Thinking Myself Out of a Job

Leading worship in various Churches and at different Christian events, I find myself occasionally in some settings in which I am forced to seriously examine what it is that is going on.

Now, whenever I'm doing something corporately with other Christians I always ask, "What are we doing?" That's one of the reasons I belong to a liturgical Church (which is a misnomer; all Churches have a liturgy).

Far too many of the events at which I find myself playing are saturated in revivalism, and I'm starting to really question the propriety of that mindset.

Revivalism as it is practiced in the Evangelical Church is the brain-child of Charles Finney, a pedal-to-the-metal heretic, any way you slice it. Why would we want to imitate his failed attempt (research it if you doubt me) to bring revival to New England in the second "Great Awakening?" It leads to all kinds of goofiness, unsurprisingly, or as my friend Aric said, "It was started by a heretic. How could it possibly go wrong?"

Revivalism says of God that He is not already giving us all that we need. He is not currently doing something which we need or want Him to do. We need more than what we've got (insert Tozer's famous line here).

I dispute that. I deny it. Hard. We do not need to gather together and seduce God into giving us what we want. We ought not treat Him as an idol we can beat when the crops aren't good.

Revivalism is skubulon. Reformation is what is needed. Reformation in our worship changes what we are doing, it centers our desires on God's will and not our felt needs and allows us to see and rest in the fact that God's grace is sufficient.

Now, how do I respond to this growing conviction given my job? Do I quit, be a mercenary, or hope to exert a corrective influence when I find myself amid weirdness?

Should I question each call that comes my way? Maybe that's the answer. I work with excellent, exemplary worship leaders and speakers, and maybe as long as I know who's involved I will know which way things will go.

Maybe, simply by virtue of the presence of leaders who get it, the whole thing won't be a sloppy, emotionalistic mess.

There's more. I'll add it later once I've got this more worked out.