I have to admit, I'm not always ready for worship. Are you?
I think we learn from John 4, when Jesus is talking to the Samaritan woman how important our heart is in the whole matter of worship.
We don’t suddenly delight in God when the service begins no matter what the song might be leading us to say. Our hearts are the worship center and we bring our worship with us. Each of us worships in the quiet of our hearts all week. Then we all pile in here together to feed off the corporate energy of worship. What this should produce in our church is a great bonfire of worship. As each of us brings our kindling to add to the fire, the more of us there are together, the larger the fire should be. Corporate worship is the gathering together of hearts delighting in God. When that happens, there is a special dynamic that takes place.
Another way to look at it is this. I’m an Alabama fan. I’ve always been an Alabama fan. Everyone who is an Alabama fan has a reason for being one. People don’t go to Alabama games to become an Alabama fan. People don’t go into Bryant Denny stadium and become an Alabama fan. They go to games and share in the passion with all the other Alabama fans. We look forward to going and supporting our favorite teams. We build it up, dress up in their gear, paint our faces, etc. Then we go. We let our enthusiasm go for the team while there, and we celebrate with others.
Worship should be like that. We are putting on our Christian gear everyday, when we go out we celebrate with other Christians. When we come to church, that is our time to Celebrate our Christianity with everyone else. We don’t cheer for other people, we praise our God.
3 comments:
i totally agree with all that. well said.
We had a somewhat similar sermon Sunday morning from Jeff Shocklee regarding the meaning of "church" -- that we define it as the area contained by the 4 walls of the building we travel to Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night. He challenged us to see the church as more than the building, but rather as the people.
His main text was Stephen's speech to the Sanhedrin where he pointed out that for them, the temple and its grandeur had become the focus of their worship, replacing what should have been a focus on God. How often does the building become our dominant theme, rather than our hearts and the hearts of those around us? How often does our worship start and stop with the opening song and the closing prayer?
For me, too often.
Let us all work to move our worship into our homes, our jobs, our commutes, our vacations -- into every moment of our lives, regardless of who is (or isn't) watching.
Excellent thoughts, Lane. I really liked your analogy about supporting a team. It made me think to myself, "Am I a fan of God?"
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