The Power Of Song

Have you ever thought about the amazing gift that God has given us in song?  I think because we are bombarded with music everyday, of every shape and style, we really forget what God intended when He gave us this gift. 

I read a quote from Lloyd Jones’ book “Spirtual Depression” that said “Much of our unhappiness comes from the fact that we are listening to ourselves rather than speaking to ourselves.”  That’s true isn’t it…in fear we are listening to ourselves saying “I’m not in control”.  In anger we are listening to ourselves saying “I deserve revenge”.  Many times we follow our emotions which all too often is saying something completely contrary to what Christ would have for us.

Singing is a way of silencing our thoughts, our motives, our wants, and our feelings and speaking to ourselves.  And even more, when the songs contain truths about God, we are speaking God’s truths to our lives…truths that reveal His character, His will, His desires.  And the amazing thing, the more we speak to ourselves, the content of which we are speaking begins to embed itself into our very core, and then our thoughts become like His…our motives become like His…our feelings become like His. 

I can remember many times in my life when I was scared, worried, or distressed and began to sing songs about God’s love and faithfulness.  It never ceases to amaze me that in the midst of those times, a song can make those feelings disappear.  There is an instant relief when I begin singing of Christ’s saving grace.  When I stop listening to myself, and start speaking the truth of God into my life through song, all the worries fade as I am reminded of the truths of God.  What an awesome gift God has given the church and His people…no wonder He commands us to sing!

Worship…What’s Going On? PART II

What’s going on when we are engaged in full-out God-centered worship?  Last blog we talked about worship becoming more and more enjoyable as we delight more and more in God.  He gives us joy and makes us keep coming back for more and more.  So, we’re going to pick up there.

1) We Delight In God

2) God Delights In Us

Have you ever wondered, “What’s the point of it all?”  “Why would God create us in the first place?”  What is so special about us that God would first create us, and then sacrifice His Son to buy us back?  Yeah, I’ve wondered the same thing…how could I be valuable to God…the same God who creates atoms and holds them together; the same God who takes these atoms and binds them together to form molecules; the same God who forms water, gases, and solids from these molecules into this place we call the universe.  What is so special about man that God would call him “the most prized of all creation”?  We get the picture sometimes that God created us so that we would glorify Him, and lift Him up, and talk about Him…which is all true.  But the mystery is that God also created us for fellowship…for His pleasure.  He takes joy in you…let that sink in for a minute.  Genesis 1:31 says “When God made the universe, He looked with delight and saw that it was good.”  God Almighty enjoys you.  That is quite humbling.

God is never more delighted in us than in the times when we are worshipping…the times we are giving all we have to follow hard after His will…the times we lift up His name.  Isaiah 62:3-5 “You shall be a crown of beauty on His hand…you shall be called My delight…for the Lord delights in you…as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.”  That’s amazing isn’t it?  The part that got me is that God rejoices over me as a groom would rejoice over his bride.  I remember my wedding day…I felt a lot things…excited, anxious, nervous…if you’re married, you know.  Besides Christ’s work in my salvation, my wedding day was the only other day that I felt a completeness begin in life.  That day I realized this woman, my wife, would complete me.  Its interesting God would use this analogy…we know that God has all He needs in Himself.  He is the All in All, Beginning and the End…but somehow, a worshipping child of His brings Him a fulfillment that He compares it to a groom and his bride.  I believe that we as a God’s children do not fully realize the joy we bring to Him.  We tend to be so caught up in our brittleness and dependency upon the Father, that we overlook who we are in Christ.  God has invested so much in us…He invested is work by creating us, His Son by saving us, and His Spirit by keeping us.  And when His investment worships and glorifies Him, He calls us a crown of beauty on His head.  He takes joy in a worshipping child.

There’s another scripture I wanted to throw at you…Zephaniah 3:17.  Listen to this…”The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; He will rejoice over you with gladness; He will renew you in His love; He will rejoice over you with singing.”  This is probably one of the only scriptures in the bible that I know of that describes God as a singer.  Yeah…that’s pretty cool isn’t it?!?!  God sings…and what’s more, He sings over us!!  He rejoices over us with singing.  When we gather together and begin singing at the top of our lungs songs of praise in corporate worship, its easy to get an image of God, sitting on His throne in Heaven with arms crossed and reverent look on His face.  But I think if we could peak into Heaven for just a few minutes during our worship, we would find a completely different scene.

