Good Shepherds Make the Difference

A reader responds to Attractive Worship:

S.M. Hutchens does a fine job of defining what is wrong with what passes for ‘worship’ in today’s evangelical churches. I agree with his analysis.

But, there is a problem for traditional worship and traditional churches: in too many traditional churches the worship is either too precious and mannered—more concerned with the outward form of ritual and vestment than with the substance beneath—or is pervaded with that sense of dusty tiredness you find in old museums, where no one takes the time to interpret or explore the riches hidden in locked cases.

Where the best traditional churches (and, I think, the best non-traditional churches, too) differ from those above is that leading them are real pastors and teachers: men who, filled with the power of the Holy Ghost, are able to quicken the forms and words of the liturgy with the sort of understanding that comes first from parishioners’ knowing that they are loved and cared for, and, secondly from their hearing and heeding the call to live out the Gospel in the world.

The crisis for traditional churches is really one of leadership: there are many ‘conservative’ or ‘traditional’ priests and ministers who are bitter or bored, or who are caught up in the political aspects of their denomination’s struggles, or who find that traditional forms are a good outlet for their own idiosyncratic individualism; there just aren’t very many for whom being a humble, but vigilant and loving shepherd is very important.

Regards,
John Graves