Unsexy Church

Season 3 Episode 15: Why Liturgy Matters

• First Baptist Tampa • Season 1 • Episode 15

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The Unsexy Church Podcast

New episodes drop every Wednesday Morning

ABOUT THE PODCAST

The Unsexy Church is a weekly podcast exploring the real, everyday life within our church family. Each week, join Pastor Bob (Senior Pastor) and Darren (Worship & Discipleship Pastor) as they sit down to discuss a wide variety of subjects—from deep theological questions to the practical, often "unsexy" work of following Jesus and building a healthy local church.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO THRIVE?

We want to help every person make a genuine commitment to follow Jesus and then follow through with that commitment in Connecting People to a Thriving Life in Christ. These Thriving disciples should Dig In to the Bible, Grow Up in Christ, and Branch Outinto the community.

Our Mission: To Connect People to a Thriving Life in Christ. What is a thriving life in Christ? Scripture says that Jesus Christ came “that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” Our mission in the city of Tampa is to make disciples who follow the pattern of the believer in Psalm 1 and desire God’s glory above all things.

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Welcome And Easter Weekend Recap

SPEAKER_03

Hey gang. Welcome back to the Young Sexy Church Podcast. Ministry of First Baptist Church of Tampa, where our mission is to help you connect to a thriving life in Jesus Christ. It's a good morning here at FBC Tampa. Good morning, Jordan. Good morning. How are you today? I'm doing amazing. Doing amazing. Doing amazing. How about you, Pastor Bob? Pastor Bob.

SPEAKER_01

I am good.

SPEAKER_03

I'm tired, but I am good. It's been uh yeah, I'm it this is a church hangover. I've got church. I ate way too much yesterday, and it was a very long weekend, but it was a man's a great weekend. We had a great weekend here at FBC Tampa. Just uh this is the first year since I've been here. I've been here seven years, a little over seven years, and this is our first year that we have done two services uh for Easter. Uh it's always been super packed the years previous, and parking is always an issue at FBC Tampa. We're a downtown church, and so our parking is limited. So we decided we would launch out and try to do two services. And uh the choir almost revolted, the band almost revolted, but no, they did a fantastic job. They really did, they did a great job. And it worked out well yesterday. It was a really good weekend. Friday was our uh Good Friday service. We always have a good Friday service at noon. Um, much different than our Easter um or resurrection day celebration. More somber on Friday. Yeah, somber, uh less instruments, less vocalists, less everything, really. Um less flowers, less flowers for sure. Man, if you have a chance to check us out online, you should just see the flowers uh on Easter Sunday. It is amazing. John Bayless and his crew do a fantastic job every every week. We had good Friday services, um, Friday, and then Saturday morning. We had the preschool Easter egg hunt. Always fun to see the little ones running around grabbing eggs, chasing the eggs, man. And then uh Sunday morning, yep, bright and early. We did not do a sunrise service. We did not. Why I will just say this. Okay. I this You're welcome. Yeah, that's exactly. I I was about to say a big thank you. Uh, this is the first church I've ever been a part of, like in my entire life, that has not done the Easter sunrise service. And I'm grateful. Sure.

SPEAKER_02

Just logistically, where would you do one here? Yeah, for sure. It'd be tough. You and I were here before the sun came up, though. We were here earlier.

SPEAKER_03

It was still dark when we arrived. Yes, it was. Trying to get all the uh preparations made and batteries checked and and sermon gone over and just make sure everything we did and we just have a good crew. We got we got a lot of folks that get here early and make sure everything is is done and it's it was good. It was a good day celebrating the resurrection. Man, it really was great. It was and we didn't know what it was gonna be like having two services. You know, we kind of thought I don't know, we I in my head I was thinking okay, we're gonna have like 200 at one and another, I don't know, eight hundred maybe at another one. Yeah, I just didn't know what I thought it'd be very flop, you know, lopsided and uh pretty evenly split. It was pretty evenly split. We had a service at 8 30 a.m. and then a service at 10 45 a.m. Both pretty pretty close. The later one was probably better attended, but they were both full. Yeah, they were.

