Published on
April 17, 2014
You might picture COCHUSA and Vineyard congregations as too different to find common ground. But Cudjoe, Park, and Rethmeier found productive ways to discuss worship together.

Dale Cudjoe is a pastor and bishop in Church of Christ Holiness USA (COCHUSA), a historically black denomination that began in the Deep South. Andy Park and Cindy Rethmeier are musicians and first-hand witnesses of the Vineyard Movement, which began in the 1970s in Southern California.

You might picture COCHUSA and Vineyard congregations as too different to find common ground. But Cudjoe, Park and Rethmeier found productive ways to discuss worship together. All three were panelists at a 2014 Calvin Symposium on Worship seminar on how congregations can deepen their conversations on worship.

The seminar was based on Church at Worship case studies of the congregations that launched COCHUSA and Vineyard. The following audio excerpts from that seminar may pique your interest to listen to the entire seminar and read stories on how to discuss worship calmly and productively and how to use Church at Worship books in personal devotions, small groups and classrooms.

  • Dale Cudjoe talks about how healing remains an important element in the Church of Christ Holiness USA (COCHUSA) denomination
  • Andy Park explains why early Vineyard worship songs valued gentleness and silence
  • Cindy Rethmeier talks about the strengths of what came to be known as the Vineyard Movement
  • In this 20-minute segment, all three panelists discuss how COCHUSA and the Vineyard Movement began in very difference cultural contexts, yet share key similarities