We work hard trying to improve our lives. Better hair. More healthy habits. Get a grip on balancing our budget and our calendar.
When was the last time you worked hard to improve your worship life? As in, actually evaluating what you’re doing when you attend a worship service at your church, analyzing your thought patterns, testing your assumptions, pursuing new discoveries and growing closer to Jesus and other Christians.
Start here. Understand and practice the difference between the vertical and the horizontal in worship. This is what that looks like at CrossLife Church.
Horizontal elements and expressions are around and among us—stage and screen, lighting sometimes dazzling sometimes dark and often colorful, hearing each other singing and clapping and Amen-ing, seeing folded hands or raised hands or extended hands of blessing or someone making the sign of the cross over their heart.
Those are all good, horizontal things. Important things. Big things. But Jesus is bigger. The vertical of worship is better and more important than the horizontal.
Vertical elements and expressions in worship are those moments—and there are many—where you are connecting with Jesus by faith as you believe the words he speaks through Bible teaching, you are delighting in his promises and purposes for you, encountering the overwhelming presence and peace of his Spirit, finding his grace, growing in hope, Hallelujah-ing with hands clapping or repenting with head bowed in humility.
What you do with your hands, what you see with your eyes, what you hear with your ears—the horizontal—makes a difference for the vertical.
At many churches, including CrossLife, children sing in church. Not from the back but from the front so you can horizontally see them. Not with hands in their pockets but raised in praise, or moving as choreographed by their teachers, or perhaps holding palm branches or candles. Why? Not for the sake of the horizontal, but using the horizontal to make the vertical—the connection to Jesus—bigger, better, more beautiful for more people.
Another example is lighting. Lighting in worship is a horizontal component that is big, but strategically designed and delivered to make Jesus bigger, to help us worship Jesus more. At CrossLife we plan and produce every single slide of every single service with protocols and priorities that serve the vertical. Everything is thought through thoroughly.
The number of lights we designed in our worship center, and the particular position of each light installed in this room was planned to serve the vertical, to worship Jesus more. Notice the backlighting on the cross, for example.
Instead of big, clear windows that automatically illuminate the worship space to the same level of brightness as outside, we chose to design a worship space that allows us to control the lighting so that the horizontal can better serve the vertical. The lack of windows in our worship space allows us to better utilize the contrast between darkness and light.
We use darkness like a shadow, to cover things up. Darkness can cover up the entire crowd of sinners so that we better see the cross of Jesus with its own lights, centered and above everyone in the worship center. We use darkness to cover each other up horizontally, and at moments we purposely see other worshipers less so that we can see Jesus more.
We use light in the spotlights or overhead lights, strategically drawing attention to God’s Word being spoken or sung by a person on stage (usually the words of Scripture/song are displayed on the screen more prominently than the person, another use of lighting). We use colored lights from above or synchronized on the millions of pixels on our LED screen—timed theologically to reinforce spiritual truths like heaven, the blood of Jesus, growing in faith or victory through his resurrection.
Similarly, we use sound the same way. With thoughtful planning and production, CrossLife trains our AV team and rehearses for each Sunday, in order for the horizontal element of sound to serve the vertical expressions of the gospel.
Sometimes we increase the volume of music, purposely covering up the sounds of other worshipers so that the focus is less horizontal and more vertical as you sing to Jesus. Other times, we do the opposite. Sometimes we allow a song leader to be the loudest in the worship center, so that the congregation is musically led to learn new songs. Other times, we do the opposite.
Jesus once said, “I tell you that something greater than the temple is here” (Matthew 12:6).
Greater than the animal sacrifices offered at the Jewish temple and the songs of praise offered here, Jesus became the only sacrificial offering to be killed and his blood to make complete payment demanded by God’s justice for all sins of all people.
Greater than the Jewish priests dressed in their robes or a pastor standing and speaking on stage under the spotlights, Jesus become the great high priest dressed in human flesh and he stands between us and God’s holiness, interceding and speaking not curses but blessings on our behalf, “I died for them.
Greater than “Hallelujahs” and “Amens” rising from the congregation, Jesus rose from the dead and became alive again to promise eternal life in heaven to all believers and give new life to our worship right now.
So how can you worship Jesus more greatly?
PRAYER: Jesus, I want to improve, and to worship you more. Thank you for both the horizontal and vertical elements of worship expressed at my church. Teach me more about them. Renew my joy of salvation. And please bless the worship at my church. Amen.
SPIRITUAL NEXT STEP: Read Psalm 95:1-7 and Psalm 96:1-5 and verse by verse identify each line as a vertical or horizontal dynamic in your worship. Discuss in your group why you answered the way you did. Give some examples of vertical and horizontal worship at CrossLife or your church.