Thank you Tim for asking the question! Yes we do! Many of our people do not know how to worship, or understand what worship really is. Just singing a song or two and a prayer and a listening to a sermon and placeing a dollar or two in the offering is not worship. We need a new and fresh vision of who God is, and how to worship HIM!
I also think that we need a theological defintion of worship. As I look out into my crowd on Sunday morning, I don't quite know if everyone gets what worship is.
I could say, "Wait for my dissertation." Obviously I am concerned about this same issue. The goal of my dissertation is to try to change the conversation about worship from, "Does it have a beat and can I dance to it" to, "What is worship suppose to be accomplishing anyway?"
I think that our emerging post-Christian culture will actually place a greater burden on what we do in worship because the worship service will be our primary arena for making Christians (in the fullest sense of that word). Worship has to be about who God is. We must worship to please Him, not ourselves. Worship must never be designed according to the tastes of the people we are trying to attract. They are sinners and cannot know what worship ought to be about.
In worship we are seeking to bring people into the full reality of who God is in a way that enables them to live Christianly in a secular society. Worship is about creating a world out of which we live as Christians. It must be a powerful enough experience to orient me into the world of God as the focus of my life in opposition to the surrounding society. I've probably said enough to confuse the issue already, so let's see where the discussion goes.
The seeker service, by definition, is not a worship service. At Willow Creek, they are very deliberate in saying that their worship happens on Thursday night and that the seeker service is not worship.
The original seeker service, was the campmeeting and/or tentmeeting revival. They had the same mission: to introduce people to Jesus and to send them back to worshipping congregations for faith formation. Here's our fundamental problem. We allowed a service form that was not intended to be fully-formed worship to become the way we did church. Now we have no idea how to do worship, because we have never done worship.
I think our pattern of worship is a lot like fast food. It's quick and easy and tasty and cheap. The problem: it is also unhealthy. The bigger problem: we have gotten so used to a fast food diet that we have no palate for real food and we have no idea how to cook.
It depends what you mean by "prayer service" and by "worship." Historically, worship has been called in latin orandi (prayer). But, we usually think of a prayer service as akin to something we do on Wednesday nights. All of these services are worship services, but the are not "fully formed worship." So, you have to begin by asking, "What are we trying to accomplish in worship?" and build from there.
Worship takes effort. We have taught our people to come to church expecting to be entertained. We have taught them that worship is for and about them. As a result our worship practices are anthropocentric exercises in self-love. Across the country and across denominational lines, people are reacting to what worship has become. I'm working on finding a meaningful solution.
Obviously I am concerned about this same issue. The goal of my dissertation is to try to change the conversation about worship from, "Does it have a beat and can I dance to it" to, "What is worship suppose to be accomplishing anyway?" 