I’m finally reading Paul Hiebert’s Transforming Worldviews: An Anthropological Understanding of How People Change. Hiebert was a pioneer in the field of missionary anthropology. I had looked at the book a few years ago when searching for a textbook for a sophomore level missions class. I saw that the book addressed the themes of the class, but that it was too advanced for sophomores.
Now I’m finally getting back to it. Being a student of culture and culture change, I’m finding the book fascinating. I’m reading the Kindle edition, which allows you to highlight passages. I told Carolina that the highlighted passages outweigh the non-highlighted passages!
I found one chart very interesting, a comparison of three church styles: high church, evangelical church, and charismatic church. Interesting to see them analyzed as different worldviews.
Services in a high church focus on mystery, awe, and holiness. They take place in cathedrals, using the following forms of expression: rituals, chants, liturgy, candles, procession and high order. People often kneel or prostrate themselves. The overwhelming focus is on God the Father.
Evangelical church services, according to Hiebert, focus on peace, order, and hope. They take place in churches, using preaching, hymns, testimonies, silence and meditation. People stand, sit and bow their heads. The focus is on Jesus.
Charismatic churches focus on ecstasy, power, and action. They take place in meeting halls, and have prophecy, choruses, dancing, clapping, and healing. People lift their hands and raise their faces. The focus is on the Spirit.
It seems to me (not Hiebert) that much of the “worship wars” have to do with people in one tradition wanting to incorporate elements from another tradition. It’s also about people judging their outlook to be correct and the others as “boring” or “entertainment-focused” or not “decent and in order.”
Any insights that you pick up from this?
True worship must transcend culture and tradition. I don’t feel it must always be comfortable or familiar to us. It’s not this mountain nor Jerusalem, but in spirit and truthfulness.
That is very helpful… I agree. I also find it interesting that scripture never pushes one certain “culture.” Finally, I wonder how this paradigm would work in studying various religious groups, and various ethnic groups. Thanks for the insights…I am adding the book to my “To Read” list.
Thanks, Tim. I’ve not read Hiebert’s book and therefore cannot comment on his observations other than to say that I’ve seen material like his over the years in my attempt to understand the concept of worship. I’m not sure that we can categorize worship styles as he has done so, since in my experience I’ve seen so many variations of each and sometime in the same assembly. Recently I attended a church group that I could not really describe as “pentecostal or charismatic,” and as I spoke during the “testimonial hour,” it really looked like two different churches. In the back sat a group of I guess maybe 30 or 40 people who could have been confused as a “iglesia de Cristo.” In the front were two distinct groups, one of about 20 of 25 people singing to the music up front and over to one side about 8 or 9 dancing and still others writhing on the floor. I could not tell you how many may have been listening to me speak because I took it as an opportunity to preach.
I believe we each worship God differently, because of the way we first came to know God. Preachers can preach, teachers can teach, but there is always something special in one’s life that causes one to begin to know God. “Different strokes for different folks”
1Cr 12:6 And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.
1Cr 12:7 But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.
1Cr 12:8 For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit;
1Cr 12:9 To another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit;
1Cr 12:10 To another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues:
1Cr 12:11 But all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will.