The Mission of Worship

This past week, I began my final semester at IWS. The class is all about multi-cultural worship, how to use it, and why it is important. One of our readings entitled “The Mission of Worship” by Sandra Van Opstal, has a quote that really struck me. It says “The mission of worship is therefore experiencing God in all his fullness as well as embracing God’s mission to proclaim and demonstrate his kingdom of reconciliation and justice.” Wait…when I am worshipping I am actually on a mission? Yes in fact you are!

Now I don’t know about you but when I “worship” I don’t normally view it as a missions trip. Usually I am in the comfort of my pew or my home, how can my worship be missional? The reality is that every part of our lives is worship when we are living for Christ. While we are singing in church we are indeed attempting to “experience God in all his fullness” but at the same time we are doing more. We are joining with Christ’s Body throughout the world as they sing praises to Him. By doing this act we are proclaiming to God and those around us that we are on board for God’s mission.

James 1:27 says “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” Worship is between you and God but it cannot end there! It has to continue to the rest of the world! This is why it is so important that we do not view worship as “going through the motions.” It means so much more than just crossing something off your check list for the week. It is a proclamation that you are standing in solidarity with all Christians and committing to “proclaim and demonstrate his kingdom of reconciliation and justice.” Start to view your worship as part of God’s mission and see how he transforms your heart and attitude in worship.

Stewardship

Stewardship is defined as “the management or care of something.” In the case of Christianity, stewardship means taking care of the world around us and giving freely of our time and money. The problem is that our time, money, and possessions are very precious to us. For those of us who work full time or multiple jobs, there is not a lot of spare time to be had. And if we give it to other people, then there is none left for us. The same goes for our money and possessions. When we are giving so much, it is sometimes hard to see where the benefit is for us or how we are being made better through it. But God promises blessings to those who give generously.

2 Corinthians 9: 6 says “Remember this: Whoever shows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will reap generously.” My husband and I love to play board games and one of our favorites is called “Settlers of Catan.” The point of the game is to collect resources which you can then trade in to build roads and settlements which then earn you more resources, etc. In order to flourish in the game you have to be willing to spend your resources. If you hold on to them, you will never advance your colony and never win the game. But if you are willing to spend, even if it means you will have no resources for a few turns, you will see the rewards later in the game.

The same is true with our giving. God asks us to give everything but it results in a great return for God's kingdom, and sometimes even for us. Mother Teresa once said “Intense love does not measure, it just gives." God’s amazing love to us in Christ is an example of this, and we can respond to his generosity by being generous. Don’t hold on to your resources. Give freely and trust that God will provide for you even as he uses you to provide for others!

Fear the Lord

Fear the Lord

I want to start by looking at Psalm 103:8-18. It says

The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust. The life of mortals is like grass, they flourish like a flower of the field; the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more. But from everlasting to everlasting the LORD’s love is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children’s children— with those who keep his covenant and remember to obey his precepts.

This verse shows the depth of the love Christ has for us. But it also shows us something about God that can be confusing if read the wrong way. That is that we are supposed to “fear” God. Fear is something I have struggled with my whole life. From spiders, to murderers, to failing tests, you name it I have been afraid of it. The Bible says “do not fear” 365 times. That’s one verse for each day of the year! So if He commands us not to fear that many times, why does he tell us to fear Him?

When God says for us to fear him, he is talking about respect and reverence. A King can be “good” but if he is not feared then no one will do what he says. Since I am a teacher, I deal with this daily. I consider myself a “good” teacher but if I do not instill a respect and reverence for my teaching in my students, they will walk all over me. In the same way, God asks us to fear him. We read in the Bible what has happened to those who went against Him, and it is never good! The Israelites had to live in the desert for 40 years and they were constantly being captured by other nations. The Old Testament has several stories of people being struck dead on the spot for disobeying God. He uses these stories to show us that he means business. He is all powerful and being under his command is not to be taken lightly.

Lucky for us our God is also benevolent, loving and compassionate as the verse above says. He knows we are going to mess up. Fearing God does not mean we are perfect, it means when we mess up we know who to apologize to. One of my favorite quotes of all time is from The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. In the story when the children see Aslan the Lion for the first time, Lucy asks Mr. Beaver if Aslan is safe. Mr. Beaver replies “Safe?... Who said anything about being safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King…”

Our God is good but he is not safe and he is to be feared as the King above all Kings. May we continue to fear Him and show our respect and reverence as we go about our lives this week.

God Exists Outside our Comfort Zones

I am currently reading several works for my new semester at the Institute for Worship Studies and they are all about Multicultural worship. One of the books, entitled “Worship Together in Your Church as in Heaven,” talked several times about how God “exists outside our comfort zones.” I thought this would be a good topic to discuss as we are entering a new year.

