“Non-liturgical is much less structured, it means a pastor getting up and just winging it week to week, without really any sense of a yearly calendar or anything.”
I would take exception to the “winging-it” statement. I’ve never known a Pastor to approach a service without much prayer and much study. It might be different that you are used to, but there is actually a lot of hard work that goes into it rather than just doing what the calendar tells you to.
Yeah, that was probably a bad choice of words. I didn’t mean there wasn’t a lot of prayer and prep that went into it, I meant largely that the service varies greatly from pastor to pastor, year to year—it’s basically up to each person.
And believe me, there’s a lot of work that goes into following a calendar too....especially the old one!
Been to the occasional tent meeting where the preacher 'winged it'...Been to a few church services where the pastor 'winged it'...It seems to be far more inspiring that someone reading from a script...
While there are many pastors who read their sermons there are many who prepare notes and take off from the notes they have...They prepare the notes to be able to stay on topic...
Any one can read a newspaper or a sermon...I like the fella that preaches from his heart and spirit...