Theatre as a Method for Worship

The most effective way to impact a person's life is experience. People know God and grow in a personal relationship with God only through experience. But experience with God usually doesn't just come. Rather, experience is achieved by interacting among a community of persons. Life experiences are usually either directly or indirectly connected to other people. As Roy Cheville points out in Spiritual Resources are Available Today, people live in relationships. That connection may be found in another's action or inaction. Examples of action are endless: driving, touching, speaking, writing, and working. Examples of inaction are refusing to tithe, indifference, and non-involvement.

We are all called to be members of the body of Christ. That is, we actively engage in ministry according to our gifts and life circumstances. The nature of being includes interaction with others. That is, as members of the body of Christ, people who do not know Christ can see us, for we are tangible. With all our inhibitions and faults, Christ continues to strive to work through the best of each one of us, if we so choose, so that others can come to him. Our actions in discipleship have the potential to bring people into moments of God's presence. People then have the opportunity to experience and choose and develop according to those choices.

All art forms, including theatre, are specific actions by people. When theatre combines with active discipleship, the expression has the potential to help people experience moments of God's presence. Because of its nature, theatre can function as an approach to witnessing. It is an art form about people which connects to people in a common experience. It engages us in interpersonal relationships wherein our identity can be developed and enabled.

To use the theatre as an approach to witnessing does not mean we try to change or restructure what theatre is. For instance, conflict is necessary, for theatre relates to life and life includes conflict. Revealing the less desirable aspects of life is also necessary in order to be true to life circumstances. Excluding conflict and the less desirable aspects of life and characteristics of people, even in the worship setting, does not help us examine our relationship with our world. But taken as a whole, the theatre experience transcends its own portrayal of these things and has the potential to touch a deep inner chord within people who then may experience God. The theatre has the potential to help outreach, heal, worship, and empower.

The theatre as an approach to witnessing is an outreach ministry. As written before, experience is a key word to describe the value of theatre. Theatre helps people experience something in a way no other method can. People experience life portrayed on stage or in a worship setting without actually doing it. Yet that experience is real. However, it is also safe. For instance, people can experience life in an alley without needing to leave home and live in an alley. This way, they can understand and feel, and still be able to go home and respond to that experience on their own terms and if they are able. Through experience, theatre has the potential to help bring people to God.

The theatre as a method to witness is a healing ministry. Theatre is about human life and living, and can profoundly touch those people who are bruised and broken-hearted. A person identifies with the characters and their situations. The experience touches a profoundly deep and sometimes painful inner chord within us. In many ways, the person becomes vulnerable, for the person becomes emotionally and spiritually open. With the element of Christ somehow revealed as part of the experience, healing can be stimulated.

One of the reasons for this phenomenon is due to the actual theatre experience. A group of people gather and share the experience, and yet the experience is also very private. In the theatre setting, more so than in nearly any other setting, it is acceptable to feel and show emotion. People usually don't question it when it happens. Yet no one knows the ways the experience specifically touches a person except the person. This aspect is very safe and is a major catalyst in a person being able to open and receive the ministry.

The theatre as an approach to ministry is a worshipful ministry. When we worship, we honor, celebrate, and venerate God. We also consider our relationship with God and each other in terms of commitment, reconciliation, compassion, and redemption. Again, the very creation of theatre determines what it is and what it does. The theatre has the potential to help us worship through celebration as well as outreach and healing, and at the same time honor and venerate God.

Finally, the theatre is an empowering ministry. Theatre gives the opportunity to open the hearts and minds of people to gain greater understanding, compassion, and strength of spirit. Upon examining our relationship with our world in this context, we could be empowered to help reveal Christ in the world. But this depends on the theatre that is created as well as the commitment and the spiritual state of all the people who share the experience.

The goal in using theatre as worship is the same as any other expression of discipleship. The goal is to help develop a person to his or her greatest potential. And a person's greatest potential can only be realized through an active, ongoing exploration of and relationship with God. Roy Cheville asserts:

"The total person is to be visioned as reaching out in continuing, expanding relationship with the wholeness of God in the fullness of the universe. Less than this is cutting short the resources available for personhood development. The creative, exploring person will keep at the job, trying for an enriched and enriching relationship with spiritual resources. The honest person will see his concepts of God calling for growth and refinement. He will see his language needing expansion. He will see conventional ways of getting with God as not adequate. He will see that many who set out to relate with God have limiting notions. But the person of pioneering spirit will thrill at the great adventure in relating more and more.

And the Holy Spirit will minister in this exploration. The true outreacher will endeavor to see how this Spirit calls for right relationship."

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), a German playwright who wrote Faust, a poet, novelist, theoretician, and scientist, endowed art with three functions: entertainment, edification, and exaltation of the human spirit. The word entertainment comes from the Latin tenere, which mean "to hold," and a complete definition of the word is to hold the attention agreeably. While some people may believe that worship, ministry, and a life with God means stoicism and asceticism, most believe worship, ministry, and a life with God means an active, intense, lively, and celebrating discovery. Because of its very nature, the theatre allows us a way to do just that.

Edification or enlightenment is also a function of art and theatre. It is within the nature of the human spirit to need to know. The theatre allows us a way to learn something about another person's unique point of view by experiencing it. Yet edification ties to knowledge through emotion. Factual knowledge can increase understanding. But emotional edification through a theatrical experience also frequently contributes to the quality of life. The essence of edification lies in emotional rather than intellectual understanding.

Goethe's third function of art, exaltation, ties closely with the spiritual life of persons. Besides entertainment and edification, the nature of human existence also requires exaltation. We not only need to face our own existence, but we also need to have a wide view of humanity and the struggles of humanity in the world. The theatre is a search for truth among human endeavors. As such, the theatre has the potential to help people improve their lives by the experience.

However, we can't set out to make experience happen. That is, we can't set out to create a specific kind of experience for people and expect our work to always touch a person's inner being in profound ways. Sometimes, no matter what we do and how well we do it, the experience doesn't happen. When it does, much of this phenomenon happens on a sub-conscious level. Instead of trying to create a specific experience, we try to respond to the needs of people the best way we know how. Using theatre is but one way of doing that. But when the experience does happen, it is truly wondrous.

Copyright 1990 Debra Bruch

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