At its best, contemporary worship leads people to have an authentic encounter with God. It is high energy, hands up in the air, people pouring their hearts out to God. It is songs that people are familiar with, and can relate to. It is language that they understand.
Contemporary worship at its best is also good music. Now understand me, I recognize that the music being good in no way is a prerequisite for authentic worship. We are told to make a joyful noise, not a skillful noise. However, think with me to a time where you heard bad music. Now I am in no way a skillful musician, in fact I would not even call myself a musician. Still, I do know when I hear good music or bad music. When I hear bad music all concentration is diverted to thinking about how bad the music sounds. I am also not saying that there cannot be bad contemporary music, however, when it is good, the music has a way of making the outside world disappear. I can close my eyes and almost see Jesus standing before me. Good music allows me to concentrate on the encounter that I am having with God.
Contemporary music at its best is also organized. The songs are an intentional progression of worship that leads you straight to the feet of Jesus. I have witnessed some of my friends who lead contemporary worship plan their service. With the modern technology, they are able to loop their music when they feel God moving, and they are able to instruct the rest of the musicians as to what direction to go, and all of this happens without skipping a beat. In fact, the audience would never know, which allows them to stay in their encounter with God uninterrupted.
Yet contemporary has its moments that are not so good. While I thoroughly enjoy contemporary worship, it does have some moments where it is at its worst. It is because of these worst moments that I believe people hesitate from going to a more contemporary style. They believe that the moments when contemporary music is at its worst, is what contemporary worship is all the time.
At its worst, contemporary worship is just another concert that one pays to go see. The music is loud and rocking, hands are held in the air, someone to the left even has a lighter app up on their phone. The worship leader introduces the guitar player for his rocking solo, and attention is on the player instead of encountering God. The LED lights are flashing and moving, and are constantly blinding the audience. Side note, I love LED lights, but they are meant to help set a mood or backdrop, some of the ways they are being used today subtract from the mood.
At its worst, contemporary worship is hardly worship at all. It is no longer about the authentic encounter with God and it has become about the music, or the lights or anything else. But we must remember that the moments it is at its worst does not have to define what contemporary worship is all about. We should however be careful to not let it become what it can become.
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