So I have been thinking lately about worship and why we do it, then the question came to my mind, why is it so awkward to worship God?
One of the first hings I thought of was... we tend to worship the Lord using words I wouldn't use on a daily basis like mercy, king, goodness, provider, rock. I wouldn't use these because well honestly some of them are words from a different time like king for example but when I really thought about the word king it makes total sense to say it while praising God.
Websters dictionary online has the definition of King - a : a male monarch of a major territorial unit; especially : one whose position is hereditary and who rules for life b : a paramount chief
The territorial unit in this definition would be my heart, the Lord is the king of my heart and life.
So then I started thinking about why is it weird for me to be around people and shout to the Lord who is worthy of all my praise something good about him. First of all I would be doing two things that are very against our culture, 1. being to use kind words exalting someone, 2. being to actually be loud in a public place.
Our culture is so against using kind words
When I watch t.v. I see a lot of violence and sex and foul language
Honestly the word good can be some what of an insult these days, often times people will tell a christian they are such a good person or live such a good life, not to be honoring of them but to say they are a goody two shoes who doesnt know a thing about the world and is naive.
Why on earth would I want to praise someone when the world I live in is so anti good and anti praise.
Secondly why on earth would I want to be loud and expose myself around a bunch of people shouting to the Lord who we dont physically see right now.
I'll tell you, first of all its biblical - Psalm 100 says "Shout to the Lord all the earth!" This is David saying God is real and worth loving and the whole earth is going to recognize this and proclaim His name! Secondly, why on earth wouldnt I want to shout praises to the one who saved my life and delivered my from death and comforts me and protects me and has taken my place on the cross and brings me joy and provides for me and loves me more than any earthly woman can and who is my friend and counselor and who trusts me and forgives me and satisfies me.
I am tired of being around people who love the Lord with all their heart but because they have been raised in a world that tells you go for everything but Jesus and satisfy the lust of your flesh with money and things and women and power they stand in a place of worship and are spiritually lame. Jesus is the most freakin exciting thing to ever walk this earth and so when I am spending time telling him how much I love him it is impossible for me to be quiet and stand there in this place of reverence the church has created and to be ashamed to be loud because of what the world has taught us.
In so many churches it is "disrespectful" to praise God in a loud and open way, and you should always bow your head like your in trouble. I bow my head because honestly I'm not worthy to look into the face of God not because I'm in trouble and I should hold my head in shame but Jesus has come down in the form of man and created a surge of worship in our hearts to dance even more wildly than David did and look to the heavens and proclaim in authority that Jesus is King!
There is a wonderful time and place to kneel before the Lord and to bow our hands and stand in silence and receive from God but if that is all we do we are missing so much! Worship is exciting because the one we are worshiping is exciting!
I want people to find out and experience a God who is so fun! thats right I said fun!
I was praying during worship a few weeks ago out loud and I just said loudly that "God you are so fun!" and people laughed, not because they were being mean and mocking me but because it was such a strange thing to say in church. I mean who yells out God you are so fun! Well I do because He is, the Lord is who gives me all my joy and is who created this world and who has designed things that are so good.
So I was just stating truth so I said it out loud a few times because we get so caught up in this reverence thing and honor deal of what our words need to be and sound like and we lose everything about why on earth we are worshiping in the first place.
I couldnt care less if your prayer doesnt sound pretty or the words you are saying to God dont sound like the normal church words, we worship from the depths of our hearts and so if you yell out truth about God then yell out the truth that is real and relevant to you!
I'm not saying that yelling all the time is what you should do, I'm merely saying there is so much joy in doing something that is not what the world wants or what Satan wants, proclaiming amongst a bunch of believers what you believe to be true about our God.
Theres one last thing that came to my mind
When we do this we break strong holds of the enemy in our friends lives, our praise to God can be such an encouragement to the people around us. It can spur someone into something they have never experienced, all because we were faithful to Love our God in a different way.
Lets be a people who are not ashamed of what we look like or sound like and just love the Lord with all our hearts. I am terrible at this but I'm learning and trying to be faithful to the Lord and I've seen such a difference in my joy when I worship when I just dont worry about anything around me but the Lord, who my praise is for.
"First of all I would be doing two things that are very against our culture, 1. being to use kind words exalting someone, 2. being to actually be loud in a public place."
ReplyDeleteI love this part. so true.
I've recently got to know an amazing group of believers who meet weekly at a house church. Their meetings look different every week, but they usually go like this: encouragement/prophecy/prayer time, worship, and then hanging out.
ReplyDeleteThere are several ways they worship on any given night. Pretty consistently, there is a room that has instruments where someone leads music worship (a different person every week!).
But, you'll also usually see a bunch of people dancing and running around this tiny house and laughing A LOT. That is worship. These 18 to 20-something year olds look like little kids delighting in their Father's love. It's play time for them. It's amazing.
I personally haven't experienced worship like that, and it was (and still) is weird to me. I say weird because it's not something that I'm used to. I do not think it's bad. In fact I think it is wonderful.
You bring up a good topic that needs to be talked about more. I hope we see a shift in our church culture!