In my opinion there isn’t a right way to worship. A well rounded faith explores the different means of worship just as there are the different aspects to God.

Push yourself to try something different.

Buddhists sit silently and don’t move during our version of worship. The silence and concentration help us see and hear what we are looking for. In more animated forms of worship the focus and concentration developed in quite contemplation is lost.

But when we play the flute, dance, or do more active forms of yoga or in fact do anything we have the dynamism of the spirit in is and there’s no choice… you just gotta dance!

Certainly, whatever is socially acceptable in a given group will dictate some of their (our) behavior. I always tried to remember that I cannot know what God is doing at any moment – especially when worship is going on. How can we know the thoughts of the Holy Spirit?

“Genuine worshipers” are a different story than un-believers in a chapel service. I’m pretty sure that genuine worship can happen anywhere genuine believers gather, no matter the format.

“The reformation of doctrine led to a reconstruction of worship on the basis of Scripture and the guidance of such passages as, God is spirit,” and must be worshipped, in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24), and, Let all things be done decently and in order” (1 Cor. 14:40). Protestantism aims at a rational or spiritual service, as distinct from a mechanical service of mere forms. It acts upon the heart through the intellect, rather than the senses, and through instruction, rather than ceremonies. It brings the worshiper into direct communion with God in Christ, through the word of God and prayer, without the obstruction of human mediators.”

“Calvin built his form of worship on the foundation of Zwingli and Farel, and the services already in use in the Swiss Reformed Churches. Like his predecessors, he had no sympathy whatever with the Roman Catholic ceremonialism, which was overloaded with unscriptural traditions and superstitions. We may add that he had no taste for the artistic, symbolical, and ornamental features in worship. He (Calvin) rejected the mass, all the sacraments, except two, the saints’ days, nearly all church festivals, except Sunday, images, relics, processions, and the whole pomp and circumstance of a gaudy worship which appeals to the senses and imagination rather than the intellect and the conscience, and tends to distract the mind with the outward show instead of concentrating it upon the contemplation of the saving truth of the gospel.
He substituted in its place that simple and spiritual mode of worship which is well adapted for intelligent devotion, if it be animated by the quickening presence and power of the Spirit of God, but becomes jejune, barren, cold, and chilly if that power is waiting. He made the sermon the central part of worship, and substituted instruction and edification in the vernacular for the reading of the mass in Latin. He magnified the pulpit, as the throne of the preacher, above the altar of the sacrificing priest. He opened the inexhaustible fountain of free prayer in public worship, with its endless possibilities of application to varying circumstances and wants; he restored to the Church, like Luther, the inestimable blessing of congregational singing, which is the true popular liturgy, and more effective than the reading of written forms of prayer.”

Does this mean then that the following applies to me, since I brought out “things new?”…

Therefore every scribe who is instructed to the kingdom of Heaven is like a man who is a householder, who brings out things new and old out of his treasure.
(Mat 13:52)

If so, thanks.

“Music does influence, the hippie revolution was all about music as the medium for a message.”

Let me ask you – about Francis of Assisi. Did he have anything to do with the “hippie music” of his time, or rather something “more acceptable” to God?

hint..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troubadour

and…

“Inspired by his youth as a troubadour love poet who searched for an invisible, unattainable “lady love,” Francis fixed his affections on “Lady Poverty,” and tried his best to die of love for her—since she seemed to him the closest companion of Christ.” http://www.takimag.com/site/article/flogging_brother_ass

Francis took up the music of the countercultural Troubadours and transformed it from being songs in search of a girl into songs in search of “lady poverty.”

A modern example might be the late Keith Green, a man whose “hippy” sensibilities did not prevent him from also writing lyrics that make Steve Camp seem emergent.

And if you are going to knock these two (Francis and Keith), well then goodnight!

Blessings,
Joe