Gentle Wisdom

Comment by David Ker

Wednesday 14 May, 2008 @ 8:41 pm

What strange songbook did you get all those weird lyrics from?!? Not one mention of Jesus or Amazing Grace!

Well, at least you’re not a party-pooper like Nick.

Comment by Peter Kirk

Wednesday 14 May, 2008 @ 8:58 pm

Yes, David, I know I have provided more ammunition for the anti-TNIV crowd, who are no doubt unaware that ESV includes almost the same weird lyrics.

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Thursday 15 May, 2008 @ 8:14 am

[...] snarky, sublime and interesting replies (not necessarily in that order) to my Weird Worship meme: Peter, Nick, Jim. P&W is important to talk about love it or hate it because of its influence on [...]

Comment by Peter Kirk

Thursday 15 May, 2008 @ 1:17 pm

Some interesting responses here.

Roger Mugs is the only respondent so far to actually list some weird worship, or to tag anyone else. But his second example, from Keith Green, is in fact a straight quote from Psalm 51:11-12, which doesn’t seem at all weird to me. His third example, “Dropkick me Jesus”, is of course wonderfully weird, just the sort of thing David Ker must have been looking for.

Predictably, Jim West implies that at least 98% of contemporary worship is weird.

Eddie, however, takes a very different line:

- to which I replied:

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Thursday 15 May, 2008 @ 1:28 pm

[...] the MBTI, I’m an ISFJ, so usually I like to stick to the rules. But, with this one I followed Gentle Wisdom’s route and just let my mind go down its own path with the topic. Instead of five weird songs, I’ve [...]

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Thursday 15 May, 2008 @ 3:20 pm

[...] but I should note that weirdness has been with us for a long time. I am not remotely sure why Peter Kirk thinks Psalm 150 is weird, but I quite agree with him that Psalm 137: 9 is weird. What an [...]

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Thursday 15 May, 2008 @ 3:51 pm

[...] In addition to David’s original post, there have been a number of great replies, including this from Peter and this from Eclexia. I’m not sure that I’ll come up with five, but I’ll [...]

Comment by rogermugs

Thursday 15 May, 2008 @ 4:07 pm

peter… to me this brings up some of the questions about how some of the psalms are to be sung/prayed. As for that song I listed, keith green was able to do it to music, I am only able to do it uncomfortably…

i’m still learning to wrap my head around some of these psalms that don’t handle my AD theology…

Comment by Peter Kirk

Thursday 15 May, 2008 @ 4:50 pm

Indeed, Roger, there are profound issues here.

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Thursday 15 May, 2008 @ 5:36 pm

[...] Weird Worship meme seems to have taken off. See David Ker’s latest roundup, also this one I wrote earlier [...]

Comment by David Ker

Friday 16 May, 2008 @ 1:14 pm

Peter, I like your follow-up analysis. Of course Roger’s post ties into the BBB series by Suzanne and my Cyber-Psalm today is tied to yours and Doug’s mention of Psalm 137. Truly a world-wide web! But are we the spider or the fly?

I felt both Eddie and Jim were engaging with the topic in their own way while not taking up the meme per se. And you know how I hate memes!

Comment by Larry J. Hooge

Monday 19 May, 2008 @ 4:27 am

Psalm 150. Weird? Perhaps. But it’s also quite beautiful. Here it is as a chiasmus:

A Praise the LORD!
B Praise God in His sanctuary; Praise Him in His mighty expanse.
C Praise Him for His mighty deeds; Praise Him according to His excellent greatness.
D Praise Him with trumpet sound;
E Praise Him with harp and lyre.
F Praise Him with timbrel and dancing;
E’ Praise Him with stringed instruments
D’ and pipe.
C’ Praise Him with loud cymbals; Praise Him with resounding cymbals.
B’ Let everything that has breath praise the LORD.
A’ Praise the LORD!

A few notes:

B/B’: Praise Him everywhere (B), everything (B’).
C/C’: God’s deeds and greatness are matched with the sound of crashing cymbals.
C’ to D/D’ and E/E’: Starting with cymbals, other instruments are brought in. From the loudest (cymbals) to quietest (strings).
F: The very physical act of dancing takes center stage.

The dancer(s) are surrounded by increasing bands of volume (E/E’ to D/D’ to C’), greatness (C), numbers (B’) and space (B). Working from outside-in, the ‘volume’ decreases until it is focused on the act of personal worship - involving the whole person.

Nice!

Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord! (A/A’)

Comment by Peter Kirk

Monday 19 May, 2008 @ 10:48 am

Larry, thanks for this interesting analysis. The centrality of dancing is interesting, especially to those of us for whom dance in worship is thought weird. It wasn’t so in Old Testament times.

Comment by Larry J. Hooge

Monday 19 May, 2008 @ 2:28 pm

True enough.

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Tuesday 29 July, 2008 @ 2:32 pm

[...] Peter has tagged me with a meme started by David Ker and challenged me to mention examples of weird worship either from the Bible or from personal experience. [...]