Joyce Borger

I’m angry. I am angry that my daughter, who is starting ninth grade today, which in the U.S. marks the move to high school, is doing so from the desk in her bedroom. I’m angry that we as a country couldn’t do what was necessary to make a safe return to school possible for many of our students and teachers. Truth be told, that isn’t the only thing I’m angry about, and in the scheme of world events it’s not that significant. The world we inhabit at this moment is full of anger. Anger at the “other” who doesn’t share our political position or worldview. Anger at Hong Kong police attacking a twelve-year-old girl and ongoing anger over broken promises. Anger that a sixteen-year-old boy in South Africa was caught in crossfire and killed while eating a biscuit at his kitchen table. Anger over vote rigging in Belarus. Anger that the opioid epidemic is worsening in Canada and getting so little attention. Anger at injustices shown to indigenous people groups and people of color. Even the creation seems to be angry, with raging fires, swarms of locusts, hurricanes, derechos, and drought. I’d like to think that by the time you read this all will be solved—my daughter physically in school; democracy returned to Hong Kong; indigenous people groups fully recognized, with progress towards restitution and reconciliation for all who have suffered from systemic racism. Creation at rest. But my guess is that many of these situations will remain, and so will the anger and grief. Let us continue to lament and turn our anger over to God, and then ask God how God wants to use us to bring about shalom. In the midst of all of this I was blessed by the content of this issue, and I hope you will be blessed by reading it. Even if you don’t use the worship services for congregational worship, use them for your personal devotional time. Read the prayers provided in the services. Spend time reflecting on the texts of songs; click on the links in the digital edition to listen to them. Spend time with Scott Hoezee’s reflection (p. 18). Use the images of the slain lamb (p. 27) and Hans Holbein’s “The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb” (p. 33) to reflect on how Christ took on this world’s righteous anger, its laments, its pain, and its sin, how he suffered, died, and descended to the dead so that we might be saved—that we might have hope. I also encourage you to read about the importance of joy and praise in Latino worship even amid struggles (p. 43). Finally—or maybe first—read John Witvliet’s response to a question about the place of anger in worship (p. 35). Today especially, I needed the reminder that “some psalms of protest and anger are notable not simply because they express anger or disappointment but because they do not simply express anger or disappointment, but relinquish it, entrusting the pain or source of bitterness to God” (p. 35). Let us continue to lament and turn our anger over to God, and then ask God how God wants to use us to bring about shalom.

God’s got you. You are not alone. God’s got you and God isn’t afraid of your fears and wonderings, your anger and questions, your weariness.

Have you heard of the slow movement? Slow food? Slow living? It’s all about creating the space needed in life to draw closer connections between individuals and communities. The slow movement desires to strengthen the relationship between people and the earth and all it contains, to know where your food comes from, to grow it, gather it, prepare it, smell it, and take the time to relish it. It’s about being present, being grounded in who and where you are, and focusing on the journey of life and not simply goals and outcomes. To do that you need to slow down. This year many of us have experienced a forced slowing as we stayed home to reduce the spread of COVID-19. We had nowhere to go, so households were forced to engage with each other. Siblings became each other’s only playmates. We took time to arrange virtual meetups and in some instances engaged more with distant friends and family than prior to COVID. Our worship was simplified (though its creation wasn’t simple), and church meetings were canceled. I don’t wish for a resurgence of COVID or the coming of another pandemic, but as real as all the loss of life, employment, dreams, and opportunities are, so are the glimpses of good things that arose in and through the pandemic. It’s important that we don’t lose the good. And one of the good things was the slowing down. As we circle around to the Advent and Christmas seasons once again, whether your church is worshiping all together or in households or in small groups, I encourage you to intentionally plan a slow Advent. By that I mean being intentional about locating your congregation in the cosmic reality of God’s activity and in a specific time and place. Help your congregants see that they are in the in-between time, the time between God breaking into this world as the incarnate Christ and the return of our glorious Savior. Discover again how we can find hope in the fact that Christ became human and understands the highs and lows of life. Remind your people that that same Christ overcame death itself, so we too can live knowing that one day we too shall experience that reality and even now can claim it as ours. Take the time to name current realities in all their complexity: the grief, fear, loss, joy, excitement, and hope that exist side by side. Name and pray against the evil of racism in all its forms, against the devaluing of life expressed by the normalization of abortion, against underfunded schools, against the refusal to care about missing Indigenous women, against the fact that so many Indigenous and isolated communities do not have access to clean water and electricity, and against other evils plaguing our communities and world. Advent is about helping our people live lives of patient and active endurance amid personal, communal, national, and global struggles while clinging to the joyous expectation of Christ’s return. Advent isn’t simply about preparing for Christmas, buying gifts, and putting up decorations. It is about watching and waiting to see what God is doing in our lives and in the world around us and then joining God in that work by willingly giving up our life for others. Advent requires us to slow down—to watch, to look, to listen, and then, in consort with the Holy Spirit, to act. Our hope is that in this issue of Reformed Worship you will find resources to do just that, not just during Advent, but all the way through the season of Epiphany.

Worship practices during the COVID-19 pandemic have opened up opportunities for worship leaders to reflect the principles and the most important elements of corporate worship.

By the time you start thinking about Ascension and Pentecost services Easter will have passed. Pastors and worship leaders are giving a collective sigh of relief that they have reached this stretch of Ordinary Time without any great expectations for special services. But wait—the gospel story isn’t over yet. Christ has been raised from the dead, but the story continues through Christ’s ascension and the giving of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and beyond. It is with the giving of the Holy Spirit that we join the story.

During this Advent season, are you the one knocking or the one invited to express God’s love and mercy and open the door? My daughter and I took a road trip one summer and because I wanted some scheduling freedom we didn’t book campsites ahead of time. Given just how many campgrounds there are I naively thought we would have no problem securing a site each night. How wrong my assumptions were and as place after place said they were full I felt my anxiety rising.

The anti-idolatry response [to worship’s “de-Christianizing of God’s people] is to make sure that our worship leaders and planners from pastors to musicians, artists, tech, liturgists and elders, and yes also those gathered, understand that it is God who calls us to worship, it is the Holy Spirit who enables our worship, and it is Christ who perfects it. 

Is it ever OK to be intentionally exclusive in worship?  I’ve been having this internal argument of late about whether or not it is ever OK to make a worship decision that you know will result in some demographic being left out when it is within your power to be more inclusive? In other words, is it ever OK to be intentionally exclusive in worship? Think through these scenarios with me:

Storytelling is a universal phenomenon playing a significant and revered role in all cultures before our modern western age. Through the passing on of stories, history was learned and remembered, children were educated, truths were passed on, and hope was given. Listeners learned about good and evil, about perseverance in the face of all kinds of trials, and that ultimately good wins over evil. Many stories portrayed a simple dichotomy of good versus evil, but more complex stories showed that most of the world had a propensity for either, and it was up to us to choose to do right.