For those of you who don’t know I have recently become a dad.  My little girl is 3.5 months old now, and is starting to smile and coo and caa…everything that little baby girls do.  As I stand there at her bed, and she looks up to me and starts smiling and singing and laughing, I do not stand there with crossed arms.  I find myself joining right in with her…sometimes I think I must look like a goof-ball singing her baby songs, dancing, and making funny faces.  But I can’t help but think this is the way God is with us.  As we sing, and praise, and worship, I imagine that God is right there, just like me, singing with me and clapping hands and rejoicing along with us.  Its right there in Zephaniah 3:17!!  God rejoices in us.

I don’t know about you, but I want to be a pleasure to God.  I want Him to find joy in me.  I want my songs to be the kind that finds his affections.  And I want my song to be joined with other believer’s songs, because God delights in that kind of worship. 

But that’s not all…see you next time.

Worship…What’s Going On PART I

Its good to be back this month. I’ve been excited about starting a new blog series/study. Last month we looked at The Basics Of God-Centered Worship…which was really cool. Man, if we could only grasp the true blessing we have in worshipping Christ. In this series we are going to take a look at the results of genuine, God-centered worship. As many of you know, I am a worship pastor, and find great importance with corporate expressions of worship…be it music, prayer, communion, teaching, admonishing…whatever. Corporate worship is an important part of the Christians life…so important that Paul instructs us in Hebrews to “not forsake the assembling of the saints…”. But why…what’s going on in corporate worship. What’s the point…is it merely something designed to evoke emotions and feelings that hopes to stir dedication to the Lord? When a person is truly worshipping Christ with all he or she has, what are the results? What’s happening when we are singing, unrefrained to our Lord Jesus Christ? What’s happening when we are speaking words of encouragement to each other? Well, this is what I want to focus on in this study. The Word of God has some very pointed reasons for corporate worship, and over the next few blog series we are going to study “what’s going on” with it. So, here we go…

1) We Delight In God!!
Yeah, I think one of the most obvious results of true worship is delight. Most of us have been there at some point or another in our Christian lives…”Man, I really don’t want to go to church today. I got in late last night. Its raining. The youth are gone on a mission trip, so about half the church is going to be gone anyways. Besides…I heard there going to be doing a lot of hymns today in the service.” What do you think about these echoes of our soul? Does this sound like real devotion, real worship. The fact is, this is us…this is our flesh nature. The natural magnet of our flesh longs to pull us away from God, to find delight in the world…delight in us…it’s easy isn’t it? But something changes when real worship is happens in our lives. The more we push through and seek the more we begin to delight in the Lord. Our soul’s echo start’s becoming “Man, I can’t wait to get to church today…I can’t wait to serve!!”

David and some of the other writers in the Psalms realized this and tried their best to convey what was in their hearts. These guys were sold out to God…they gave all they had to worship at some point in their lives…and here’s what happened: “The one thing I will seek is that I may dwell in the house of the Lord, all my life (Psalm 27:4)”; “In Your presence there is fullness of joy (Psalm 16:11)”; “How lovely is Your dwelling place (Psalm 73:25)”; “Blessed are those who dwell in Your house, They will still be praising You (Psalm 84:4)”. If we take a surface level look at these soul echoes, we find DELIGHT. These worshippers began finding themselves in an addiction with God. As they worshipped, they began to delight in the Lord so much that it was all they could think about. They wanted nothing more than to be in the presence of the Lord.

The early church new this kind of joy in worship. Acts 2:46 says “day by day…they took of food with gladness, praising God and having favor with all people”. The early church did not have bands, and lights, and programs, and buildings. In fact, for a lot of them to worship God meant they would be hunted down and stoned to death. Where was the delight in this? It was given to them by the Spirit of God. They worshipped, and God began to give them the thirst for more, and more, and more. Jesus’ disciples understood the same thing in Luke 24:52-53. “the disciples returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple, blessing God.” They couldn’t get enough. They loved worshipping and blessing God. They found joy in it.

So, test one…ask yourself “Am I delighting in the Lord?” Let me stress, we are not asking “Am I delighting in my WORSHIP to the Lord?”…But am I delighting IN the Lord. As a minister I have become all too familiar with the difference between these two motivations. Sometimes, there’s excitement in worship…there is a cool band, the lights are great, and they do songs that speak to me…songs that I’ve grown up with, or songs that are new. You’ve heard it before…maybe even said it before…”I’m comfortable at this church.” I want to say to you, you may be delighting at the present moment, but this kind of delight is fleeting. It is temporary. Soon the newness will wear off…hardships will come and you will not find as much delight as you did before. Maybe you minister on the worship team, and love it to begin with…but the more you work it, the more you grind, the more you find it’s not as exciting as the first month or two you got involved. There’s a good chance you are delighting in the service, in the act of worship itself. I want real joy, real delight in God…the kind of delight that remains on the rainy days, or the late nights. I want the kind of delight that the guys in the Psalms had…the kind that the early church experienced…the kind that the disciples knew. And when I’m really worshipping…when I strip everything back in my life and just worship, that’s when the Lord will give me that delight. That’s when I become addicted to Christ. One way I’ll know that God is pleased with my worship, is that I will find myself delighting in Him.

