{"id":4093,"date":"2008-10-30T10:54:31","date_gmt":"2008-10-30T16:54:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/?p=4093"},"modified":"2013-06-11T07:44:23","modified_gmt":"2013-06-11T13:44:23","slug":"emerging-worship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/emerging-worship\/","title":{"rendered":"emerging worship"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Earlier this week blogger <a href=\"http:\/\/zoecarnate.wordpress.com\/2008\/10\/28\/worship-for-an-emerging-church-part-1-zehnder\/\">Mike Morrell<\/a> asked &#8220;what sould emergent\/emerging worship look like and sound like?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m sure everyone has different ideas. <a href=\"http:\/\/jonnybaker.blogs.com\/\">Jonny Baker<\/a> is big into the alt.worship scene. Others like <a href=\"http:\/\/www.solomonsporch.com\/\">Solomon&#8217;s Porch<\/a>, are big on their community of faith writing their own songs and sharing them together. Others I know could care less what the music looks or sounds like &#8211; they&#8217;re more interested in the celebration and the sharing of stories\/testimonies. They admit that their mind wanders during community singing and they may start thinking about work, home or motorcycles instead.<\/p>\n<p>Either way I believe our worship should be defined as &#8220;celebrating what God is doing.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Michael points to 4 key elements (suggested by <a href=\"http:\/\/pomomusings.com\/2008\/10\/13\/dana-decker-when-we-sing\/\">Adam Walker Cleveland<\/a>) that should be a part of &#8220;emerging worship&#8221; ::<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>gender-inclusive language (esp. in our language for God)<\/li>\n<li>a shift from a I-YOU-me &#038; God focus, and a refocusing on the community<\/li>\n<li>a passion for the biblical themes of social justice, peace and a desire to speak for the oppressed<\/li>\n<li>maybe just some more songs straight from scripture (or from saints and desert fathers), letting God\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s work speak for itself, instead of pressing our own interpretation onto it, and onto the congregation that will sing the song<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Some may say the words to the songs don&#8217;t mean much &#8211; but I&#8217;m a big believer that they do. When I play an artist like <strong>Derek Webb<\/strong>, <strong>Bob Dylan<\/strong> or <strong>Flobots<\/strong> on my Zune &#8211; their lyrics move me to action (or at least increase my desire to do something). <strong>U2<\/strong>&#8216;s <em>Sunday Bloody Sunday<\/em> doesn&#8217;t allow me to sit back and ignore the violence going on in the world &#8211; it calls me to action. <\/p>\n<p>And likewise, as I and others have said before, when I walk into church and only sing songs about being hungry or thirsty &#8212; I&#8217;ll probably leave feeling hungry and thirsty. But if the weight of the world is on my shoulders and I can sing songs of <em>How Great Thou Art<\/em> and <em>How Great is Our God<\/em> or other songs about the strength and might and love of my God, my burden is lightened and I&#8217;m more willing to submit control of my situation to God.<\/p>\n<p>Michael points out one band that is attempting meet these four keys to emerging worship, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ztheband.com\">Zehnder<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>I got a copy of their album and it&#8217;s definitely a mix of musical styles. A little something for everyone perhaps. (That may be something that&#8217;s missing at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.encounterthis.com\">encounter<\/a>. We tend to lean more towards the rock or the softer acoustic\/unplugged rock sound.)<\/p>\n<p>On <em>Going Up<\/em>, the Zehnder brothers lyrically fit the 4 points that Michael and Adam point to, while mixing in original tunes as well as a rendition of <em>What Wondrous Love is This<\/em>. Musically I wasn&#8217;t as impressed the first time I listened to the album, but upon further listening and as the words began to sink in I&#8217;ve became more and more attracted to the music.<\/p>\n<p>Musically I would say several of the songs are similar in style to Simon and Garfunkle others have more of an upbeat sound with almost a choral backing, especially on the song <em>Rise Up<\/em> ::<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Rise up, feel the change!<br \/>\nThe Resurrection comes again!<br \/>\nRise up, believe the change!<br \/>\nWe&#8217;ll never be the same again!