For nearly forty years many in our Synod have bought into the idea that Contemporary Worship is the way of the future and that it is what young people desire. But where are they? Our church body has an average age higher than nearly any other church body in the United States. It is past time to admit that the experiment has failed.

The worship wars among us may not be dismissed simply as a case of more or less healthy turbulence to be expected in an age of cultural change and instability. We chatter all too glibly and reassuringly about culture, when in fact the crisis in our cultus goes to the bedrock of our faith, doctrine, and confession. Under the guise of sensible cultural adaptation, we are in fact being robbed of the dogmatical and sacramental substance of the Gospel. It is time to wake up from pleasant delusions, to sound the alarm, to watch and pray, not to be lulled to fatal sleep by soothing untruths.

Note: I believe I coined the expression “Tale of Two Synods” in 2021. Here are all eight of the Gottesblog posts that make use of the term. — Ed.