One additional thought....

(David) Dear Christ the Word family,

If I can add one thought to Pastor Andrew's excellent sermon preparing us for our future in our new building...

Andrew is right in leading us to remember that worship is always directed in two directions: in praise of God and as rejoinder to the sins of the world. Gideon's altar built on the site of and with materials from the altar of Baal is just one biblical illustration of this principle.

Living in a culture whose besetting sins are sexual and a day in which sexual anarchy has invaded the Church requires that the character of our worship be unapologetically masculine in its fundamental principle. Worship of God the Father begins with fathers, not limp-wristed, narcissistic, self-doubting androgynes. And federal heads leading in worship will drive worship in a masculine direction.

But there are two things to remember in the midst of this. First, and more as a by-the-way than as our principle point, worship tinged with femininity is entirely appropriate if you're a woman. The woman who touched Jesus' hem comes before him "trembling" when He asks, "Who touched me?" She shies from public notice and is frightened at His call to come forward. She is not the Roman centurion boldly asking Jesus to simply say the word for the healing of his servant. Yet she is a giant of faith; her faith and worship reflect feminine virtues, and they are glorious virtues--in a woman.

Second, and more importantly, masculine-tinged worship is not merely a rejoinder to the sins of our day and the gods of our age, it is a reflection of the timeless nature of public worship instituted and demanded by our God, who sets men as priests, made men his choristers and used warrior kings to lead His people in worship and to compose the psalter of His Church. At the heart of Old Testament worship was bloodshed and death on the scale of an abbatoir. It's inconceivable, despite the utensils, cooking, spices, herbs, incense and choral singing of Old Testament worship that any but a man would serve as priest in the temple of God. The work might appear the work of a woman in her kitchen--the life of a Jacob rather than an Esau--but the vicarious and propitiatory violence at its core, the bloodshed and butchery at the heart of worship instituted by God made it a fundamentally masculine occupation. 

We can place women in our military and pretend that they make good killers, but it's a lie. The one thing men can and always will do better than women is destroy. And destruction, violence and death are never far away when we adore God in worship. 

When we have worship in a masculine-tinged milieu, we simply follow the timeless direction of God and the specific example of His Son, who chose twelve men to lead His Bride.