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><em>Spirit Born<\/em> seems to have it&#8217;s musical and vocal styling influenced by <strong>Sting<\/strong> (<span class=\"removed_link\" title=\"http:\/\/ztheband.com\/music\/audio\/assets\/ZGU01_Spirit_Born.mp3\">download the free Mp3<\/span>).<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\nYou know the wind blows, wind blows where it chooses<br \/>\nYou hear the sound of it<br \/>\nBut you don&#8217;t know, don&#8217;t know where it comes from<br \/>\nOr where it goes, it goes, it goes<br \/>\nYeah, you know don&#8217;t know, don&#8217;t know where it comes from<br \/>\nOr where it goes, it goes, it goes<\/p>\n<p>Blow through me, Wind, breathe on me, Breath, make Spirit born,<br \/>\nAll of my soul, make Spirit born, Spirit born.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>And <em>Justice Jam<\/em> could be possibly be confused with a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flobots.com\/\">Flobots<\/a> track using backing strings, a hip-hop beat and heavy social justice lyrics (<span class=\"removed_link\" title=\"http:\/\/ztheband.com\/music\/audio\/assets\/04_JusticeJam_sample.mp3\">listen to a sample<\/span>).<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>For justice I bust this flow for free<br \/>\nUsed to be blind but now I see<br \/>\nThrough the eyes of the elders who came before me<br \/>\nLike Malcolm and Martin and I can&#8217;t forget Mahatma Gandhi<br \/>\nTake a knee, homey \/ Hug an old bodhi tree<br \/>\nRealize how to be revolutionary<br \/>\nDestiny is divine when aligned with the truth<br \/>\nThat resides deep inside that g-ride of my youth<br \/>\nNow I got proof of insurance and a photo ID<br \/>\nBut I choose to tell time by Mayan prophecy \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Oo, Let justice roll down&#8230; <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Overall I think the Zehnder brothers have created an album that challenges us to much greater themes than much of the music you&#8217;ll hear on your local &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/faith\/christian-is-a-poor-adjective\/\">Christian radio station<\/a>.&#8221; It challenges us to think about our faith and how it impacts (or doesn&#8217;t impact) our daily lives.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m not sure the songs are as singable in a community settings as some that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.daveandrews.com.au\">Dave Andrews<\/a> has written but I definitely wouldn&#8217;t object to trying them out in a community setting.<\/p>\n<p>But don&#8217;t take my word for it.<\/p>\n<p>Go check out the band&#8217;s website <a href=\"http:\/\/ztheband.com\">ztheband.com<\/a> and then purchase their CD from <a href=\"http:\/\/cdbaby.com\/cd\/zehnder\">CDBaby<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>And while you wait for the album to arrive, check out their 2003 rendition of Song of Peace ::<\/p>\n<p><object width=\"425\" height=\"344\"><param name=\"movie\" value=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/iXaOynkWi8Y&#038;hl=en&#038;fs=1\"><\/param><param name=\"allowFullScreen\" value=\"true\"><\/param><param name=\"allowscriptaccess\" value=\"always\"><\/param><\/object><\/p>\n<p>Give the band a listen and let me know what you think.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Earlier this week blogger Mike Morrell asked &#8220;what sould emergent\/emerging worship look like and sound like?&#8221; I&#8217;m sure everyone has different ideas. Jonny Baker is big into the alt.worship scene. Others like Solomon&#8217;s Porch, are big on their community of faith writing their own songs and sharing them together. Others I know could care less &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/emerging-worship\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">emerging worship<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[560,18,13],"tags":[718,767,717,854,1103,1585,1048,1471,1584,4647,1586,586,1583],"class_list":["post-4093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community","category-faith","category-music","tag-adjective","tag-bob-dylan","tag-christian","tag-derek-webb","tag-emergent","tag-emerging-worship","tag-flobots","tag-jonny-baker","tag-mike-morrell","tag-music","tag-sting","tag-u2","tag-zehnder"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pEnSo-141","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4093"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4093\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11210,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4093\/revisions\/11210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}