Work and Worship

Matthew Kaemingk

Description

The modern chasm between "secular" work and "sacred" worship has had a devastating impact on Western Christianity.Drawing on years of research, ministry, and leadership experience, Kaemingk and Willson explain why Sunday morning worship and Monday morning work desperately need to inform and impact one another. Together they engage in a rich biblical, theological, and historical exploration of the deep and life-giving connections between labor and liturgy. In so doing, Kaemingk and Willson offer new ways in which Christian communities can live seamless lives of work and worship.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie
• Christian worship

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 17 novembre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781493423873
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

“Our practices of Christian public worship shape us for faithful witness in every part of our lives and are shaped by the hopes, needs, and fears that we bring with us as we gather. This book offers a probing exploration of this dynamic, with particular attention to Christian discipleship in the workplace. It is ideal for any believer who longs for deeper connections between worship and daily life, and for any pastor or worship leader who shapes public worship. It is a book that promises to spark generative ideas and to prompt deeper engagement with public prayer, preaching, and other central practices of worship.”
— John D. Witvliet , Calvin Institute of Christian Worship, Calvin University, and Calvin Theological Seminary
“This book is for bridge builders who desire to put into practice what it can mean to live a fully integrated life. There is so much truth in this book that it made my heart ache for our current reality and, at the same time, soar with hope for what could be by simply understanding that the church can provide so much more for its community of laborers. Kaemingk and Wilson approach this topic with great self-awareness and humility, offering readers many resources to bring work and worship together.”
— Julie Chung , connections minister, Saddleback Church
“Both honest and hopeful, Work and Worship explores the gap between Christian worship and Christians’ work lives, offering a clarion call to challenge what is broken and celebrate what is promising about human labor in light of God’s own work. With probing theological reflection and vivid examples drawn from worshiping communities around the world, Kaemingk and Willson’s efforts are historically contextualized and faithfully grounded, making this book a practical, pastoral addition to any shelf. Work and Worship is a gift to the whole Christian community—drawing from diverse traditions for the faithful within each congregation who are aching to hear a good word about their work.”
— Laura Kelly Fanucci , author of To Bless Our Callings: Prayers, Poems , and Hymns to Celebrate Vocation
“In Work and Worship Kaemingk and Willson offer us a profound exploration into worship practiced in light of the daily grind. This is a reconciliatory vision for Christian leaders and laypeople who wonder how worship on Sunday and work on Monday are interconnected. The range of materials here—both biblical and historical—lay deep foundations that I want to see my students engage as they move from their classrooms to worship to the table and then out into their wider vocations.”
— Bruce Benedict , chaplain of worship arts, Hope College campus ministries
“Nothing is more important for the local church today than to reconnect our Sunday services with our work on Monday so our whole lives can be an act of worship. This wise, accessible, and learned book is a magnificent gift to all who seek insight—theological and practical—on how to do that well. I’ll be recommending this book for years to come.”
— Greg Forster , director, Oikonomia Network

