Summary Of The Music Architect By Constance Cherry

Reading about song selections for the movement of worship really gave me a new perspective on things that I had never pondered much about in my life before. In “The Music Architect” Constance Cherry talks about the importance of having a natural, orderly form of worship and the different biblical models of worship that are widely used in today’s churches. She shares how when some of these orders of worship placement are not met it can negatively affect the message, towards worship or the whole church service in general, and the narrative of worship. In the Bible, the New Testament is where the first patterns of worship begin. In Acts, Paul writes to the Church of Corinth with his concern of matters relating to the order of worship. Evidently,
the idea of the importance of worship is not new, it has been thought about for a long time. It is important for churches to have a natural and understandable order so that genuine communication and relationships are enhanced between God and fellow believers. It is also important to realize that the order of worship has nothing to do with worship style, but with relationship between God and his people. Good structure in the order of worship should not draw attention to itself but should almost be unnoticed because we should not be carrying the form, but we should be letting the form carry us.
I really enjoyed reading about the different biblical models and the biblical background behind the three of them.
Cherry first talks about the Isaiah model which is based off of Isaiah 6 in the bible. The Isaiah model moves consistently from revelation to response and is personal and relational. First it begins with the acknowledgement of God’s presence, the confession of our sins, receiving God’s forgiveness, listening to the Word of the Lord, and going out with his message. This seems to be a very relevant model in many churches that I have been to. The second form of worship is the Tabernacle Model. This form of worship is popular with pentecostal circles. It is based on three sections: the outer court, the inner court, and the Holy of Holies. The way this form of worship works is the believers working their way up from the outer court, which is a general form of worship, to the Holy of Holies which is the highest form of worship. The gospel model is a form of worship that is based on scripture and being aware of the good things the Lord has done relating to the bible. It focuses on the believers coming together as a church, reading and proclaiming the Word of God, responding to these teachings, and being sent out to reach out to others. The gospel model is a good example of what is used in my non - denominational church at
home.