There is insight to be had about the mystery and majesty of worship in all styles of worship and worship music. I'm reminded of that with Paul's words: "Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable His judgments, and His paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been His counselor? Who has ever given to God, that God should repay Him? For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever! Amen" (Romans 11:33-36).
God has gone past finding out; more powerful and holy and gracious than we can imagine. He has gone beyond our highest thoughts and deeper than our most intense emotions. And yet. . . He calls us to worship Him. Though mortal, flawed, fallen creatures, we are to offer our worship to God - the eternal, perfect, all-wise Creator and Lord of all! Churches and many in the church approach worship differently. Given our limited perspectives, how could it be any different? Until we see Him face to face, our worship will always be partial. Until we know fully as we are fully known, our worship will always be incomplete. As we worship Him to the best of our ability, that will differ among His chosen ones as they worship. Because of where I have led worship for the last 25 years and my belief in multi-generational, blended worship, I think there is something for us from most all of the differing approaches to worship.
First the Formal-liturgical kind of worship reminds us that worship is vertical, Biblical, and Godward in approach. That is not a bad thing for us to contemplate as we worship Him.
Second, there is the traditional Hymn-based worship. There is a theological richness found in the musical, texted form of hymns that must not be neglected by the worshipper. And they don't have to all be only the old hymns. The Gettys and Stuart Townsend, as well as others, are providing wonderful new hymn expressions with theological depth that we need in our spiritual walk. We need both old and new.
Third, there is "contemporary" worship. . . which is somewhat of a nebulous term because it means something different to different people. For the most part it uses the musical and stylistic language of the present generation to lead people into an authentic expression of worship, and sometimes into a keener awareness of the presence of God in our midst. It has given expression directly to God where many times the hymns were expressions about God. So it does expand our worship expression in a meaningful way. The danger is worshipping it as a style, rather than worshipping Him, and it becoming more performance-oriented with small "praise teams" and bands.
Then there is the influence of Charismatic worship. The good of this is that it points out that worship without the Spirit is dead. The goal is that worshippers experience some measure of the fullness of God, including the Holy Spirit. The pervasive problem is some of the shaky charismatic theology that goes along with it. This kind of worship will be more faithful to God's Word if it lets go of the outcomes in worship, allowing God's Spirit to "blow wherever and however He pleases" (John 3:8) and rejoices in the true role of The Spirit in pointing to Jesus - especially His victory through suffering.
Then there is Blended, Multigenerational worship. Worship is both divine and human. Blended worship hopefully tries to blend the best of all the different approaches in an effective way. It is divine in God's grace standing behind, motivating and empowering worship. In that sense it is all about God. But it is human in that we as worshippers must recognize His worthiness and seek to give expression to that worthiness in ways that please Him. There is a hopefully gentle tension between the different styles that is inclusive to all generations and the body who gathers and worships together willingly yielding to one another's tastes and approaches. This yielding is Biblical.
As Jesus-followers we want and need the written Word of God to guide us in matters of faith and practice, including worship with discernment and sensitivity to the Spirit, realizing the vastness of His mystery and majesty in worship. mjm