SPEAKER_02

It was good. It was really cool. That helped with the parking and all the transitions and all of those good things. It was it was fun.

SPEAKER_03

It was good. We didn't do core group Sunday, which is always sad. But uh we'll be back at them this coming Sunday. This coming Sunday, get to your core group, right?

A Dark Date And A Twinkie

SPEAKER_03

All right, so I was uh looking for uh fun facts, and I thought it may be really good to like just know how many, I don't know, chocolate bunnies are served every year, or how many uh uh Easter eggs are colored and hidden and all that kind of stuff. And I decided I'm not, I'm gonna do something totally different. Now, this really I'm gonna start he's going dark again.

SPEAKER_02

He's been doing these dark fun facts.

SPEAKER_03

Okay, one dark fact. Okay, yeah, there you go. But I'm going, I mean I I do have a fun one, but one dark one is on April 6th, is the day that we entered into World War I. Wow, that's pretty dark, yes. But I didn't I did not go go with that one. So here is the here's the fun fact. All right. Uh 1930, James Dewar was trying to figure out how to help his sales of shortcake when strawberries were not in season. So he filled his shortcake with cream filling. What do you think these are?

SPEAKER_02

I know. I think I know.

SPEAKER_03

Do you know what these are, Jordan?

SPEAKER_04

No.

SPEAKER_03

Come on.

SPEAKER_04

Really?

SPEAKER_02

He needs to eat a few of these.

SPEAKER_04

You could you could stand eating a few. Body mass index. Yeah. Twinkies. Twinkies. Twinkies. Which have zero nutritional value. Jordan's looking them up. You know what a Twinkie is? You don't know what a Twinkie is? Don't they have Twinkies in France? Oh no. Oh no. No. He's looking them up. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Wow. He's looking up 1930, April 6th, first Twinkie. The first Twinkie. Wow. Yep. Yep. And it originally, yeah, he filled it with uh cream filling. The the original cream filling was banana. Like banana cream. Okay.

SPEAKER_02

That might actually give it more flavor.

SPEAKER_03

I'm not a bait. I don't like bananas that much. I actually I can't stand bananas. When I say I don't like it that much, I mean I really don't like them. How many Twinkies do you think are consumed uh each year? Too many.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Yeah, too many. How many Twinkies are consumed every year? Are we in the millions? We're in the millions.

SPEAKER_03

With M. Four to 500 million. 400 to 500 million Twinkies every year. 1.1 million Twinkies every day. We wonder why we have an obesity problem in the United States. That means hostess makes over 1,000 Twinkies per minute. Oh my goodness. That's a lot of Twinkies, man.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. One Twinkie is a lot of Twinkies.

SPEAKER_03

All right. I'm interested to know. So obviously, Jordan, you have not done this, but um Bob, have you ever had a fried Twinkie? No.

SPEAKER_01

No. That's crazy. No, no. Not even close. That makes them even better. I mean, no.

SPEAKER_03

If you go down to uh Armature Works, yeah, uh they have a um uh restaurant there that's all um fair food. Yeah, yeah. So you can get you know fried Oreos. I was gonna say this sounds like the state fair. Exactly. Yeah, you can get a cheeseburger on a Krispy Kreme donut. Um, yeah, good stuff. Okay, you say so. It's good stuff, not good for you stuff, but it's good stuff, man. All right, that's our fun fact for today. Twinkies, 1930. World War II and Twinkies. World War I, War I. Yeah, because World War II would have been December 7th.

SPEAKER_02

December 7th. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

April 6th, World War I. We is when we entered in. Right. Uh

What The Doxology Means

SPEAKER_03

today we're just, I don't know, you mentioned something in your sermon yesterday that got some got some pretty hearty amens, at least in the second service, anyway. Uh Matt, you you said that uh growing up in your church, um, you did something every week when you took the offering. What was that?

