A Lutheran explains the importance of preaching the reality of Christ at Mass

If you haven’t got the faith, it doesn’t mean a thing.

[W]hen Christ is not proclaimed as the One who sits on the altar—whose true body and blood that were offered to God for the sin of the world are given to the Church for the remission of sins—when this reality is not understood or clearly confessed, then there is nothing left but window dressing and show.

Why concern yourself with paraments and vestments, or with liturgical propriety and rubrics, if the reason for all this is missing? Gottesdienst [a Lutheran movement and
organization] aims to provide a defense for the liturgy by confessing in no uncertain terms what the liturgy is for.

We don’t genuflect, or make the sign of the cross, or bow, just because it’s the faddish thing to do, or because we happen to think it would be stylish to look Catholic. We do happen to do those things for pretty much the same reason they do them, though in their case it might be more of a matter of obligation than of confession, considering the fact that they have for centuries had a penchant for speaking of matters of the Gospel in terms of “holy obligations.” We are, however, quite willing to agree that where Christ is present, there solemnity is appropriate, and any lack of solemnity is inappropriate.

Bingo.