I have a definite comfort zone. I know exactly what I can do easily and what will send me into a panic. Have you ever thought about your comfort zone when it comes to worship? I mean think about it, you most likely chose Valley Chapel because you felt comfortable here and you were comfortable with the flow of the service. This is absolutely not a bad thing! It is important to enjoy the church where you worship. The problem is sometimes we can get too comfortable where we are in our faith or church life and before we know it we have become stagnant. Not regressing, but not moving forward either. What is required here is a journey outside our comfort zone.

The book I previously mentioned says, “Many of the things we value in worship have to do with our own comfort. But a scriptural understanding of worship demands that we be uncomfortable at least some of the time.” Later on it says “If we stay in our comfort zones, our God becomes increasingly small.” There are many types of worship being used in Christian churches, that you might not be aware of, that can broaden your worship experience and further you in your faith journey. All you need to do is be willing to experience them. So as you start this new year, what can you do to get outside your comfort zone and experience God in a new way? It might be volunteering to read scripture during the service. It might be having a prayer meeting or worship service at your home (maybe with Christians of a different culture). Whatever it is, pray that when God gives you the opportunity to get outside your comfort zone that you would be willing to take that leap of faith and respond.

The Word is Alive

The Word is Alive

Hebrews 4: 12 says “For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” This is something I have heard for most of my life. “The word is alive.” God is continually moving and speaking through His word, even though it was written so long ago. The question is: How can we continue to view the word as “alive” when it is something that has become so commonplace in our lives?

Since I was born I have probably either heard or read the story of Noah’s ark a total of 1,000 times and that is true for most of the accounts in the Bible. Because of this, when I read the Word I can sometimes feel unenthused when I am reading it because I’ve read it so many times. This is not what God intended when He gave us his word. The Bible should bring new revelation and meaning to our lives with every reading. In this post today I will be discussing some ways to revitalize your Bible reading and make the Word come alive again. If your Bible time is lack-luster, here are some things you can do.

1. Find out the History
For me the Old Testament can sometimes be hard to read, especially those dense books like Numbers and Deuteronomy. What was helpful for me was reading about what was going on historically at the time these books were written. This can shed light at to why God is commanding the Israelites to do the things He asks them to do. By studying daily life in Israel, we can draw connections to scripture and gain a deeper understanding of what God is saying in the Word.

2. Word Study 
A meaningful thing to do while you are reading is to identify particular words and ask “why did the author choose this word instead of another word.” For instance, in Genesis 1, the Bible refers to everything God did as “good.” Why not “fantastic” or “spectacular?” A great way to study this is to look at the original Hebrew translated word for word. http://www.scripture4all.org/OnlineInterlinear/Hebrew_Index.htm is a great website for this. It shows the Hebrew translated word for word next to today’s Bible. Also, looking at a concordance can be helpful. There is more meaning than you know in the Bible that is waiting to be discovered.

3. Praying the Psalms 
Most of the Psalms are actual prayers and in ancient times they were often chanted aloud. Praying through the Psalms is a very meaningful experience that can bring depth to you Bible reading. One way to do this is by switching up the pronouns. For instance, Psalm 105: 1-4 says

Give praise to the Lord, proclaim his name;
    make known among the nations what he has done.
Sing to him, sing praise to him;
    tell of all his wonderful acts.
 Glory in his holy name;
    let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice.
 Look to the Lord and his strength;
 seek his face always.

To pray this, add “I” before each line and change pronouns referring to God into “you”.

I will give praise to you LORD, I will proclaim your name
I will make known among the nations what you have done.
    let my heart seek you and rejoice.
I will sing to you, sing praise to you;
    tell of all your wonderful acts.
 Glory in your holy name;
I look to you and your strength;
I will seek your face always.

This is just one example of how to pray a Psalm but it is very effective and turns the Psalms from a prayer written by David into a cry of our own hearts. It makes it more personal.

4. Get Creative 
For all you artists out there, use your creativity to enhance your Bible experience. Compose songs when you are reading the Psalms or simply sing whatever tune comes to mind. Read dramatically aloud the passage as you feel the writer would have said it. Paint or draw a picture based on a passage of scripture. I have seen several posts lately of people turning their actual Bibles into works of art by drawing in the margins. This blog shows great examples of this: http://www.rebekahrjones.com/bible-art-journaling-challenge/ . Get creative and a guarantee your Bible will become more and more precious to you as you go.

I hope some of these suggestions are helpful and will revive a love for the Bible in you. The Word is Alive and God can make it alive again for you if you let Him!