The Liturgical Fruit Basket
“The perfect church service would be one we were almost unaware of with the least surprises . . . Today it is a liturgical fruit basket upset.” — David Scaer from the Advantage of Liturgical Ruts (Logia 6:2 pg 53-54)
At one time a typical American Lutheran church would be using the Lutheran Hymnal or Service Book and Hymnal depending on which acronym of Lutheranism it was affiliated with. The worship service each week was familiar (which to some meant repetitious). The young children learned the liturgy and hymns next to their siblings, from their parents and grandparents. New members to the church or the Lutheran faith learned from being immersed each week in the Divine Service and catechesis.
Now you have to contend with the likes of traditional, contemporary, blended, emergent, progressive, multi-generational and try to determine what it all means. Liturgical innovation is the name of the game. As a liturgical Forest Gump might have said, “Worship is like a box of chocolates; you never know what you’ll get.”
I find a calmness in the predictability of the Divine Services in Lutheran Service Book. They all follow the same outline, granted with different musical settings and different texts, and offer opportunities for variety — elaboration and simplification during the rhythm of the church year. Some might lament five settings of the Divine Service in LSB, but I tend to like an intentional and planned use of the settings throughout the year. At first, learning a new service setting or hymn might be challenging, but soon the challenge fades away. It becomes like breathing — it just happens and is natural.
Ultimately, I think careful and deliberate worship planning comes down to a respect and reverence for the worship patterns that we have as Lutherans. Not that we “idolize” these forms, but we ask ourselves why we may want to deviate from them.
Just as Dr. Scaer provided the introduction to this blog post, I will also let him end it.
“We don’t notice a good shoe, which is often an old one.” (Logia 6:2 pg 53-54)
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