Those Perverted Lights

Last night I was talking with my son about the music at the Catalyst Conference. I commented on the guitar player's ability to use his effects pedals (echo, wah wah, "flanger," etc.) almost as instruments. We also talked about the staging and lighting, which was impressive (but didn't particularly call attention to the musicians and singers). Quite abruptly, my son said, "I wish our services were like that."

As we talked about what he said, he made the point that the various services he's attended that have been in more of what we might call a "concert" setting always enable him to focus on the worship aspect of both music and preaching, in contrast to a brightly-lit setting with less "high-powered" music.

One comment I've heard repeated by several people is that low lighting in a service gives the setting a "night club" atmosphere. But isn't that allowing a preconceived notion of a secular activity to restrict something that might be beneficial, enabling, and edifying to worshippers?

Many people who attend worship services from Sunday to Sunday -- and I'd say probably the majority of them -- are self-conscious enough to feel uncomfortable lifting their hands in worship, even if they feel the liberty and prompting of the Holy Spirit to do so. The simple adjustment of lower house lighting has the immediate effect of taking the focus off of the indivdual worshipper and removes one mental hindrance to their worship: self-consciousness.

Some might argue that the attending worshipper should not feel self-conscious about worshipping freely regardless of the circumstances. While that has some truth, there could be a number of reasons for that self-awareness other than paranoia. For instance, for better or worse, I have avoided lifting my hands because I don't want to draw attention to myself. I know this to be the case with others in the congregation, too. I should note that this runs deep with me and I still deal with it personally -- one of the reasons for my inclination to drop out of "the institutional church machine" several years ago was that I saw the lifting of hands by singers and musicians to be pretentious and showy.

I want to talk about music and performance issues tomorrow, but taking the issue of house and stage lighting only, why do we wipe out the possibility of utilizing a setting simply because "undesirables" do so in a totally different arena? (Don't get me started on why we may think certain people are undesirable...)

Potentially uncomfortable paragraph ahead (especially if my parents are reading this)... You were warned!

To draw an overkill parallel from left field, God made humans to enjoy sex. But He didn't intend for it to be abused in the twisted and perverted manner in which some use it. Are we going to just drop this whole "sex" thing because there are weirdos out there? Probably not. I would argue that we're dealing with a similar parallel here, only on a smaller and less far-reaching scale of right and wrong.

For those of you who've stuck with this post to the end, do you have any Scriptural or moral argument for or against "concert" style lighting in a worship service?

Posted in: Events, The Church, Worship