Isn’t 95% of church politics simply a matter of a difference of opinion? In matters of the words of Jesus, stand firm like a rock. In matters of opinion, bend like a willow.

This is your blog, Rich, I won’t be offended if you need to cut this off.

And, about the politics. Church politics damages things, Dan. Its like telling a sprinter that having one leg is fine and that constraint still allows him to run. We need not cut off legs. Church politics (as described above) hurt, not just are a challenge. Its like breaking a glass. Its a challenge to pick up pieces of glass but you cannot ever again drink from those pieces. This why the scripture tells us to get right with our brother before coming to worship. So, it is a deeper issue than just having constraints. Its being sure we are in unity.

In your original post you said: “Make worship style indigenous to reach and reflect your community”. Irrespective of medium or context, Christian radio, at least in our community, may be the more indigenous.

I agree, let’s not lose our zeal to reduce damaging, meaningless politics. But, where the rubber meets the road is, given the constaints that you know will be in place when you walk into your church venue next Sunday — constraints that you have not been able to mitigate over the last week, or month, or year, even though you tried — how are you going to rise above them, and possibly because of them, orchestrate an awesome time of worship? If your church committee or lead pastor gives you a constraint of a 95 Db maximum, how are you going to make music so good that it would be ruined at 100 Db? When God constrains the beauty of the blue sky on a rainy day we get a rainbow. Right?

Keep up the good work, Bro!

Not sure Christian radio is really much help Dan. The issue is iPod verses broadcasting. Our little worship sets mean more because of the context. Liturgy verses a soundtrack.

Politics is more than a challenge, it’s a wet blanket to Gods gifting being used. It is damaging. The idea is to lift lids rather than settle for less. Right?

Christian Subculture
Sometimes I think it’s the other way around: the Christian music radio station in our community is cutting through a much larger cultural/musical swath than is our church, and, our church is the one who’s drawing from the same small list (Brewster, Tomlin, Hughes, Redman, Hillsong, Crowder…) of songs and writers. I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that more people have found Christ by listening to our community’s Christian radio station than have found Him during our church’s music sets.

Church Politics
Church constaints present us with a challenge: within these constraints, how do we still provide excellent and heart-and-mind-moving worship? If J. S. Bach (or John Williams, or Yanni, or Billy Joe Armstrong) had to work within these constraints what great stuff would they put together? If we could give Michaelangelo only three colors of chalk, what great piece of visual art would he come up with?