The faith of my grandmother

Humans are extremely visual creatures. Studies show that we remember 80% of what we see, 20% of what we read and 10% of what we hear. As I’ve gone on my journey towards the Orthodox Church, I have been thinking about what this means for how we structure the Christian gathering. This blog is a quick reflection on what I’ve been learning about what should be centre stage when we come together to worship.

I believe, as did the ancient Christians, that in some way, Christ should take up our visual frame during worship. I also think it isn’t metaphorical when the author of Hebrews tells us to fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. We are visual creatures and what we focus our attention on can be either beneficial or detrimental. I have worshipped at a number of protestant denominations on my journey, but without exception, my visual focus was trained on people, whether it’s the worship team or the pastor. Francis Chan, a well-known protestant pastor, has gone on a similar journey recently and much of my thinking is in line with his. Recently he said:

“It was at that… time [500 years ago] that for the first time someone put a pulpit in the front of the gathering. Before that it was always the body and blood of Christ that was central to their gatherings. For 1500 years, it was never one guy and his pulpit being the centre of the church. It was the body and blood of Christ, and even the leaders saw themselves as partakers.”

Francis Chan, at a Church Together gathering in California 2020.

Chan is on a journey in relation to the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, which is not the point of this blog. I think my concerns were less about communion specifically, and more about what I was asked to fix my eyes on, and why I’ve come to see the danger of fixing them so regularly, as Chan says, ‘one guy and his pulpit’. You can see a clip of his preaching here if you’re interested.

Musicians in church

We are so blessed in church by auditory beauty: music that is both holy in its content and lovely in its composition. I have always loved the protestant churches I’ve attended over the years, in how they honour the skills of musicians. This is especially true of Pentecostal churches. A surprising feature of my Orthodox Church is this: the musicians are off to the side. They can be seen, but they do not take centre stage. Their voices harmonise in a way I rarely hear in modern music, making me think of the great harmony we find with our fellow man in the Bride of Christ. They sing the Beatitudes, the Nicene Creed, prayers and psalms as they are in Scripture. Over the past months, this has been such a balm to my soul. Not only do we read Scripture, we elevate it in song (and it also means that I now know the Nicene Creed off by heart!).

I am certainly not the first person to point out the worry of placing musicians at the centre of worship. Many have raised concerns about gatherings sometimes being indistinguishable from a concert or gig. I think there can be great comfort in that style of worship, as it is culturally understandable. But I agree with others that precisely because it is culturally understandable that it is concerning. The musicians at my church shun the spotlight and instead use their voices to illuminate the gathering in a new way, with Scripture and the Creeds ringing in our ears. I have come to see this as lovely and worthwhile.

Pastors in church

I raised in a previous blog that not every church has the sermon as the centrepiece of the service. One of the outcomes of being so fixated on the role of preaching means that the pulpit must become the centrepiece of the church. I know that this is such a ubiquitous feature of modern churches, that it’s hard to think of a church structured any differently. Until last year, when I thought of church visually, I would have thought of a number of things. It would have either been people playing music on a stage, or someone standing in front of me, talking.

But I have come to un-learn a lot of that, and have realised, like Chan, that it is not how the Church gathered for 1500 years. The pulpit, mic-stand, etc was only popularised at the Reformation.

The early Church knew that we are visual creatures. The advent of mass literacy has not changed that, and I believe now that what a Church asks me to fix my eyes on matters a great deal. For Francis Chan, the body and blood of Christ should be what fixate on and gather around. I agree, and would add visual reminders of what it is we worship: the risen Lord, Christ’s passion on the cross, his glorious incarnation into flesh. I am glad I no longer look at one person (as Chan says, some guy), or even many people, giving their thoughts on the Word. That is important, but it is not what we should fix our eyes on.

What have you fixed your eyes on?