SPEAKER_01

Try to avoid the stare of the guy with the plate. No, we we talked about uh doxology.

SPEAKER_03

Doxology, yeah. You sang the doxology. I don't know that I sang it.

SPEAKER_02

Did you sing it?

SPEAKER_03

Well, we sang it then. I don't know that I sang it yesterday. No, no, no. If I would have been on my game yesterday, you know, the second service, you know, we would have been singing the doxology. When you when you brought it up, I would have brought the choir in.

SPEAKER_02

The choir came in though, and I was quoting it. The choir came in in the second service. They helped me out.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, so but uh we would have actually sung it though, instead of uh just them repeating it with you.

SPEAKER_02

But uh, but that was a thing growing up um in the churches that I grew up in when we collected the offering. Every single time we collected the offering immediately after everybody stood and sang the doxology.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, yeah, very, very uh common. You know, matter of fact, uh what you referred to yesterday is sometimes referred to as the common doxology. Right. You know, praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise him, all creatures here below. Praise him above, ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, right? Amen. The connection at the end for sure. Yeah, so we I when I grew up, we did not uh I mean we sang the doxology sometimes, but we didn't do it every every week. Okay. I don't know, I don't know why. If there was a rhyme or reason, you're in a liberal church, probably well speaking of I'm kidding, it's probably the exact opposite. Speaking of though, you know, there are uh denominations and churches that have changed the words to the doxology. Oh, okay. Like they've taken they've made it very gender neutral. So they've taken father out of it. Yeah, yeah. They've uh taken like even like the heavenly host out of it and changed it to the love he's done or something. I don't need to know like that. Yeah, you know who you are out there if you've done that. Cut it out. All right, sorry. Don't do that, don't do that. Oh man. So you yesterday told us uh what a doxology was. What's a doxology? What does that even mean? That's not a word that we hear.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, outside of that context. Yeah, you really don't. It's it's a it's a compound Greek word, two Greek words, doxa, which means glory, lagos or logos, which means word. So it's a glory word, it's a statement of praise. Saying glory to God. Exactly. You're just giving glory to God.

SPEAKER_03

Usually shorter, you know, a short saying, you know. Uh some some hymnals, um, you'll see it in parentheses, it'll say, you know, doxology, the old one hundredth. Do you guys know what the old one hundredth is? You're about to enlighten us, I think. I might tell you what it is. It is just basically a tune. Okay. You know, you'll see uh a lot of in, you know, if you would open a hymnal by chance, we go someday. I've been known to do it. Yeah, we do it occasionally here, right? Um if you would open a hymnal, sometimes you'll see on lots of hymnals or lots of hymns, you'll see to the tune of top lady or to the tune of so these were uh just very familiar folk tunes in a sense that everyone was familiar with to make these words easier to sing because they knew the tune well. Yeah, it'd be almost like saying, I mean, I'm being a little facetious here, but it'd be like saying uh to the tune of row, row, row your boat. Right. You know, everybody knows it, everyone could sing it, right?

SPEAKER_02

And so that was the common practice back then. It was to take you know secular tunes and turn them into sacred music by adding words to them.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, common tunes that everyone knew. All right. So this was uh this is the old 100th, it's just a a a hymn or a tune for a long-metered hymn, basically. And it's uh uh I can't remember the guy's name, but he was French that came up with the tune. But Thomas Kern in 1674 is a guy who actually pinned the words to the common doxology that that that we sing today. Um and it's been been used, I mean, since then, I mean, just in many different denominations, and some churches, even still today, sing the doxology every single Sunday.

SPEAKER_02

Well,

Liturgy And Order Of Worship

SPEAKER_02

churches used to be, and I don't know where your question line is going today, but um churches used to be a little bit more liturgical in nature.

SPEAKER_03

So when you say liturgical, what do you mean by that? I figured this is where it is like a donor.

