I don’t think it would be difficult involving lectionary readings into worship, adding corporate prayers such as confession and our fathers.

I think that ideally for liturgy-lovers who come from evangelical backgrounds, a liturgical service would be very easy to do with more contemporary music replacing the hymns, if that was desired.

But if the purpose was to introduce evangelicals to liturgy, I think the lectionary would be a good place to start.

When I was a pastor at a Baptist church with a traditional form of worship, I found that people were much more willing to experiment with something “new” (irony intended) at “special” services–Christmas eve, Maundy Thursday, etc. Other than that, taking a long-term, gradual approach is always best, with as much preaching and teaching about the biblical bases for such practices as possible. Also, it is important to let these things be more than one person’s hobby horse. I would recommend a pastor share his or her heart for this kind of worship with some key leaders and help them understand why the pastor thinks it is important to move in this direction. Then those leaders can help interpret the pastor’s intentions to those in the congregation that may be anxious.

Some elements are fairly easy. I found that I could preach from the lectionary more or less unobtrusively simply by adding a second Scripture reading. A deacon would read either the OT or the Epistle and then I read the Gospel lesson just before the sermon. All three texts (and sometimes the Psalm) could be in play in my sermon, and I would refer to the text that was left unread as necessary for background info.

I was a bit more ambitious when it came to the Lord’s Supper, but I somehow managed to introduce the Sursum Corda and something approaching a Sanctus (a familiar chorus or a couple verses of “Holy, Holy, Holy”) to our monthly communion service—and received only positive comments. Although I didn’t fiddle with the Baptist custom of having the deacons distribute the bread and the cup to worshipers in the pews. I’ve blogged about adding liturgical elements to Free Church communion services.