This is only the beginning.  Next time will take a look at some other results that come from real worship…

The Basic of “God-Centered” Worship – PART III

Man, it has been a busy week…but a good one!!  I am glad to be back to the blog, and looking forward to finishing up this series on “God Centered” worship, because it is going to lead us into some very cool discussions.  If you will remember from the last post (PART II), we created a definition for worship as it is supposed to be:

“God Centered” worship is….
Our response,
Both personal and corporate,
To God –
For who He is!
And what He has done!
Expressed in and by the things we say
And the way we live.

This week we are going to look at the few phrases we didn’t cover in the last edition….so here we go.  Worship is our response….EXPRESSED IN AND BY THE THINGS WE SAY AND THE WAY WE LIVE.  Which of these things would you prefer?  A husband who tells you he loves you all the time, or one who is faithful to only you, and consistently does things that shows he cares?  What about a friend who keeps reminding you all the time that you’re his best friend, or a friend whose always there for you in good times or bad?  If you’re anything like me you would probably answer “I want both.”  So does God!!  He wants the words, but He also wants the life. 

Take a look at Romans 12:1.  “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.”  Did you see it there…”reasonable service”?  Its interesting that this term can be traced back to “act of worship”, which means to God WORSHIP=SERVICE.  In many people’s minds, it is simply enough to say (or sing) of the greatness of God.  It is enough to say “God is great, I love Him!!”  But just like us, God wants the words backed up by the actions.  We as Christians have no other response worthy of the sacrifice of Christ than giving EVERYTHING we have to Him.  That means the things we say; the way we handle ourselves in difficult situations and in the face of persecution; the way we reach out and serve those in need; the way that we strive to live out the truth of God’s Word in our lives.  Paul was saying, you have to become the living sacrifice.  Have you ever heard the statement “worship is a lifestyle”?  That is absolutely true…the true “God-Centered” worshipper expresses their worship through both words and deeds and I pray that we as a generation can learn to delight in the glory of the Lord, and express our delight in the things we say and the way we live.

So here we are…we’ve covered the entire definition except for this one phrase…worship is our response BOTH PERSONAL AND CORPORATE.  There are two avenues in which our worship, our response is to be carried out.  The first is in our personal life.  Developing our personal worship life is one of the most important things we could ever do because it is the way by which we tune our heart, soul, mind, and strength to love God and God only.  It has really been amazing to me that the God of the universe, Creator and Sustainer, The Great I Am desires to know my personally…one on one.  It is humbling that He desires to show me things in the circumstances I face and decisions I make.  Quiet time worship with the Lord, or worship when no one else can see as absolutely one of the greatest things I can do with my life.  Jesus said in Matthew 6:6 “when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen.”  Jesus understood the importance of a personal worship time between us and our Maker.  It is a time for personal growth and journey.  It is a time for seeking God’s will.  It is a time to fully express our worries, ambitions, and thanks to God.  Some of my greatest worship experiences have been times when I have sat behind closed doors and sang my heart to God, or have grabbed a pen and paper and begun journaling my prayers to God.  The Word says it best in Psalms 91:1-2: “He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress; My God, in Him I will trust.”  If you want to abide under the shadow of the Almighty, or focus your worship on the Almighty then it begins in the secret place…in the place of personal worship.

In addition to personal worship, we are also commanded to worship corporately.  We are commanded to share our hurts, pray for each other, edify the body, and many other corporate expressions of worship.  Since corporate worship is my ministry I am going to save this topic for a later, more in depth blog.  We will dive into exactly what constitutes corporate worship from the Bible. 

William Temple defined worship this way, “To worship is to quicken the conscience by the holiness of God, to feed the mind with the truth of God, to purge the imagination by the beauty of God, to open the heart to the love of God, and to devote the will to the purpose of God.”  In closing this blog series, I pray that first of all, we as worshippers understand the fullness of the God of our worship.  And secondly, we understand how to effectively position the mirrors of our soul to reflect His glory by properly responding to all the God is through Christ’s work in our lives.  Understanding the engine of worship is the first step in fulfilling the purpose with which we were created.

