So Amazing About Grace, Philip Yancey points out that the church has failed miserably to be this embodiment of Christ's approachability. He tells a tragic story – one of many – in which a prostitute who has been renting out her two-year-old daughter for kinky sex came to him, unable to buy food. In their conversation, he asks, "Have you tried going to church for help?" He writes, "I will never forget the look of pure, naive shock that crossed her face. 'Church! she cried. 'Why would I ever go there? I was already feeling terrible about myself. They'd just make me feel worse.'" (11). It is a staggering shift in paradigm from the example we see in Jesus Christ – prostitutes running toward him. In his chapter on "Creating a Culture of Acceptance" in No Perfect People Allowed, John Burke (my pastor) writes:

"Church must re-present to others the Body of the One who is willing to accept rather than condemn – who draws near in relationship – who is for them, not against them. Everybody longs to know this – that despite everything, they can be accepted and forgiven. But words alone won't do. Theological statements like 'Christ died for your sins' and 'God so loved the world' have been leached of all meaning for seekers today by what they have experienced. Many people can't believe God will accept them and love them until those who claim to know God start to show them." (92)

Sunday morning remains the primary window for those who are seeking Christ to come to him, and those Churches who try to create a "come as you are" culture of acceptance are simply trying to be that approachable, unintimidating, unexclusive embodiment of Christ to them.

Yet this is not only an important thing for seekers; it can also be important to the Christian as well. The process of sanctification is ongoing, and so the process of approaching the throne of mercy is unending. We often sin, and then feel so dirty and guilty because of our sin that we run away rather than run to our King. Yet, this is the opposite of what we should do. Instead, we should come just as we are – even and especially in our dirtiness – and penitently approach the throne of forgiveness asking for healing. To come to church in whatever clothes are natural to you is a way for some to act out physically how we are to approach that throne every day spiritually.

Coming "as you are" can also lead to a greater continuity between the person you are on Sunday and the person you are the rest of the week. It is a mystery how the body and spirit are inextricably connected to one another. To some, dressing up can disconnect the worship experience on Sunday from the rest of the week, and lead to a very compartmentalized spirituality. The body remembers, "When I am dressed up, I am spiritual; when I am not, I am not." This kind of compartmentalized spirituality is not desired as a Christian, and so the "come as you are" approach is a way to help prevent that disconnect and let the Shalom of God – which is peace, deliverance, wholeness – penetrate our lives.

Those who choose to dress up on Sunday mornings do so "to the Lord." Likewise, those of us who choose not to dress up do so "to the Lord." I hope that this essay has helped to explain that wearing ordinary clothes is not irreverent sloth, but has many beautiful practical and theological motivations behind it. As the body of an immanent and transcendent Christ—his representatives to the world—we would do well to welcome a juxtaposition of clothes into our assembly. Why not strive for Orthodoxy against being Ebionite or Docetic and let blue jeans and shorts represent the humanity of Christ while slacks and dresses represent His transcendence?

So I plead with you to consider that yes, we serve a mighty and glorious God and King who deserves all honor. But let us not forget what that King looks like. We are the court of Jesus Christ, the sovereign assembly of a king that was born in a feeding trough and worshipped by both well-dressed Magi bearing expensive gifts and lowly shepherds who came straight from their pastures bearing dung on their sandals. According to the flesh, our king looked very ordinary in many respects. He grew up in the sticks of Nazareth – a place out of which people thought nothing exceptional could come out. Raised in a very ordinary blue-collar family, our King was (and is) a friend of social rejects and a bunch of goofballs he called his disciples, as well as the well-to-do. Our king was baptized by a grungy weirdo wearing a dead camel, and he has been known for washing crusty fishermen's feet. We serve a very strange king, an unexpected king, a king unlike anything else the world has ever seen. The King of Kings is, in fact, whom we worship, and yet He rode a donkey instead of a steed. And lest we forget, in the final hours before his crucifixion we saw on our King's body the most blessed, disturbing, and beautiful juxtaposition of fine and feral apparel this universe has ever seen: a purple robe and a crown of thorns.

"We are His body."

Worship: "Meeting People Where They Are"

The following is a response to a conversation we had in a class in response to an article in the Baylor Lariate regarding the nature of the chapel service at Baylor. The chapel organizers are making an effort to have chapel "meet students where they are," making it more "customer-friendly." The the general consensus of the class was that "meeting people where they are" violates the true nature of worship. This is my response to that charge.

I regret that the conversation today regarding chapel was so one-sided. It is my own fault as much as anyone. I agree with very much of that “one sided” conversation, yet I think that a couple things should be said that were not said, and I will attempt to do that now, and perhaps play a bit of a “devil’s advocate.” Now I must preface this by admitting that I have not gone to the Baylor chapel yet (being a Truett student, we have our own chapel to attend), however, I can vividly remember the chapel services during my undergraduate studies at Ouachita Baptist University, and I hope this can relate.

First, I must respectfully disagree with Dr. Wood when he seems to equate “chapel” with “church.” Perhaps I am “picking nits” alongside Mr. Roberts, but there are several rather large differences between the two. In fact the only two similarities I can think of is that there is (1) a sermon and (2) songs that are sung as a corporate body. The primary and most obvious difference between the two that stares us blankly in the face is the fact that people are required to go to Chapel in order to receive their diploma, in contrast to going to church which is (as Dr. Wood has pointed out all virtues to be) a free choice. As a result, you have several people attending this Chapel service who would by no means attend a worship service in a church under any other circumstance. And this has a natural effect on homiletics (which can be defined as “The branch of rhetoric that treats of the composition and delivery of sermons”), which brings me to my next point.

