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PUTTING AN END TO WORSHIP WARS - Elmer Towns

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Churches will use more video filmed announcements, testimonies and even "short<br />

subjects" to reinforce the sermon. Churches will continue to use overhead or slide projectors for<br />

music and scripture reading. Some pastors are getting outstanding sermon support from rear<br />

screen projection to enhance communications, including sermon outlines, maps, pictures,<br />

landscapes, time lines and other eye-appealing helps.<br />

5. Urbanization. The American church has been driven by rural values and thinking.<br />

Of course the worship service was held at 11:00 AM because of the cows. In the olden days the<br />

farmer had to get up early to milk his cows or they would go dry. Then he fed the stock, did his<br />

chores and by the time he ate breakfast and took a bath, it only gave him time to get to church for<br />

9:45 Sunday School and 11:00 AM church service. Today, most urban churches hold worship at<br />

11:00 AM, but there are no cows, only a rural tradition continues.<br />

Much of America church tradition is steeped in rural tradition, and as our nation is<br />

becoming more urbanized, metropolitan city values are influencing the church. More and more<br />

Bible study is being done in cell groups instead of adult Sunday School classes. Rather than<br />

sitting in folding chairs, lined up in rows, listening to a Bible lesson, contemporary America<br />

prefers the informality of a home TLC (Tender Loving Care) group. Rick Warren, pastor of<br />

Saddleback Church, Mission Viejo, California, says, "Put a guy in a tie and coat, sit him in a<br />

classroom and he'll never say a word." Then pastor Warren who uses cells effectively observes,<br />

"Put the same guy on a couch in someone's family room, give him a cup of coffee and he'll talk<br />

your arm off." The dynamics of Body Life worship will continue to grow as Americans can't<br />

build large educational buildings and won't attend structured classes. As our nation continues the<br />

trend toward informality, cells will grow in popularity. As the by-product of urbanization-anonymity--continues<br />

to grow, the attractiveness of Body Life services will attract more and<br />

more.<br />

6. Multi-expression. Sunday morning worship will continue to vary from street to<br />

street, from ethnic community to ethnic community. One church will remind you of an<br />

eighteenth-century European service, and across town there will be the up-beat "mod" church<br />

service that is free-wheeling and contemporary.<br />

Some will meet in humble frame buildings on dirt streets. Others will meet in soaring<br />

cathedrals with spires and magnificent stained glass windows. Some will have a "do-it-yourself"<br />

variety of worship with lay preachers and a simple format. Other churches will reflect traditional<br />

America mainline protestant forms. Still others will reflect the emerging church that reflects<br />

"Body life" and koinonia fellowship.<br />

Religious intensity will continue to vary from apathy in some churches about to die to the<br />

fervency of revivalistic preaching in fundamentalistic churches. The not-so-traditional ethnic<br />

sect (i.e. Mennonite or Amish) will reflect its family traditions. The cathedral will demand<br />

reverence and those worshipping in a close-knit family living room will shows hospitality and<br />

friendliness. The emotional charismatic churches will generate excitement, and the mystical<br />

quiet churches will demand meditation and reflective worship. The only thing we will know for

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