Coping Mechanisms?

I don't know if you are familiar with "A Prairie Home Companion" with Garrison Keillor, but I like to listen in as often as I remember it's on. I was reading some letters to Mr. Keillor when I came across this one:

Dear Garrison,
As a Methodist to a Lutheran, I have a pressing question. I work in church communications and one of the things I'm helping folks do is the incorporation of multimedia and digital storytelling into their worship services. Mass communication has changed from oral to written to digital and I'm trying to teach my folks how to do all three. Of course, traditional folks don't care to have a bunch of electronic gadgetry on their holy ground. Any suggestions on how to bridge the gap?

Billy
Dardanelle, Arkansas

Billy,
I have no idea what digital storytelling is ---- do you mean holding up fingers to indicate numbers? Or simply words on a screen? How this fits into the worship service I can't imagine and am not sure I want to find out. There is nothing like sitting and listening to someone with a message in their heart. That isn't old-fashioned, it's just common sense. If the Lord has spoken to you, if Scripture has spoken to you, then you ought to be able to tell the rest of us. Multimedia is for advertising. The church doesn't need advertising, it needs witnessing, and that's ordinary people saying what's in their hearts. Just like I did right now.

 

I kinda like that, you know.

While I'm good with using the tools of the day to communicate the truths of eternity, I am fearful that to often the tools of the day take the place of the truths of eternity.

If the person up there in front of you hasn't experienced the "...good things of heaven and shared in the Holy Spirit,  who has tasted the goodness of the word of God and the power of the age to come..." then what authority does he speak to you from?

I'm starting to wonder if the thing that "Postmoderns" reject mostly from the modern church is simply the lack of a powerful God. That the God of the Moderns has all the bells and whistles of a god, yet they deny his power.

The church has created programs and personal development series which are designed to help us to know God, at least with our heads, hopefully with our hearts. But doing the heart stuff is difficult work. It Spiritual work.

Waiting on God, anointing in his name, Fasting and seasons of prayer. These are spiritual activities that so much of the western church has been ill equipped to tackle. So, to respond to our lack of Spiritual Power, we try other things that might just do the trick.

Moving to big, splashy presentations can be just another way of coping with our lack of power. Of covering our weaknesses.

Again, I'm all for using the tools of the day to communicate eternal truths. But we're just kidding ourselves if there isn't depth beneath it all. If there aren't the connections to God and the empowering of the Holy One in our lives and churches.

"When they were together for the last time they asked, "Master, are you going to restore the kingdom to Israel now? Is this the time?"
He told them, "You don't get to know the time. Timing is the Father's business. What you'll get is the Holy Spirit. And when the Holy Spirit comes on you, you will be able to be my witnesses in Jerusalem, all over Judea and Samaria, even to the ends of the world."
These were his last words. As they watched, he was taken up and disappeared in a cloud. They stood there, staring into the empty sky.