SPEAKER_02

What do you mean? So liturgical is just a a a structure of worship, so items that go into a particular or a uh specific worship service.

SPEAKER_03

So it kind of has a uh more heady or high church feeling today, but but but what you're saying basically is it really is uh every church has a liturgy. They do. It's it usually it's an order that they do things. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02

There there used to be a more set liturgy, right? In in in higher church, and then we've kind of moved away from that. Ironically, uh I believe somewhat ironically, some of the churches that would lean more liberal stay liturgical. Yeah. Whereas the more conservative churches, uh, you may or may not find the the old-fashioned liturgy in them.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, yeah. I what was your so I can I did not grow up you know high church. I grew up uh now my my wife grew up Episcopalian. So a little more a little more high church, right? Much higher. Never heard the gospel, but the liturgy.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, but the liturgy but that's my point, right? That's my point. The liturgy was there, the high church elements were there, but the gospel may not have exactly yeah.

SPEAKER_03

And so uh I grew up in a Southern Baptist church, um, and uh and so our liturgy was literally this a good morning, three hymns, an offatory, a special music, right, a message, an invitation hymn. I mean that just generally speaking, every single service was that was that way, right?

SPEAKER_02

Um Yeah, I I grew up Southern Baptist as well, but um some of ours, our liturgy was a little bit different. Usually a call to worship. Yep. Um and that call to worship could be scripture reading, it could be an organ song, it could be uh any number of things, a prayer. So there's some kind of call to worship. Yep. Then there's some form of worship whether usually it was hymn singing at at that time. Right. Um, usually a pastoral prayer.

SPEAKER_03

So when you're growing up, uh songs like what was the instrumentation?

SPEAKER_02

It just depended on the the church and the talent and the skills that were there. So mostly piano organ. Yeah. Mostly.

SPEAKER_03

Ours was strictly piano organ. Yeah. I d I don't I don't think we wanna anyone ever even thought about anything any different.

SPEAKER_02

That would have been the vast majority of time it would have been piano organ. Occasionally you'd have had handbells or harps or but rarely a guitar or anything like that.

SPEAKER_03

So I'm from Springfield, Missouri, originally, which is like 45 miles from Branson, Missouri. Right. The live country music capital of the world. Right. That's what they say anyway. And uh we had several, not several, but quite a few members that were connected to Branson shows and things like that. And so I can remember like the first time a guy came and sang with his guitar in my in our church, man. That was like revolutionary crazy. Yeah. Crazy. Almost heretical. What do you do? Yeah, man. But I loved it. Like, man, it just, you know, uh, yeah, it was good, it was awesome. Yeah. Interesting. So I didn't mean it. That's okay. That's interested in the yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. So there they're usually a pastoral prayer time in there where the pastor's praying over the needs of the congregation or whatever it may have been. Uh an offering collection, uh, usually followed with the doxology.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Uh as you said, a special music. Uh oftentimes there we we would do responsive readings, and sometimes that may have been at the call to worship. Yeah. At the beginning. At the beginning, typically, um sometimes at the end, but uh typically at the ending. So then sermon, um some response time, invitation time, a benediction. Yeah. Uh towards the end.

SPEAKER_03

So are there um oh gosh, I just it just this was what happens when you get old? Get more gray hairs. I had to have a birthday this week, Darren.

SPEAKER_01

Eek.

SPEAKER_03

Um I won't be the oldest guy in the room anymore. We will be the same age, won't we? Oh my gosh. I don't know what I was gonna ask you. I mean, I have lots of notes here, but uh yeah. Oh I okay, so you it was interesting. You did

Where The Offering Belongs

SPEAKER_03

your uh you did your offering in the uh middle of the service. Typically, yeah. That's when we did ours. Yeah, typically. Uh that's when we do ours here. It's in the middle of the service. I can remember our worship pastor actually like making a case and like showing studies and statistics to committees and and leaders, leadership, why we should move our offering time to the end versus the the middle. And you know, he had all these studies that showed how giving went up and all this kind of stuff. You move it to the end, blah, blah, blah. I don't I don't know. Did it work? Did we get it moved? I don't know. Maybe uh, you know, but it's just interesting. But I do remember that it was very uh controversial. Yeah, that was not uh I mean you didn't mess with our liturgy too much, you know. Yeah, you don't.

