Worship Pastor as Prophet: Form Vs. Function

The worship wars are started because of insubordination of the “forms” of worship in a service. Music is a form; it is not a function of a service seeking to experience God in communication with him and about him. Music can fall under the category of a number of the functions, but it itself is NOT a function of worship. When the “form” of music becomes, in the mind of the congregant, a “function” of worship, you will inevitably be fighting over the correct way. The function designations are such because of the simplicity of each function and the open-ended nature of which the Lord ordained them. Although the functions are general, they are direct scriptural ways in which communication happens from God (scripture, prophecy/preaching), to God (prayer, meditation, confession), and about God (testimony, confession). It will do the worship pastor well to look at every element down to the minutest of details and see if it indeed aligns to a function which has its foundation in at least one of the three directions of communication. There are MANY forms out there that are being done that don’t, but are being done because of a fleshly human satisfaction in them. Those forms may or may not be inherently wrong, but without a function that accomplishes a direction of communication, they will inevitably prove to be futile in the context of a true worship service.


With an understanding of function being superior to form, you can see why arguments about contemporary versus traditional style of music just have no bearing to the ultimate goal of a Sunday morning service meant to amplify a believer’s life of worship. Rather, it simply distracts the leadership down the rabbit hole of people pleasing and fear of man. The devil has had a lot of success in distracting people from what is actually important to spend time and energy on. That is why, I contend, that when you prayerfully plan a service, you MUST start from the foundation and work up. You first ask yourself “how can we be sure to be in communication to, from, and about God in this service?” and not start with a discussion about “what is the latest and greatest thing being done in churches today?” If you want to cultivate a culture of worship in your church, where people are being molded more and more into the likeness of Christ and responding to it, you should teach this biblical model, and you should model this service planning rubric.

I don’t want to completely minimize the value of good forms. There are many great forms out there that have proven to stand the test of time in regards to accomplishing the function on the firm foundation of communion with God. One of these is music. Music has been a form used to accomplish the function of prayer and testimony for thousands of years. King David was a prime example of one of the first “Christian artists.” Then you have the sons of Korah as perhaps the first worship band of all time. The Psalms were most assuredly put to music originally and in contemporary time as well. Some of the best lyrical mining can happen by digging into the Psalms for material to be put to music! Again style of music has no bearing in the argument. Though I am not a fan of the popular craze in the young market designated as “screamo,” but if combined with the message that ascribes worth and praise to God because of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the style becomes moot and the message becomes superior. I may not prefer that, and it probably won’t end up in my church because I wouldn’t be able to pull it off well and I personally am not drawn into worshipful or overflowing heart with that particular form and if I am charged with leading a congregation in that overflow, I better genuinely exhibit that myself before expecting to lead well. This brings up a very crucial point in the issue of forms that accomplish functions. Maybe you do have a form in mind that will accomplish a function, but you may or may not be able to do that form justice with your musical ability, accomplish it with excellence or a genuine heart. Excellence and genuineness in the context of forms is extremely important. It displays a passion for the subject of our worship and minimizes distraction to those we seek to lead in worship. Again, we don’t lead people into the presence of God; we lead people in responding to God’s constant overwhelming presence. When this truth is realized and responded to outside of the walls of Sunday morning, we are successfully cultivating a culture of worship in our churches. That is our goal. No matter what the form, focusing on making the functions of worship around the foundation of three part communication, we seek to train, guide, and lead by example our congregations to worship every day in their own contexts!