Hester Buell - Church Visit 1

Hester Buell - Church visit 1

Church name: Bethany Chapel

Address: 404 North President Street, Wheaton, IL

Date attended: 2/9/2014

Category: Less liturgical

Describe the worship service you attended. How was it similar to or different from your regular context?

The worship at Bethany Chapel was much less eclectic and more traditionally Evangelical than the worship services at my home church. While Church of the Resurrection's service includes worship songs, call and response, Scripture readings, prayers, a sermon, and then many more worship songs during communion (which we have every week), Bethany's service was much more simple, consisting of hymns, announcements, and a sermon. Resurrection's service is much longer, more complicated, more interactive, and more formal. We use traditional hymns, contemporary worship songs in multiple styles, Taize songs, chant, and sometimes songs from O Brother Where Art Thou that I'm not sure are actually worship songs. We use a wide range of instruments and styles––from soaring choral pieces to banjo-picking, feet-stomping choruses. Because of its variety of worship styles, Resurrection sometimes seems Catholic, sometimes Pentecostal, and sometimes Southern Baptist. But whatever style the worship band is using, they do it very intentionally, with much forethought and artistic direction. The worship service at Bethany Chapel was much more simple. When I attended, we sang a string of hymns before the sermon, and that was the extent of the worship. The singing was accompanied by a piano and two violins. There were two people who sang up front with microphones, but there was no sense that they were the worship "leaders"––everyone sang as one. The lines between people who worked at church and people attended were very blurred, which I appreciated. We are, after all, one body.


What did you find most interesting or appealing about the worship service?

This simplicity and the communal aspect of the worship surprised and delighted me. At my home church, the worship is so artistically crafted and polished that it can sometimes feel like a performance. When you're only one person in a huge congregation, and the worship team is so talented, it's easy to slip into the role of spectator. Bethany Chapel, however, did not allow for this. Each person in the sanctuary (all 30 of them) was an integral part of each hymn, and they sang with remarkable gusto. The simplicity of the worship style also made me focus more on the words of the hymns themselves. When the man standing by the pulpit with a microphone belted out "The body they may kill; God's truth abideth still," I was struck with the force of it. It was quite unlike the worship songs at my home church, which tend to be more emotion-inducing, often with more simple and repetitive words. Some people find this style more worshipful, but I enjoy the theological richness of hymns. 

What did you find most disorienting or challenging about the worship service?

In some ways it was challenging to transition to such a different worship style. I was used to worship songs being more like performances, and so at first the worship here seemed underwhelming. These hymns accompanied by piano were not about to do the emotional work for me. There were no impassioned repetitions of simple lyrics with heavy drumbeats in the background, there were no flourishes or improvising. But as we continued to sing, I appreciated this heartfelt simplicity more and more. We were singing true, beautiful things about God, and we meant it. Aside from the hymns themselves, I felt a small amount of confusion because I always felt that I should be doing more. My church includes a lot of congregational participation through call and response (in prayers, in Scripture reading, in confession, and in blessings), so I was surprised when I was never asked to open my mouth except to sing.  

What aspects of Scripture or theology did the worship service illuminate for you that you had not perceived as clearly in your regular context?

I appreciated the simplicity of the worship service, the lack of formality and performance. There was no sense that the people standing up front were performing for the congregants standing to sing. What arose instead was a strong sense of fellowship, a palpable reminder that we are all equal, one body in Christ. It was also a good reminder that God does not ask us all to be rockstars. God takes us as we are, God uses the weak things of this world to shame the strong. All God asks for is a penitent heart and a simple desire to follow Him. We sang those hymns simply but honestly, reminding ourselves and thanking God for what He has done. The simplicity of the service also somehow made Christian discipleship seem more real to me. It was more true to the way things really are. When we worship God throughout our day, we are not accompanied by profound, dramatic musical arrangements to stir the right emotions in us. What we do have, however, is the words to the hymns––the truths of God that never fade.