‘Worship Party’ Adds Spirit to New Year’s

Growing up, Lane Merrifield, 22, felt something missing on New Year’s Eve.

A pastor’s son--Merrifield’s father, Bruce, works as senior pastor at Costa Mesa’s Harbor Trinity Church--he joined his family at church get-togethers each Dec. 31.

“The only thing that would really happen in the church was, like, a games night,” Merrifield said. “There was not much substance to it. It was more just kind of hangout time.”

But then last year, Ric Olsen, the church’s college pastor, began talking about “The Revolution,” a hipper way for Christians to spend New Year’s Eve. He needed the musical talents of Merrifield, who volunteers as Harbor Trinity’s band leader, to throw the proper “worship party.”

Together with about 350 other Christians, Merrifield celebrated New Year’s Eve 1999 at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Newport Beach.

Put on by about a dozen churches from Newport Beach and Costa Mesa, the six-hour event featured dinner, dancing and games. But it also included time to reflect on the last year and to prepare for a new commitment to God.

“It’s entertaining,” he said. “But it’s so much more. It offers a spiritual element. You’re asking God to reveal what area of your life he wants you to change.”

After the success of last year’s party, some of the organizers said they hope even more people will show up this year.

“It’s such a significant thing to start the year new and fresh and be available for what God has to offer you next year,” Olsen said.

The 34-year-old college pastor said he modeled the party after similar events he’d helped put on during his days as a missionary in Europe.

“This is my seventh time,” Olsen said. “And every year at least one or two people come up to me and say, ‘My life has changed dramatically.’ ”

While chuckling over the irony that many conservative and traditional Christian churches have turned an essentially secular holiday into a religious one, Fred Plumer, the pastor at Irvine’s United Church of Christ, agreed that spiritual reflection is never a bad thing.

“We ought to be able to turn every day into a spiritual day,” he said. “If we did that more often, the world would be a better place for it.”

Organizers of the multidenominational event at St. Andrews said they planned to marry the social and spiritual again.

At first glance, the flier that organizers have distributed on college campuses and in churches throughout the Southland more resembles those advertising rave events at dance clubs than a church service.

“That’s why we call it worship party, not worship service,” said Mark McCormick, who is in charge of college students and young adults at St. Andrews.

Olsen said he and the others were trying to erase the impression that Christian worship is dull.

“So many people get the idea that Christianity is boring,” he said. “The goal of the night is that in this worship, you’re going to have a blast.”

And with a 48-channel lighting board, a fog machine and two 15-foot television screens to project song lyrics as well as scenes from New York’s Times Square, the trio said they were aiming for the dance-club effect.

The evening will begin with an Italian dinner (a $5 donation is suggested) and dancing in the church’s fellowship hall.

The evening would be split into two sections, the first before midnight to reflect on things past, Olsen said. “Taking Communion just before the ball drops at midnight seals the cleaning-the-slate part,” he said. “After midnight, we take on the new challenges. That’s why we called it ‘The Revolution.’ People become revolutionaries.”

Merrifield put it more bluntly.

“The first part is dealing with garbage,” he said. “The second half is pure celebration.”

Merrifield remembered that the thought of three hours of straight praying at first seemed daunting to him.

But “last year, we almost hit 2 o’clock” in the morning, he said. “And people didn’t even realize.”

Sharing his impressions after last year’s party, a techno rave enthusiast thanked Merrifield for inviting him along.

“He said to me that it was so cool to wake up feeling better than the night before,” Merrifield recalled. “He felt like he didn’t sacrifice any fun.”

FYI

“The Revolution” New Year’s Eve worship party at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church takes place Sunday from 7 p.m. to 1 a.m. The church is at 600 St. Andrews Road, Newport Beach. Information: (949) 574-2261.