Robert Webber, Ancient-Future Worship: Proclaiming and Enacting God’s Narrative (Ancient-Future Series). Baker, 2008.
Prequels:
- Ancient-Future Faith: Rethinking Evangelicalism for a Postmodern World (1999)
- Ancient-Future Evangelism: Making Your Church a Faith-Forming Community (2003)
- Ancient-Future Time: Forming Spirituality through the Christian Year (2004)
LifeandLeadership.com Summary
As the title of the series suggests, Webber suggests that the path for the church’s future, or the effectiveness of the church as it transitions from the modern to the current era, is to go through the past. And by the “past,” he means ancient paths of the first few centuries of Christian faith and practice, often referred to as classical or historic Christianity. Webber suggests that going back to these roots of the Christian faith helps guard against the polarizing reactionary tendencies of our time that either hold tenaciously to the remnants of modernism or surrender entirely to the postmodern ethos.
Webber reflects the thinking of many Younger Evangelicals who seek points of contact between classical Christianity and postmodern thought. The church during this ancient period, he argues, was less conditioned by accommodating to culture (which evangelicals have tended to do), but was more interested in presenting a biblical alternative way of life. As such, the wisdom of the ancients is uniquely suited to equip the postmodern church to succeed, “not by watering down the faith, but by being a counter cultural community that invites people to be shaped by the story of Israel and Jesus.” Webber draws from ancient writers, and also garners insights from all the major epochs and Christian traditions – Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant, evangelicals, etc. – to address the challenges of our era.
The four books of the Ancient-Future series translate wisdom from these ancients into four areas of ministry: faith, worship, ministry, and spirituality. Follow the links below to each of the other volumes in the series:
- Ancient-Future Faith: Rethinking Evangelicalism for a Postmodern World (1999)
- Ancient-Future Evangelism: Making Your Church a Faith-Forming Community (2003)
- Ancient-Future Time: Forming Spirituality through the Christian Year (2004)
From the Publisher
With the many models of worship available, choosing a style to worship God can be a bit overwhelming. Is it better to go with traditional or contemporary models? Christians may find themselves asking how early believers worshiped and whether they can provide insight into how we should praise God today. Rooted in historical models and patristic church studies, Webber’s final volume in the respected Ancient-Future series examines how early Christian worship styles can be applied to the postmodern church. Pastors and church leaders, as well as younger evangelical and emerging church groups, will find this an invaluable, insightful resource for answering questions about—-and creating—-contemporary ways of expressing praise to God.
God has a story. Worship does God’s story. There is a crisis of worship today. The problem goes beyond matters of style—it is a crisis of content and of form. Worship in churches today is too often dead and dry, or busy and self-involved. Robert Webber attributes these problems to a loss of vision of God and of God’s narrative in past, present, and future history. As he examines worship practices of Old Testament Israel and the early church, Webber uncovers ancient principles and practices that can reinvigorate our worship today and into the future. The final volume in Webber’s acclaimed Ancient-Future series, Ancient-Future Worship is the culmination of a lifetime of study and reflection on Christian worship. Here is an urgent call to recover a vigorous, God-glorifying, transformative worship through the enactment and proclamation of God’s glorious story. The road to the future, argues Webber, runs through the past.
About the Author
Before his death in 2007, Robert Webber was the William R. and Geraldyn B. Myers Professor of Ministry at Northern Seminary in Lombard, IL. He was also the President of the Institute for Worship Studies and Professor of Theology Emeritus at Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL. Dr. Webber authored or edited more than forty books on worship and other ministry-related subjects.
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