Tomorrow is Independence Day here in the United States. It also happens to be Sunday, a day of worship. Only once every seven years, the 4th of July actually falls on a Sunday. We plan to make a big deal out of Independence Day on Sunday at Church Requel. The question has occurred to me of how the worship planner should respond to the secular and cultural calendar. It seems to me that there are three options.
Option #1 - Ignore the Holiday. The great preacher, theologian and reformer, John Calvin, was somewhat famous for ignoring even the sacred calendar, let alone the secular calendar. He had a preaching schedule and he stuck to it. This has the benefit of remaining focused on preaching only the Word of God and not being sidetracked. Calvin rightly figured that if he adjusted his preaching schedule every time something special was on the calendar, he would be adjusting a third to half the time. But, it seems to me, that ignoring the holiday has the disadvantage of missing a key launching point, which is already in the forefront of parishioner's minds.
Option #2 - Cater to the Holiday. Design the entire service and sermon around the Holiday. This is the exact opposite of Option #2. The idea here is that since people are already in "Holiday" mode, the worship planner should make the weekend service and sermon about the Holiday. I was surprised when I visited the Sermon Central website this week to discover how many of the sermons were designed around the history of the Signing of the Declaration of Independence. Many of my contemporaries then launch into a sermon about the rights that we, as Americans, may be losing. This option is really not an option for me, since a) I want my preaching ALWAYS to focus on God's Word and its application for us today, and b) I never want to allow my personal political views to stand in the way of someone hearing and receiving the Gospel of Christ.
Option #3 - Mash with the Holiday. Use the holiday. Don't ignore it or cater to it. One of the most popular shows on Fox is Glee (not recommended from my point of view because of the very loose moral values portrayed). Part of the winning formula for Glee is the mashup: when they take two different musical themes and "mash" them together. This is what I like to do with the holiday schedule. We take people from where they are in their minds when they walk into the service to the Biblical principles and applications that we have planned and scheduled.
This weekend is a perfect example. We plan to teach our way through Philippians this summer. Option #1 would have us totally ignoring the 4th of July and would make us act as if tomorrow's Independence Day festivities weren't happening, while we plow our way through the scheduled Scriptures. Option #2 would have us set aside our Philippians study. But option #3, which takes a little more creative thinking, provides some wonderful opportunities, which I plan to exploit tomorrow.
- What does the Christ-follower need to be set FREE from?
- What was the unity required of the Continental Congress?
- What was the sacrifice required of them? What is the sacrifice required of us?
- Is there a connection between "e pluribus unum" of the American founders and the "one mind, one spirit" admonition of Paul?
Mashing the secular and/or temporal with the eternal precepts of God's Word actually is not an original concept with me. Jesus was famous for it. How often did he take the talk of the day (taxation, for example) and turn it into eternal precept (Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's and unto God what is God's).
When parishioners visit Church Requel tomorrow, they will watch a "stars and stripes" countdown before the service. They'll then watch a one-minute opening video that reminds us that we are "One nation under God." After the worship songs, they'll view a funny 4th of July video from the Skit Guys at a cookout, with the not-so-subtle message of how God has blessed America. Before the sermon, the CR church attendee will again be reminded in a visually stunning video of the freedoms we enjoy as Americans, ending with the Christ-follower's freedom in Christ.
Is that overkill? Think about it this way. Those 3 videos will take 6 minutes of the 75-minute service. They have been carefully chosen and placed for the entire purpose of bringing the mind of everyone right to the exact point I want to start the sermon. If I've chosen well, I will have created a great platform from which to preach the Word of God. And, even if someone walks away not remembering my words, they very well might remember one of the videos - each one of which could stand alone as a mini-sermon! Seems to me to be a win-win all the way around.
