Feature: Using Electronic Media in Worship
Mel White
by Mel White, film maker and former pastor, Evangelical Covenant Church, Pasadena, California
"What a gimmick, Mel," jibed my friend-critic-fellow pastor, "using all that electronic media in worship. No wonder your crowd is growing." I bit my tongue. How often I had heard that good-natured questioning of my liturgical methods and motives. "Just show biz," he might have added. Or worse, "Just an easy way to keep from preparing a sermon." Wrong on both counts. My motive for using electronic media in worship is the same as for every hymn, prayer, or sermon: to lift up Christ and draw his people one step closer to him and to each other. And the method is not a short cut. It is time-consuming and risky. (And never have I eliminated the sermon with media, only supplemented and supported it.) When you spend valuable time, energy, and money to integrate a one-minute film clip only to have an usher trip on the plug mid-screening and plunge the church into darkness, or when the slide bearing the words to the morning anthem pops on upside-down, you wonder if using media is worth the impugning of your motives. But believe me, it's worth it. The excitement people feel, the enthusiasm with which old-timers invite friends and family to worship, and the changed lives and renewed spirits can be traced, at least in part, to God's Spirit at work in and through electronic worship aids. My wife, Lyla, our director of worship, and our worship team (volunteers with interest if not expertise in media, art, music, and liturgy) integrated two types of media into morning worship: (1) sight (16mm film, 8mm film, video tape, slide projections, and lighting) and (2) sound (records and audio cassettes). For the sake of brevity we must skip over the use of ...
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