Jennifer Ashby preaches and teaches regularly at Neighborhood Church in Rockville, Maryland. She baptizes people, disciples them, marries them, buries them, and counsels them in times of crisis.

But one thing she won’t do, as executive director of ministries at the Christian and Missionary Alliance (CMA) congregation, is call herself “pastor.”

The CMA consecrates and licenses women for ministry but does not permit them to use the title “pastor.” The term is restricted ...

When a mentor saw me struggling with worship in our fledging church plant, he handed me a copy of Marva Dawn’s Reaching Out Without Dumbing Down: A Theology of Worship in this Urgent Time. I wondered what a Lutheran and a lover of historic worship practices would have to say to a congregation whose traditions came more from indie rock shows than any church.

It turns out that the work of Marva Dawn—who died last month at age 72—was life-giving. Like many in my generation, I began ...