© 2020 by Matthew Kaemingk and Cory B. Willson
Published by Baker Academic
a division of Baker Publishing Group
PO Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287
www.bakeracademic.com
Ebook edition created 2020
Ebook corrections 05.17.2021
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
ISBN 978-1-4934-2387-3
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Scripture quotations labeled The Message are from THE MESSAGE , copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.
Scripture quotations labeled NRSV are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations labeled TNIV are from the Holy Bible, Today’s New International Version®. TNIV®. Copyright © 2001, 2005 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com
For Uli Chi, Bill Hoehn, and all those for whom work is worship
Contents
Cover
Endorsements
Half Title Page
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Foreword by Nicholas Wolterstorff
Introduction
Part 1: Foundations
1. Worship That Forms Workers
2. Worship That Fails Workers
3. Workers in the Pews
Part 2: Resources
4. The Old Testament: The Integrity of Work and Worship
5. The Pentateuch: Bringing Work into Worship
6. The Psalms: Singing God’s Work into Ours
7. The Prophets: Decrying the Destruction of Work and Worship
8. The Early Church: Worship and Work in Ancient Christianity
9. The Early Church Offering: Work Becomes Worship in Christ
Part 3: Practices
10. Work at the Lord’s Table
11. Worship That Gathers Workers
12. Worship That Scatters Workers
Epilogue: Rethinking Monday
Acknowledgments
Bibliography
Scripture Index
Subject Index
Back Cover
Foreword
Nicholas Wolterstorff
Many are the writers who lament the breach between the faith and the work of Christians in the modern world. Some go beyond lament and seek to contribute to healing the breach. Their typical strategy is to develop a theology of work—supplemented, now and then, with a theologically informed ethic of work. Their assumption is that if Christians acquire the right theological thoughts about work by reading their writings, the breach between faith and work will be healed and integration will ensue.
The authors of this book join the crowd of those who lament the breach, but they stand out from the crowd in a way that is of fundamental importance. They remark that they, too, once assumed that teaching the laity a theology of work was the path to integration. No longer. They became “ convinced that theologies of work need to be practiced, embedded, and embodied in communities of worship .” Furthermore, “daily work should ‘show up’ in the community’s prayers and sermons, its songs and benedictions, its testimonies and sacraments. Theologies of work matter, but they need to be sung and prayed. We need to find ways for our theologies of work to inhabit more than our brains—they need to enter our bones. . . . An integrated life is not an intellectual achievement, an all-of-a-sudden eureka moment of theological discovery. . . . The fabric of faith and work needs to be slowly and intentionally woven back together over a lifetime of prayer and worship .”
Lest mistaken conclusions be drawn, the writers go on to declare that “The mind of the worker still matters. What workers think about theology, vocation, and work is still important.” But the question that concerns them is this: “How does a theological idea about work actually embed itself deeply in the life of a worker? Put another way, how does an intellectual theology of work become a lived theology of work? Some Christians have a theology of work floating about in their brains; others have it embedded in their bones. We want the latter.”
The authors observe that they have found nothing quite like the book they have written. “As far as we can tell,” they say, “the academic fields of ‘workplace theology’ and ‘worship studies’ have never been brought together in sustained conversation.” Liturgical studies “almost never mention work or workers,” nor are there “any books on workplace theology that seek to learn from the field of worship studies.” I, too, know of nothing quite like this book. It is a trailblazing achievement!
After an opening section that the authors call “Foundations,” in which they develop the case for their approach, there is a section of six chapters called “Resources” in which they describe, in considerable detail, how work was integrated with worship in ancient Israel and in the early church. The section is truly remarkable, both in the skill with which it brings to life those ancient worship practices and in the breadth of scholarship that it displays.
In the final section on “Practices,” the authors consider ways in which the worship of the church today can become what they call “vocationally conversant worship.” Though they offer concrete examples of such worship, they emphasize that theirs is not a how-to-do-it manual. Christian worship is too diverse, and work in the modern world is likewise too diverse for any one-size-fits-all list of suggestions. The examples are not meant to be copied but to stir the imagination of worship leaders to craft vocationally conversant worship that fits their particular worshipers and their particular workers.
Though the scholarship is remarkable in its breadth, it is presented in a way that makes it readily accessible to those who are neither theologians nor liturgical scholars—lucid and blessedly free of scholarly jargon. Take and read!
Introduction
How beautiful will be the day when all the baptized understand their work, their job, is a priestly work . . . [that] each metal worker, each professional, each doctor with the scalpel, the market woman at her stand, is performing a priestly office!
—Oscar Romero, The Violence of Love
There exists a profound separation between work and worship in the lives of many Christians today. Their gathered worship in the sanctuary and their scattered work in the world often feel as if they are a million miles apart.
Monday after Monday, people engage in a variety of workplace rituals: driving to work, walking across the factory