SPEAKER_02

And and once people get comfortable with something, you know, you that that's their liturgy. That's what they yeah.

SPEAKER_03

So what are some of the pros, maybe or even like strengths of having a a liturgy, you know, that uh people like you said, people get get used to it.

Liturgy Benefits And Real Risks

SPEAKER_03

Sure. I think there's pros and cons, right? So what are some of the good things?

SPEAKER_02

I I would say one good thing of having some form of a liturgy is a recognition that this time is sacred, this time is set apart, this time is different, so it's unique. So um it is just not a gathering. We we are focusing in worship. So I think a liturgy can help the congregation to to focus on what we should be focused on.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, can help keep things in order. Yes. Um, yeah, we can go to like 1 Corinthians 14, you know, 1 Corinthians. There just the book in general seems like that church is a little out of control. There's some things happening that disorderly. Yeah, yeah, that uh were were causing some chaos, really. And and Paul was like, you know, we serve a God of of of order and kind of kind of helps helps the Corinthian church put things in in order. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

And and I think we can see in the New Testament there were elements of worship that they that they gathered together to do. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, and so I I I don't think you need to be so stuck to your liturgy that it is the overriding force of the day. Right.

SPEAKER_03

Uh but they can be helpful.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, yeah. They can be.

SPEAKER_03

So just kind of think like what are some of the things that like responsive reading? We did some responsive reading. We almost always did responsive reading um before Lord's Supper. And it was and that's for us was on a Sunday night. It we always did Lord's Supper on a Sunday night. And uh we Wait, Sunday night? What's what's that? No, we went to church two times on Sunday. Yeah, Sunday morning and Sunday night. Yeah, I remember. Yeah, with with training union in between. Training union for youth choir, yes, then training union, then circles. That was my childhood. That was my and then Burger King. Steak and shake sometimes. Yeah. We uh I love steak and shake, man. But we we went to Burger King because back back to my roots. My dad worked at the pickle plant as well, and they were they were our biggest customers. Support the biggest customer. That's right.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, we we did um responsive readings occasionally, often before uh Lord's Supper. Um and and you mentioned Lord's Supper. Some churches that's part of the every Sunday. Yeah, that's part of the liturgy, yeah. Um and there can be an argument made for that, I suppose. But uh we we choose not to do that every Sunday here. We do it uh more quarterly.

SPEAKER_03

And that may be part of the con uh of a set worship service that you just don't deviate from at all, um, is that it can become rote. It can. Yeah, and that's probably that's why we don't do Lord's Supper every Sunday. Every Sunday, right? We don't we we make that the focus of our of our time together when we do it.

SPEAKER_02

And uh we don't want to be ritualistic. We want it to be you know genuine.

SPEAKER_03

But the but the some of the pros are that these are just constant reminders of the gospel. Yeah, the things that we do in in service are constant reminders of of the gospel for sure. Yeah. So there's a a a um because there's there's a lot of things, like you said, you used to do responsive reading. We both have mentioned um special music. Sure. Special

Special Music And Focus In Worship

SPEAKER_03

music. What is special music? It was some of them were special. What what what was special about special music? A friend of mine told me, Darren, all music is special. And so I like, okay. Um, special music. I okay. I know there are fans of it out there. Sure. And I came up, and that's how I cut my teeth. That's how I learned to sing in front of people, you know, and so I get it.

SPEAKER_02

But so usually special music was like right after prayer time, before sermon, during offering, usually when either the choir or an individual sang something or somebody played something, right?

