Liquid Church - De-emphasising of a particular emphasis of faith
I like the way Ward’s vision is big enough to encompass the diversity of faith expressions. Solid church has a tendency to emphasise a particular style of worship at the cost of being welcoming and encouraging of the diversity of the ways people connect with God and each other. This one-size fits all mentality needs to be challenged. Many of the ‘newer’ approaches to worship in solid church have not been more than fiddling with the same formula. We take the formula of singing, sitting in rows and a sermon and we tweak. The last twenty or so years have seen such tweaks as modern music, singers urging us on from the front and multimedia presentations in our inputs. But, while it may seem radically different to more traditional approaches to worship, I question if we really have re-thought how church will connect with people. I respect Ward’s attempt to do exactly this.
Other Liquid Church reflections can be found here:
Liquid Church - Reservation on the role of gatherings
Liquid Church - Unity
Liquid Church - Compartmentalising Church
Liquid Church - Community vs event mentality
Liquid Church - Plasma Church
Liquid Church - Who will pay the bills?
Liquid Church - Selling solid church short