The Basics of “God-Centered” Worship – PART II

In the last post, we talked about the purpose and desire that we all have for worship.  We were created to glorify God.  Remember??…We all have mirrored souls designed to reflect the glory of something or someone, right?  So what does “GOD-Centered” worship look like?  If worship is going on around every corner in this old world, what does true, refreshing God-centered worship look like.  Let’s dive in…

In part one, we defined worship as “Our response to the thing we value most.”  And while this definition is true for every human in the world, “God-centered” worship requires a little more.  So what’s the difference between someone worshipping whatever, and someone worship the one true God?  In this post we are only going to look at a few lines.  Here we go…

“God Centered” worship is….
Our response,
Both personal and corporate,
To God –
For who He is!
And what He has done!
Expressed in and by the things we say
And the way we live.

Take a minute to soak that in….think about it.  The first statement says WORSHIP IS…  One thing that I have come to understand in my life is that Worship is a verb.  It is an action.  It is something that I do.  To truly worship God requires an action on my part…sometimes physically, sometimes mentally, and sometimes emotionally…but it always requires an action.  If you want to know what “God-Centered” worship looks like, just take a minute and flip through the book of Psalms:

Shout to God. Sing a new song.  Dance before Him.  Clap your hands.  Bow down.  Lift up your head.  Tell of His might.  Stand in awe.  Meditate on His truth.  Walk in His ways.  Still your heart.  Cast down your idols.  Run to Him.  Make a loud noise.  Lift your hands.  Clash the cymbals.  Praise Him with trumpet.  Seek His face.  Tell the nations.

You’ll notice that for the writers of the Psalms, simply saying “I Love You, God” was not enough.  There was always an internal and/or external expression of their infatuation with God.  Sometime later, Jesus told a Saducee scribe, in Mark 12:30, that the greatest commandment was “To love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength”.  He was saying in every emotion, every thought, and every movement we make we are to love and worship the Lord.  And in the words of 1 John 3:18, “Let us not love with words or tongue, but with actions and truth.”  Worship is a verb.

OK, next phrase: worship is OUR RESPONSE TO GOD (skipping the third line for right now).  It is important for us as Christians to realize that we do not initiate worship.  Our worship is very simply a response to God’s revelation in our lives.  Everything begins and ends with God.  If you read through the scriptures you will see countless acts of worship that started through a healing, miracle, or revelation of the Father, Son, or Holy Spirit.  Many churches sometimes feel that they have to create an atmosphere, or set the stage for worship to take place.  I think sometimes we put so much emphasis on creating an atmosphere that we forget that the only way real worship will happen is if the congregation catches a glimpse of God revealing Himself.  There are a very cool couple of chapters that I have grabbed onto in my life.  If you have some time, read Exodus 33:12-23 & 34:1-18.  This is the story of Moses, a man who was so determined to see God that he didn’t care what would happen to him.  He went up on a mount and said “Please, show me Your glory” (33:18).  In the following verses, God said, “OK Moses, (I’m paraphrasing here, of course) but no man has ever looked on my face and lived…but I’ll tell you what I’ll do.  I’m going to put you in this rock cleft and block your view to my face, then I’ll pass by and remove my hand and you will be able to see My back.”  And the Lord did it, and in response to this great sight 34:8 said “So Moses made haste and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped.”  This worship was initiated by God revealing Himself.  God gave Moses a reason to worship Him when He showed Moses His glory.  This should be the same with us…”God-Centered” worship cannot happen any other way.

Take a look at the next couple of lines: …our response FOR WHO HE IS.  If you were looking for the reason to center your worship on God, here it is.  We are to worship Him for who He is.  If someone were to ask you, “who is God, that I should worship Him,” what would you say?  Would your answer warrant a life of devotion and awe?  To be worshipped in this world, it is usually not enough to just be yourself.  People tend to worship great accomplishments, or great fame, or great fortune.  So what makes God different…why should we worship simply because of who He is?  I have found that the answer lies in the very character of God.  He is sovereign, He is powerful, He is holy, good, gracious, loving, compassionate, merciful, wise, faithful…. And the list goes on.  Simply put, God and His character is the only one who can bring life.  He is the only one worthy to be worshipped because He is the only one who can pour out grace because of who He is.  To worship anything else, would mean that I am worshipping something that in itself is death.  Only God is worthy to be worshipped for WHO HE IS.