SPEAKER_03

Exactly. So we I call it the the American Idol moment in worship services. Sorry, but that's what it turned into. Yes, in a lot of in a lot of places. Um we, you know, where us uh we had these things called cassette tapes. And you could buy them at the while you're eating your Twinkies. You could buy them at the music store, the record store, and uh they were accompaniment tracks. It was it's almost like Christian karaoke. You know, you could find your favorite song in the key you wanted in, and you would sing it. And I'm not saying that there was no no benefit sure, sure. I'm not saying that. I um my again, I grew up in those days where that's that's that's what you did. And there the the the body of Christ can be encouraged by someone singing the truth over them and through them and testifying through song. So I don't I'm not saying that it's no value, but what it quickly became again, uh where I what I saw was just uh American idol in the church, man. The focus shifted to the talent, not to the one that's a very strong. Not to the one being sung to. Right. Exactly. Right. Exactly right. So um, so we would, you know, that that was part of our our liturgy every every every Sunday. But we don't really do that very much anymore. I don't think there I mean, I know that there are churches that still do it, but not it's not the norm anymore. Um yeah. Things change, right? Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02

The doxology is not there anymore, the special music aren't there anymore, typically.

SPEAKER_03

Doxology is there sometimes. Sometimes we sing the new doxology, right? Yeah, we do. Um we may just sing the doxology this Sunday. I'm just gonna throw it out. You know, but there are so what how do we decide then you know what becomes part of the liturgy, what doesn't need to be in the liturgy?

SPEAKER_02

It's it's a local church issue, of course. Uh what what the church needs to help them uh focus and into to worship. So that's it's really just conversations, it's really just flow of what worship looks like for us. Yeah. Uh the elements of uh a public scripture reading, of the proclamation of the word. Yeah. Um, for for several years we we weren't collecting an offering.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Right. Which is part of liturgy. And uh we stopped during COVID because we weren't passing plates, and then we just never picked it back up after COVID. And we just got convicted that um it wasn't for a lack of funds. God blessed us right through that time. We we don't need to physically pass the plate, but we do need to focus on giving back to God and recognizing Him as the giver of all of our blessings. And so that was part of our liturgy that we had taken out for a while that we were I think we were wrong in.

SPEAKER_03

So we we had to put that back in. Yeah, I would agree. I think it's a things that we do like that physically are just such good reminders of like for the offering, for example. It's just to physically pass the plate as a reminder that we are to offer ourselves as living sacrifices. It's just a good physical uh outward expression of what is taking place inside. Um

Regulative Versus Normative Worship

SPEAKER_03

so there's kind of like two main schools of thought. Probably there may be more, you know, some of you guys are out there smarter than me, but uh like there's the regulative principle and the normative principle. Wow, those are fancy words, Darren. Yeah. So regulative, and I'm gonna oversimplify, and there are there are like levels, right? There's like a spectrum of these things, right? And so if you could if you had a whole spectrum of order of worship, you might have the normative on one side and the regulative on the other side with all kinds of stuff in in between. Okay, and the two extremes I think are are too are two extremes.

SPEAKER_02

They're at the poles for a reason.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, exactly. So regulative principle basically would say scripture, and I think we could all agree with this, but how it how we outwardly work this out is going to be different, but scripture um dictates. Regulates regulates what we regulative principle, right? Regulates what we do in our worship services. Like so, if it's not in the scripture, that means we don't do it. Right. So um, and then normative would would say almost the take the opposite approach. If it's not forbidden in scripture, it's okay. So like some extremes might be um like on regul on the regulative side, like there are denominations that do not use instruments in worship because it is not, it is mentioned in scripture, but not in the New Testament, not in the church. Yeah, exactly. So they won't they won't use instruments, right? Uh maybe an extreme on the normative side is well, scripture doesn't say we can't use movie clips and dress up like Disney princesses and come to church. Sorry. Do you have an issue here? I'm just saying, I'm just saying, you know, so why not? Right. Right? Anything goes, right? And so as long as it's not forbidden. And so uh so there's this and and so I think most churches are probably uh in the middle of that. Like and I I'd say that's kind of where we are. Um we we do every church must submit themselves to the authority of scripture in in in worship and even in our worship services, right? Um, but there's a maybe a you know a difference in maybe form and function. Like some people take a real strict form uh approach where function, you know, like there are there are things that we have to do,

