Defining the Task of a Theology of Worship

The following article underscores how the theology of worship has been neglected by many Christians and challenges believers to find new hope and power in the vision of Christus Victor.

The topic of worship is not only timely, it is urgent. There is a widespread sense among Christians in North America that all is not well with the church, that we need a new sense of direction, a new dynamism.

In particular, we need something that will capture the imagination and enthusiasm of young adults. The institutional loyalty that many older Christians grew up with is no longer evident among young people. Many of them are walking away from the church, not necessarily because they are hostile to religion, not because they object to the teachings or standards of the church, but because they just don’t sense any particular value in participating in the Christian community. They see it as an option for those who want it, but certainly not a necessity for their own lives. There is a growing sense that we need a revitalization of church life, something to convey the excitement that being a Christian involves. What we need is a new understanding of worship.

Worship and Ecclesiology

Our need for a theology of worship is part of a much larger need for a doctrine of the church.

Ecclesiology, as the doctrine is sometimes called, is the most underdeveloped aspect of Protestant thought. Protestant evangelicals have had a lot to say about the doctrine of human beings and the person and work of Christ, as well as the doctrine of revelation, which has received considerable attention through numerous discussions about biblical inspiration. So, when you look through the standard list of Christian doctrines to see what Protestants have been interested in, the work done in the area of ecclesiology is remarkably thin.

Even as part of a doctrine of the church, a full-fledged theology of worship itself is no small undertaking. It would have to include a theology of preaching, a theology of prayer, and sacramental theology as well.

Besides a theology of worship, with all it entails, a comprehensive doctrine of the church must also include a theology of ministry. The controversy over women’s ordination shows how much thinking we still have to do about this important topic. And perhaps most important of all, we need a theology of the Spirit. According to the New Testament, the church is the community of the Spirit, life in Christ is life in the Spirit, and worship is impossible without the presence of the Spirit.

Several factors seem to mitigate a Protestant evangelical theology of worship. One might be our preoccupation with the mission of the church. This tends to make our times together occasions for planning, for organization, for motivational speeches, but not for devotional or celebration. Similarly, if we are preoccupied with the teachings of the church, then our times together will become occasions for indoctrination.

Of course, the church has a mission and the church has a message, and both deserve all the attention we can give them. But there is more to the Christian life than these things. In worship, the church—the community of the Spirit—brings to vivid expression its entire experience of salvation in Jesus Christ, with adoration, devotion, and celebration.

Worship and Theology

A second point concerns the connection between worship and theology. We need to recognize both as important activities in the Christian community. If worship is the heart’s love for God, theology is the mind’s love for God; both are responses to God.

In addition, there is a reciprocal relation between theology and worship. Our worship affects our theology, and our theology affects our worship. On the one hand, theology has its roots in worship. It rises out of our experience with God. As one thinker puts it, “Theology has its basis in the experience of prayer.” (Heinrich Ott, God [Richmond: John Knox, 1974], 95.) So, theology is one of the forms worship takes.

There is an ancient tradition of what we might call “worshipful reflection” or perhaps “theological worship.” I am referring, of course, to the venerable idea of faith seeking understanding. For Anselm, the great medieval theologian, adoration found expression in careful thinking. “I do not seek to understand that I may believe,” he said, “but I believe in order to understand.… So Lord, who dost give understanding to faith, give me … to understand that thou art as we believe.” (Saint Anselm: Basic Writings, trans. S. N. Deane [LaSalle, Ill.: Open Court, 1966], 7.)

The relation moves in the other direction, too: theology can have an important effect on worship. What we come to believe about God and his relation to us cannot fail to affect the way we respond. Unfortunately, there are ways of looking at God that make it impossible for people to worship. And people who have different views of God will have different worship experiences. Those who are preoccupied with what God expects of them and those who are preoccupied with what God has done for them will have worship experiences that are radically different. Good theology and good worship go hand in hand. You can’t ever have one without the other.

Worship and Our Particular Theologies

It is one thing to assert that our worship should reflect our theology, but just how our theology should shape our worship experience is not easy to say. A series of sermons on distinctive denominational themes, for example, is no guarantee that the worship experience of the congregation will be somehow distinct.

In response, some may feel that particular denominations should not strive to be unique in their worship. Worship, they say, is one place in church life where we can reach beyond denominational boundaries and affirm solidarity with other branches in the body of Christ. But to achieve any significant theology of worship, however, we need to do more than emphasize particular denominational doctrines. We need to achieve a fundamental transformation in our perspective on the Christian life. We need something like a revolution, a paradigm shift, a new model or metaphor for what it means to be a Christian. If theology as such is truly significant, it will have more than ideas and practices to offer the world. It will have a powerful vision of what Christianity means. And this will have an inevitable effect on the central experience of worship.

Let me conclude with one possibility for theology-to-worship transformation. This is the familiar theme of Christus Victor, the idea that the entire universe is engulfed in a conflict whose central acts unfold in the history of God’s people. I first sensed the potential of Christus Victor for worship several years ago when I heard a lecture on the work of Christ as a dramatic victory over the great powers that oppose and enslave human lives—the powers of sin, death, and the devil. It occurred to me that this was a viewpoint the whole church could embrace with enthusiasm.

Consider the exciting possibilities such a vision opens up—the motifs of liberation, celebration, joy, and peace, for example. Think of the tension and drama that such a vision of human history conveys. Here is an idea with real power to transform worship. To a great extent, we have left that comprehensive, overarching theme on the theological shelf. The time has come to bring it into the arena of concrete life where personal commitments and values are shaped. The time has come to infuse our worship with the exciting perspectives the Christus Victor message contains.

In the Christus Victor theme lies an ecclesiology—the church as the people of Christ’s victory over the powers; a theology to free the mind to worship as it reflects on the implication of such a vision; a theology for worship that affirms worship as a celebration of the historic dethronement of the powers; an eschatological vision of the world freed from the powers; and a present awareness of God’s power at work in worship to free the worshiper and ultimately all creation from the domain of the powers. In this task lies the promise of a theology of worship.