When trying to answer the big question “What is worship?”, we want to look to the Bible. But before we get to some of those big ideas, we have to take a minute and address a problem that if left unchecked, runs the risk of undermining everything we do in gathered worship—and that’s the problem of pragmatism. 

What’s wrong with pragmatism?

By pragmatism I mean that we simply settle for whatever seems to work at a given point in time. And the idea is this; if we are not driven with a clear sense of biblical truth to guide our sense of purpose in worship, we will give in to pragmatism and be more deeply led by what simply seems to work than what the scriptures actually teach. 

There are a lot of common forms of pragmatism in the church today when it comes to gathered worship. 

Christian Entertainment

The first I would call simply Christian entertainment, where our functional goal is to simply put on a bigger and better show—usually than the other church down the street. And we do this to attract more people to our church—again, usually from other churches. 

It becomes a goal that is always moving and continually escalating. Better arrangements. Newer songs. Bigger production. And it just never ends. 

Don’t Suck

Another form of pragmatism in gathered worship is simply (and forgive the language for this, but I don't know what else to call it) – to not suck. 

This is in response to real struggles; either musical quality or aspects of our production technology. And those are real problems. But in this form of pragmatism, our goal each Sunday becomes “just try and make it less painful than the one before”. 

This is not to minimize these very real issues and challenges. But yet I think we can all agree they are not good goals, or biblical drivers, of gathered worship.

Passive Adoption

Another form of pragmatism, is passively following and adopting the latest trends in Christian culture. Were being marketed to now more than ever in our gathered worship, being sold pre-packaged cultures from, from the likes of Hillsong and Bethel and Elevation. 

To be clear, I'm not here to condemn those movements. But the most appropriate forms of gathered worship and music for your particular church is going to come from taking into account your specific people, in your specific place and time, rather than “passively adopting” what someone else figured out for their church. These forms of pragmatism are everywhere in the church today, and they are a problem when we become more deeply moved and driven by simply what works than biblical truth. 

So what does the bible say?

When we start to turn our attention to the Bible, we find that the word worship is actually only rarely associated with singing. We find that “worship” is something far more broad, and it's a huge thread that runs from Genesis to Revelation. And that it has a lot more to do with the intentions of our hearts than outward behavior like singing. 

The Lord says:
“These people come near to me with their mouth
    and honor me with their lips,
    but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship of me
    is based on merely human rules they have been taught."
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—Isaiah 29:13

What about you?

I know your time is tight. I know there's always pressure. I know Sunday is always coming.

And yet, if we don't take the time in the scriptures and let them guide our practice more deeply than pragmatism, we run the risk of what God warned his people through the prophet Isaiah. That we might become a people who draw near with our mouths and honor him with our lips, but our hearts are far from him. 

So before we dig into some of these big ideas from the scriptures on what is worship, let's just take a minute and honestly ask ourselves, in what ways are we more driven by pragmatism than biblical purpose, conviction, and truth?