Second, one of the most fundamental aspects of homiletics is to consider your audience. This is advocated in several books on homiletics (see Fred Craddock’s Preaching¸ Haddon Robinson’s Biblical Preaching, and Frederick Buechner’s Telling the Truth: the Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy, and Fairy Tale, as well as many others). Walter C. Kaiser even advocates that the audience should be taken into consideration even during the process of exegesis – (which can be defined as “the study of the text of Scripture in order to bring out the meaning of it.” See chapter 7 “Homiletical Analysis” of Toward an Exegetical Theology). The most commonly explained objective of a sermon is to bring the truth of the “then” (the Biblical text) through the process of exegesis and homiletics into the “now” of the audience. However, many preachers (and those in the congregation) seem to have the notion that this cannot be done, and this notion results in two “sins” at the pulpit: (1) speaking only of the “then,” thus leaving the past in the past instead of bringing it into the present and (2) speaking only of the “now,” thus failing to connect the “now” to the truth contained in the textual “then.” Of course there are also many shades of mistakes between these two extremes as well.

I am convinced that it is a mistaken notion that you cannot effectively bring the “then” into the “now.” I think those in our class (including myself!) lean more toward favoring the “then” approach to homiletics. We tend to want more Biblical knowledge, we want our understanding to be increased, and this is not a bad thing at all. We are to love the Lord with our minds. The purpose of bringing the text into the now is to make it (and yes, I am also beginning to hate this word too, but it is true) “relevant” (i.e., “What does this knowledge mean for me?”).

I have seen several examples of preachers bringing the “then” into the “now” quite effectively in Chapel. It may be difficult, but it is not an impossible task. I remember watching in awe as the late, great theologian Dr. Stanley Grenz took the basic thrust of his systematic theology (Theology for the Community of God) and connected even with the most remote and usually disinterested people in our chapel. I was astounded and moved! A preacher can (and should!) take a biblical text and bring it to a communicative level that can reach most of the listeners wherever they are. On that note, I think it is ridiculous to say “By meeting someone where they are, you cannot take them anywhere.” How preposterous is that! What, I cannot take my friend to the airport by meeting him at his house? Nonsense! You meet them where they are, and then you take them (or at least point them) to where they should be.

Frederick Buechner and others would agree emphatically that the preacher is, in a sense, “on the same level” as the listener, and must speak to the listeners “where they are.” The beginning of the article in the Lariate states the fact that the students who come are required to, and they typically come to chapel with the presupposition that it is “not worth their time.” It also points out the fact that many of the students who come are not Christians. This is “where they are,” and it would be a grave mistake of a preacher to not take that into consideration when developing their sermon. This is the difference between Chapel and Church – at church the people who come (save the children) do so as a free choice. And here lies the great weakness and challenge of chapel sermon – this yawning chasm between the disinterested unbeliever and the eager and hungry believer. How does a preacher meet both of these listeners “where they are”? I do not envy this ominous obstacle to the chapel speaker. I think it is possible to navigate this obstacle, but it must be tremendously and overwhelmingly difficult. And so the preacher (and the Chapel planner) is usually left playing to either one or the other listener: the non-Christian (one might use the word “seeker,” however this is a misnomer since they are required to come) and the Christian.

During my years in the church, I have noticed that different people respond dramatically to different approaches to worship, each approach resulting in staggering spiritual formation. I have heard critics of the “seeker sensitive church” (I’ve even been one!) say that this type of church has no place in Christianity. But I have seen literally thousands of people who have been dramatically changed and grown surprisingly strong in their Christian walk who came to know Christ simply because someone thought that it was important to speak these transcendent Gospel Truths in a way that they could understand and connect with, a way that many a “Traditionalist” would consider “un-Christian.” Likewise, I have heard the critics of the “Traditional” or “high church” worship service, and have to disagree with them as well. I have also seen people who grow dramatically as a result of a more Traditional or “high church” approach to worship. I hate to play the part of the post-modern relativist in this way, but if it is true that “You will know a tree by its fruit,” I have seen fruit as a result of both forms of worship, and must conclude that both approaches are valid and pleasing to the Lord.

Although ideal, I’m sure it would be rare to find someone that can effectively preach to the full spectrum of listeners present at chapel. So I would think it would be good for Chapel planners to compromise at this point and have variation in the Chapel services. On this point, I would say that it is even a holy act for believers on both ends of the spectrum take the example of Christ in Philippians 2 and “consider others interests instead of only their own” when it comes to attending these chapel services. A wise person once told me, “It is an act of holy submission and unity with other believers to say cheerfully ‘Have it your way,’ during the worship service.” However, take heed to Screwtape Letters and beware of the spiritual pride that comes with this act of humility. I fear that temptation even as I write this, but I think it would be a sin for me to omit what I feel is the truth out of fear. But there is another perhaps even more important point I think worth considering. My pastor once pointed out to me that we often mistake “learning something new” with “being spiritually fed.” I may not learn something new in a “seeker friendly” sermon, but I am always reminded of something that I have not mastered in my walk.

One final thing I think we should remember: the unbeliever in the Chapel service does not go to church on Sunday whereas the believer does. If by compromising my desire for a theological lecture, the Truth of the Gospel is then successfully communicated and received by even one unbeliever, it is well worth it.

I don't intend this post to be an apology for the Chapel planner's decisions or comments in the Lariate, but I think that we must recognize that even if it is to an extreme, there is a goodness behind their objective to "meet people where they are." We must not fall into either of the extremes. The answer to the question “What should a Christian worship service look like,” still remains a great mystery to me. I do not pretend to have all the answers, and I am eager to hear your perspectives on this issue because I yearn to grow in my understanding. Please, if you had the patience and fortitude to read this whole thing, share with me your thoughts, and help point me in the right direction where I have (I’m sure!) missed the boat!