Hey all I'm new here but the comments from Dan's book struck me. What struck me even more was that the selective comments chosen for this thread were shared as gospel truth instead of a man's opinon and very possibly mistakes made as a praise and worship leader and yet pushing them as common mistakes made with all worship leaders and or teams. I appreciate Dan's willingness to open up his time and energy for emails to discuss this, shows graciousness on his part.
The reasons posed for traditional or ccm/praise and worship prior to the service both have valid points and yet not one single point is correct over the other. To assume or believe that it is purposed to prepare hearts for the preaching only is very arrogant for a pastor to think that his message is the only thing that brings the flock closer to God. The presence of God should be entered into regardless of the style of music otherwise all you will have is a dead stale service and unless all you want to do is sit in a pew for a few hours with nothing changing inside of your heart then hey...that's the place for you!
Each individual will get something different from the service, it may be in the traditional or praise and worship or in the sermon itself, but that's up to the spirit of God who should ultimately be controling how the service goes in the first place.
As for older people being pushed out or feeling pushed out due to lack of change....fact is, they have to realize that they are the tools God used to create a strong foundation and nothing can change that, however they are no longer the future of the church and long after they are gone the future of the church will indeed be making changes. They too made changes when they were young because God led them to do what created a healthy church in the first place, thus God can and should use the young to bring in fresh ideas and see more happen because that is how the cycle should go. Most older folks I've spoken to don't seem to have an issue with it, they seem to hold the view that even though it's different from what they would like to see, fact is they are seeing younger generations bring in the unsaved and God is using new methods so in fact they put their stamp of approval on it.
BTW...sorry I didn't rally introduce myself before I jumped in with my thoughts....I'm Darlene but it's much easier to call me kidscare2.
)
