Seeker Sensitive Worship

This Sunday, Jan 30, I am preaching at Fayette Baptist Church, in Fayette, Maine. At least I'm supposed to. I'm still finishing my sermon. The text I've chosen is John 4:19-26. Title: "Seeker Sensitive Worship." The BIG IDEA is that God is the ultimate Seeker of true worshipers, and true worship, then, is an engaging with God on terms that he proposes and he alone makes possible ("in spirit and in truth"). I hope to encourage the congregation towards a holistic understanding of worship that goes beyond the popular "music = worship" generalization and expounds on the over simplified corrective, "all of life is worship." These two aspects must be understood together if they are to be understood and lived out as "true worship." What's your community worship service look like? Is it Seeker sensitive? Or is it seeker sensitive? Is it both? Can it be?

Thanks to Dave...

"Creating one's own blog seems to be all the rage among evil geniuses these days"--paraphrase from a recent episode of Alias.

After several weeks of incessant coaxing, I gave in and started this blog. Small beginnings with great possibilities.

What's a "Eucatastrophe"?

“The peculiar quality of the ‘joy’ in successful Fantasy can thus be explained as a sudden glimpse of the underlying reality or truth. It is not only a ‘consolation’ for the sorrow of this world, but a satisfaction, and an answer to that question, ‘Is it true?’ . . . . [I]n the ‘eucatastrophe’ we see in brief vision that the answer may be greater–-it may be a far-off gleam or echo of evangelium in the real world . . . .The Gospels contain a fairy-story, or a story of a larger kind which embraces all the essence of fairy-stories. They contain many marvels--peculiarly artistic, beautiful, and moving: ‘mythical’ in their perfect, self-contained significance; and among the marvels is the greatest and most complete conceivable eucatastrophe. But this story has entered History and the primary world; the desire and aspiration of sub-creation [those who write and enjoy fanatasy literature] has been raised to the fulfillment of Creation.
The Birth of Christ is the eucatastrophe of Man’s history. The Resurrection is the eucatastrophe of the story of the Incarnation. This story begins and ends in joy. It has pre-eminently the ‘inner consistency of reality.' There is no tale ever told that men would rather find was true....But this story is supreme;and it is true. Art has been verified. God is the Lord, of angels, and of men--and of elves. Legend and History have met and fused."--J.R.R. Tolkien, Tree and Leaf, 88-89.