A Blended Worship Service IS???

Park Chapel Christian Church has a Blended Worship Service...we call it Solid Ground. What do I mean by "blended worship" service?

Well, let’s start with the word “worship”. Many books and articles (perhaps deliberately) do a poor job of pinning down what they do and do not mean by that word. On one end of the spectrum are definitions like “a complete liturgical event for which the people of a church regularly gather”: greeting, singing, preaching, praying, the kid’s moment, it’s all part of “worship”. On the other end of the spectrum is “participation in the singing of a particular type of song of adoration towards God, usually to soft, melodic, contemplative music”. While we all agree that “worship is important”, we have wildly different notions of what is and is not a part of that important thing. Worship is simply, "declaring how much God is worth with a physical response."

For the purposes of this blog, I’m going to use “worship” to refer to those times when the gathered church sings and prays aloud together (whether en masse or one-at-a-time). An alternate definition which will work just as well is those things in which the gathered church participates in perceptible ways with the intent of engaging with the presence of God in and among them so as to respond to our Creator by declaring He is worth more than anything else.

So what is “blended worship”? Simply put, it is the use of songs and prayers from radically different streams of the church and cultural genres, in their conventional forms, within a single worship event. Imagine a choir-sung Lutheran hymn, a neo-punk chorus, and a Gregorian chant as back-to-back songs within a single service and you’re starting to get the idea.

Notice that an otherwise-traditional church service in which a single “contemporary” song is performed by a singer (”special music”) is not blended, and neither is a rock-ensemble worship band covering a hymn; each of these is an example of one style co-opting the other, but using it on its own terms.

Therefore, in the Park Chapel Solid Ground service, we make it our goal to please our Creator by offering ourselves to Him in many diverse offerings...blending many facets of our abilities and gifts together so as to declare to anyone and everyone that we praise, adore, and love a creative Jehovah that has blessed us beyond our imaginations.

Genesis 2:3, "And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that He had done."

All thoughts are welcome...you know I love ya - Don