Stadiums and Living Rooms

"We were opening for Neil Young at the time I wrote the song, and I was inspired by his ability to make a stadium feel like a living room. And we were making living rooms feel like stadiums, and I thought, this is backwards, like, we'd go on little punk rock clubs and we'd try to make it into this big hairy deal, and there's Neil, sitting there like no one's there except for two people in his living room, and he's captivating a whole audience." -Ben Folds

This quote has been rattling around my head a lot lately, along with another quote from Glenn Packiam that I'll probably share in another post. I keep asking myself, what does this mean in a worship service context?

Using our set up and our style, how do we create an experience that makes the room feel smaller?

Because I feel like, if we're not careful, the lights and the cameras and the super-polished and well-flowing service can make it feel like we're trying to turn a living room into a stadium. And this is all well-meaning. We want to be excellent. I want to be excellent. It's not about that... it's about being inviting. Showing that the message of Jesus is genuine and authentic and captivating.

What can we do to foster that family, living room feeling at church? I really want to make the room smaller, because smaller means more personal and more connective.

How do we USE the tools we have, the lights and the cameras and the screens, all this amazing technology, how do we work it all together to make the room smaller?

How can I as a worship leader foster that type of feeling? How can I help people feel closer to what God is doing, not feel as if God is this big, unreachable thing?

If you want the answers to any of these questions, you are out of luck today. It's a good brain exercise for me to ponder all these things, though.