Peacemaking and Christian Worship: A Conversation with Lisa Clark Diller from Adventist Peace Fellowship
Best Practices for Adventist Worship (BP): As a follower of Jesus who is committed to peacemaking, what specific Christian worship practices have you found most encouraging, instructive, or helpful in cultivating communities of peacemakers?
Lisa Clark Diller (LD): I have found collective prayer to be one of the most encouraging and helpful in creating communities of peacemakers. It bonds us together and helps us when we need reconciliation and forgiveness. I have also found reading the Word together and discussing it to be an important preparation for worship. Hearing ideas from others and understanding the full range of ways people think about Scripture and how they read it to help widen my heart and my ideas about God.
BP: What tendencies have you encountered in the way we gather for worship that can—perhaps inadvertently—work against the shalom we seek for ourselves and our neighbors?
LD: I think posturing about how much we know or having an environment that cultivates pride in appearance or performances mitigates against shalom for ourselves and neighbors. The less open we are with each other, the less likely we are to be reconciled and forgiving of each other and able to show up to work for justice and mercy.
BP: You are the co-director of Adventist Peace Fellowship, who is sponsoring a worship songwriting competition to inspire new congregational songs about peace. What do you hope both the songwriters and congregations who sing these new songs will gain from the opportunity to musically rehearse their faith?
LD: I believe in New Creation. The Adventist Peace Fellowship wants people to live into the Peaceable Kingdom, and we do this when we exercise our sanctified imaginations. Music is, for most people in 21st century North America, the primary way they experience worship. The songs that we sing and listen to are vital in the forming of our view of God and each other. They help shape us and the community we create in our church. I'm so excited that there's another new generation of musicians who can "sing a new song" that gives us both information and a vision for how we can love each other and seek the peace of the nations around us.