The next line….for who he is AND WHAT HE’S DONE.  Something that really spurs on my worship in times when I might not feel like worshipping is memories of past grace in my life.  The remembrance of how God has worked in my life, or how He has blessed me in some way, or how He showed Himself real and mighty in my life somehow.  It is so encouraging to know that God does not sit idly by and simply expect us to worship Him JUST because of who He is (although that would be enough), but He chooses to give us glimpses of Him being God in our lives.  He chooses to reveal Himself.  He wants to be known and sought after, so He makes Himself known.  In your worship, look back and search for God in circumstances and situations in your life.  It will prove the faithfulness, holiness, and goodness of God in your life and will spur on your worship.

So, in this post we have only touched on about half of this definition of “God-Centered” worship.  In Part III, we will finish discussing this definition and see how it applies to our lives.  I pray that everyday we get up, go to work/school, go to church, or do whatever it is we do that we would constantly seek God’s glory and respond to Him in true “God-Centered” worship.  Until next time…

Laminin

This is a clip of Louie Giglio at a Passion conference.  It is cool to know that God put His fingerprints even in the smallest details of our being.

The Basics of “God-Centered” Worship – PART I

I think its good sometimes to “pop the hood” and get into something and see what makes it run…what makes it tick.  I love taking stuff apart and seeing what makes it work…so that’s what I wanted to do with this thing we call “worship”.  What does the Bible say about it?  What are the results of true worship?  What’s the eternal value of worship?  This post will be the first of many that will take an in depth look at “corporate” worship.  So get ready, here we go…

Why Do We Crave Something to Worship?

Before we get into that question, let’s ask what is worship?  Very simply put, worship is our response to what we desire the most.  And guess what, it is something the EVERYBODY knows how to do.  Everybody that is born, no matter the nationality, race, or religion knows how to worship…we just have a hard time knowing what to worship.  For example, you don’t have to teach somebody to love and worship money, or rock stars, or sports stars.  We see intense acts of corporate worship at football games, or rock concerts…people raising hands, crying, shouting, clapping and there’s no worship leader standing on the 50 yard line signaling to the crowd to stand up, clap, shout, boo, or dress up in nothing but shorts, body paint, and a funny looking wig.  There is no shortage of worship; its everywhere.  Where does this craving come from…why do we as humans long for something to worship?  The answer begins and ends with God.

Take a look at Colossian 1:16, “All things were created through Him and for Him.”  And there’s your answer.  From the very beginning, God created humans with an innate desire to worship Him…and its still going on today.  Everyone is faced with this longing, though they may not know what the longing is for.  You’ve probably heard it called a “God-Shaped Hole”.  Its there, deep inside each one of us…and though we try to fill it with everything imaginable, at the end of the day only God can fill it.  David realized this desire, when he said “God, You are my God; Early I will seek You.  My soul thirsts for You in a dry and weary land where there is no water” (Psalm 63:1).  He realized that He was created by God, and for God and the only things that could quench his thirst was God.

I think if you break it down, the human soul houses mirrors designed to reflect the glory of somebody or something.  Everybody has that one thing that they love to reflect.  Whether it’s the newest movie, CD, restaurant, sports team, or themselves even…everybody loves to tell others what they find the most valuable.  We are designed to reflect the glory of someone or something, and sadly a lot of us reflect the wrong thing.  Romans 11:36 tells us “For Him, through Him, and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever.”  Similarly, 1 Corinthians 8:6 and Colossians 1:16 support this verse that says basically, everything that was created, was created with the purpose to reflect God’s glory.  Sadly we as humans misdirect the mirrors of our souls to reflect the glory of things that, in themselves, is death.  If we reflect the power of our money, that is death.  If we reflect all of our great deeds, that is death.  If we live every part of our life to reflect even something good, like church or religion or works, even that is death.  The only thing we can reflect that brings life to us and everyone who sees is God Almighty.  God-centered worship is the act of taking this craving, and positioning the mirrors of our soul to reflect God’s greatness, power, and love.

So, in this first part of the “Basics of Worship” we end here.  Whose glory are you reflecting?  What do you talk about the most?  Where do you love spending your free time?  What do you find yourself thinking about in the free moments of the week?  The answer to these questions can be a good indication of the direction your soul mirrors are pointing.  And if the answer is not God, we have adjustments that need to be made.  And for ALL of us, this is an adjustment that needs to be made constantly, because this world has so many things that lure us away. This is the basis of true God-Centered Worship.  I pray that daily you would join me in adjusting the mirror of my soul.

This post would be what I consider the basis of true God-Centered worship.  Everything that will follow in this series cannot and will not work unless our worship is reflecting God.  In the following blogs of this series we will get into the how’s and why’s and look at some Scripture.  We’ll also take a look at what it is we do corporately, and how that fits in with this idea of reflecting God’s glory.  Stay tuned…the Lord has some cool stuff to show us.