Contemporary? Traditional?
“Contemporary worship” sounds really hip and cool, especially when a person throws it up against the dusty, dry, wrinkly “traditional worship” style. Yet, there are several problems here. What most folks think of as “traditional” is only yesterday’s “contemporary” style. Even Willow Creek Church’s hip style that grew out of the 70s and 80s is now being called “traditional” by the teens & 20-somethings. And what the middle-agers disparage as “Traditional” is really a format that erupted after World War II, when returning soldiers, airmen, sailors and marines spurred on an explosion of new churches all across the nation. Nothing wrong with that, in-and-of-itself. But it did galvanize a specific mode of worship that was quite contemporary in its day. A style that most of our grandparents and great grandparents were comfortable with. Therefore, when I hear people whine about “traditional worship” being old and stodgy, they’re usually referring to the very contemporary-to-the-1940s form...