Equipping & Empowering Worship Leaders Worldwide

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Lately, I’ve been seeing more and more articles and blogs such as this popping up on the interwebs. The world doesn’t need another opinion, but here’s mine. It doesn’t matter if your church is “modern” or “traditional.”

The mission of the church is to make the Gospel known and to carry the name of Jesus to the ends of the earth.

What does good lighting, no lighting, good bands, bad bands, drums, no drums, organs, guitars, propresenter, hymnals, coffee, donuts, no breakfast, or any other countless number of things have to do with this topic of making the Gospel known? Absolutely nothing. Let me explain. It doesn’t matter if your church portrays itself as, “modern” or “traditional.”

What matters is how you are showing people Christ through the preaching of the Word, through genuine worship, discipleship, and community.

This is why we meet. This is why we are called by the one, true sovereign God. To show the love of Christ to the world that He created and loved enough to die for, once and for all. So why has it become polluted? Why do people think that “modern” church is slowly loosing traction? Contrary to what many seem to think, I completely disagree. “Modern” church is not the culprit, nor the “traditional” church. Honestly, I think it boils down to poor communication of the Gospel and poor discipleship. Production is not bad. A good band is not bad. Serving coffee is not bad. They are merely a means to point towards Christ. The more production and media we have going on, the more that we must point to the reason that we do all of that stuff, Jesus. This is where many churches have dropped the ball, so to speak. They have focused so much on “being awesome” or “having a great experience at church,” that they have simply forgot the importance and incredible need for genuine discipleship and sharing the truth of the Gospel. The age of “seeker friendly” and “watered down Gospel” needs to end. As the church, we need to understand that the message we carry and the Gospel we present is offensive. We shouldn’t expect everyone to accept it (John 15:20). We need to reach the lost, but not at the cost of some “easy-believism Gospel” that really doesn’t line up with scripture. It’s time to stop straddling the fence and take a stand for the truth. 11 out of 12 disciples were killed for carrying this message, for the sake of Jesus. These are truly men who picked up their cross and followed Him (Matthew 16:24). This is why it is so important to teach the truth of the Gospel and have legitimate discipleship. “Because the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those who believe, it is the power of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:18) With all of that said, we shouldn’t have to keep up with modern culture or look to them for influence. The church should be influencing culture. After all, we carry the most valuable, influential, and culture changing name and message of all time, Jesus and the Gospel. So it doesn’t matter whether your church is “modern” or “traditional.” What matters is Jesus. The end.

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Comments

  1. Ryan Loche

    Really great thoughts Seth! What would you say to the worship leader that is faced with trying to blend modern and traditional in their weekly services?

    • Seth Rice

      Good question, Ryan. I’ve actually been apart of a church that attempted to blend modern and traditional. I think what you might be referring to is a worship leader at a traditional church who is trying to start introducing more modern worship music. I’ll try to be short with this answer, as I have a lot to say about this matter. First of all, I love hymns for their theological and doctrinal value. We still play hymns at our church, although they are very modern interpretations, we love them. I think it’s great if a worship leader wants to sing “Nothing But The Blood” and follow it with something like “Holy Spirit” by Bryan and Katie Torwalt. I guess my answer would be….know the heartbeat of the flock that you are leading. As worship leaders, it’s our job to have our congregation in mind while planning our sets. We need to know when to push boundaries musically, but also know what will bring our church together as one corporate body to worship in spirit and in truth.

      The next part is strictly opinion, but I do think if a church wants to incorporate modern and traditional music that they should do so as one church, one family, united for one purpose, to worship Jesus. I think there is a possibility of danger in splitting up a church in different services such as, “contemporary service at 9:15” and “traditional service at 11:00.” Speaking from experience, it could cause division in the church, Which is unhealthy and unbiblical, especially on a subject as trivial as stylistic preferences in musical worship. Exercise precaution, but it can be done. Just like I said in the article, the church’s main concern should be glorifying Jesus and spreading the Gospel.