Jenn over at A Small Faith asks,
What is the appropriate response someone on a worship team should give when people stop you after church and say “Worship was great today!”???
While I can understand the direction that a question like this is coming from I think the question is difficult to answer without knowing the exact way in which the thank you was delivered. In reading some of the comments I believe that’s the question most are raising when answering this.
One of my long time friends is the lead guitarist on our churches praise team. Being in a somewhat stodgy reformed church my question hasn’t been so much about thanking them for the hard work they do, or for playing a piece of music that helped prepare me for worship, or moved my heart from the tedious tasks of every day living to be centered towards God – no my question has to do with clapping after a particularly moving piece.
If your Adult, Youth, Childrens, Bell – Choir, Praise Team, Organist plays/sings a piece of music which far surpasses anything they’ve done before, moves the entire congregation to joyous tears and simply blows your socks off, should you or shouldn’t you clap?
And getting back the real point of Jenn’s question; are you clapping directly for the members of the band/choir, or are you clapping for their God given abilities? I’ve certainly been mindful of this when I have clapped in the past, but I think we can get a bit too hung up on this. It appears to me that our pious reactions while in the pew, surrounded by our fellow congregants far out weigh our reactions as soon as we get of church and get stuck in traffic on the way home to lunch.
But like Jenn, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this matter.
Peace,
Rong
Hey, Rong!
Sorry it’s taken me so long to respond to you. Real life has been a little busy.
I grew up in a church that did “appreciative clapping” for special music or exceptional choral pieces. The church I’m in currently rarely claps – with the exception of the celebratory clap in honor of an anniversary or birth or other such announcement.
For me, personally, it is hard to separate the appreciative clap from the idea of a performance. It’s easier for me to categorize worship as a participatory action. The object of the appreciation, then is God Himself. Of course, this is a personal decision. There is no way to measure if the audience is clapping in response to the beauty of the gifts being used or in response to the Giver of the gifts.
It’s probably best that I personally concern myself with myresponse than with judging the response of others.
Yeah personal life has been quite hectic here also, so I wholly understand. I personally hem and haw on this a lot. I understand the concern but at times the emotional desire to show my appreciation for the efforts made by the choir/band/preacher gets the better of me.
Maybe clapping isn’t right, but standing up and shouting, “Praise God!” would be seen as even more of a social faux pas. I mean the blue haired womans brigade would be up in arms over that kind of outward action. Heavens, the next thing you know people would be giving “Amen” shout backs to the preacher, and telling him to, “Say it again brother.”
Sorry, just couldn’t help myself with that last part. It’s late and I need to go to bed.
Even though I’m in a non-traditional, non-denomination church, I totally understand the “blue haired womans brigade.” There seems to some version of them in every church, doesn’t there?
Maybe that’s for a whole different post?