Non Negotiables Of Christian Worship

SPEAKER_03

right? There are things I think that the Bible says that we need to do. We need to, like you say, there's a public reading of scripture. We must do that when we gather together, right? Now that can look I think that can look different. Yeah, it can look different in different places. Sometimes we do it through responsive reading. Sometimes we do it, we actually we always do it through um someone leading us in a scripture passage with a memory verse. Right. And then you do that when we read the script the text that you're going to preach on. Right. And a lot of times we do it uh before and in between songs. Right. You know, and so we we do that, you know, that and then I think scripture, it's very clear that we are supposed to preach the word, uh, which we do every time we meet together. And so, which you do a fantastic, fantastic job of. Um, I think scripture tells us to sing the word, right? Um, so that's something we must do when we gather together. All those of you out there who don't have any use for the singing, you think go read. Go read Colossians 3 16. All right, go read it. Uh, and and that's not, you know, I used to look at when I was younger, much younger, a lot younger. I look at that text to see, you know, and use that for proof that we're supposed to bring in a variety of kinds of music, right? We're supposed to sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, right? All of it. And and I'm not uh it's there, right? But that's not the main point of that. The main point of that passage is to let the word of Christ dwell in you richly by singing his word, right? To one another, with one another. To one another, with one another, testifying to one another, right? So we're reading, we're preaching, we're singing, we're praying. Praying, right? Lord's Supper and Baptism. I mean, those are things. Yes. Those are things that we must include. Now, how we include those can look different. Like some people won't use drama in a church. Um, we'll use some drama as long as it's communicating in some way. One of the if it's helping us communicate the the gospel and the word of God. Um I don't know. Any any other like what are some other things that we don't do anymore that or I I'm trying to think of some of the other things that uh I don't know. I don't know what you're trying to do. No, no, like is there anything like we don't do special music that much anymore? I mean it looks we don't uh we don't do we don't sing the doxology every Sunday anymore, but we're still doing all those things that I just mentioned. Right. Right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02

And I think that's that's the main thing. And that's that's the conviction that we have and the model that we've we've chosen to follow, but doesn't mean somebody can't do it differently. Yeah, right. Exactly. There's no robe choir. There's no robe choir. Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_03

That's true. You could bring it back. Yeah. I actually had a a man, I'm gonna call him out by name Brandon Rust, told me if I brought the robes back, he would join choir.

SPEAKER_02

So is it worth it?

SPEAKER_03

It's you know, it is. If I can get another guy in choir, it's worth it, man. My wife would love me to bring the robes back because then she doesn't have to worry about what she wears so much. She would she would love that. Yeah. So yeah, it's it's interesting how things things change, but how some things don't need to change and cannot change. Right. And we uh when we come together, the purpose is to exalt Christ, make him known. And uh hopefully we're we're helping helping people see him and know him and connect to him.

SPEAKER_02

Which is what the liturgy and the the doxology are designed to do, draw our focus to him and away from ourselves.

SPEAKER_03

Exactly. I mean even architecture and church as opposed to you know the the the pulpits were large to give uh to give the to give the to communicate the prominence of God's word. Right.

SPEAKER_02

And central on the stage. Central the centrality of the gospel.

SPEAKER_03

Exactly. It it was all made that way for a reason. Yep. All right. Got anything else

Final Thoughts And Sign Off

SPEAKER_03

to add? This was fun. Yeah. I'm gonna go eat a Twinkie. It's probably probably one of the most unsexiest episodes we we we've done. So uh, hey, if you're out there, give us your questions, write us a review, rate us, tell your friends about us, and don't forget, stay unsexy.

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Bob Block

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Darren Selvidge

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