You’ll see Apostles, Prophets, Teachers, Evangelists, and Pastors but you won’t find hide nor hair of a worship leader. Being a full time worship leader I had a bit of an identity crises when I flipped through the pages of New Testament scripture unable to find my job description. Then I realized something: Being a worship leader was something every Christian was called to.
All overworked people know the refrain: More bricks, less straw.
And what’s interesting to note in Pharaoh’s reaction is that he assumes that a request for worship is symptomatic of laziness.
What I find interesting in all this is how the worship of God is perceived to interrupt the work and quotas demanded by Pharaoh. The tension, at least here in the beginning of Exodus, isn’t the clash between slavery and liberation but the clash between worship and work.
The great heresy of the church today is that we think we’re in the entertainment business. A.W. Tozer believed this to be true back in the 1950s and 60s. Church members “want to be entertained while they are edified.” He said that in 1962. Tozer grieved, even then, that it was “scarcely possible in most places to get anyone to attend a meeting where the only attraction was God.”
Real worship is more than singing praises; it is the act of giving away our hearts. Worship is attributing ultimate value to something; it thinks, “If I had that I’d be happy;” it is a deep belief of the heart that says, “That is all I need.”
Worship is what we most deeply value. It’s not just the times we set aside to sing praise songs. We are constantly worshipping. Moment-by-moment, we live for something. “Where our treasure is, there will our hearts and minds be also.”
Pastor Challenge 2015 — Step aside and let the living Jesus lead at least 1 Sunday morning church meeting all by Himself.
Here’s how: Begin by reading 1 Corinthians 14:26 to the congregation from a microphone on the floor in front of the platform. (“What then shall we say, brothers and sisters? When you come together, each of you has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. Everything must be done so that the church may be built up.”)
Then go sit down in the congregation and watch what God does with ordinary people during the next hour or so.
Rob Rienow explains why children should be involved in the gathering of the saints for worship. Believe it or not, this was actually the norm for millennia. It’s only in the last century or so that we had the genius idea to split families apart and do age-segregated ministry. Let’s examine the fruit of that and compare it to the fruit our ancestors saw as they worshipped together as families.
Click the button below to hear the audio of Rob’s message…
Gardening not only renews and refreshes me, it also teaches me important lessons about the God who created and cares for us. God is revealed through so many aspects of the created world.
Gardening has taught me to look for God in all my daily activities and encounters. As I watch the days and seasons follow their expected patterns, I am reminded of the faithfulness of a God who comes to us in all seasons of life. Our God, who poured out such great love in the complexity, beauty, and diversity of creation, still cares for us and will never abandon us.
There is a great misunderstanding in churches of the purpose of music in Christian worship. Music is viewed as a means to facilitate an encounter with God; it will move us closer to God. In this schema, music becomes a means of mediation between God and man. But this idea is closer to ecstatic pagan practices than to Christian worship.
It is important to understand that music in our worship is for two specific purposes: to honor God and to edify our fellow believers. Unfortunately, many Christians tend to grant music a sacramental power which Scripture never bestows upon it.
You’re not reading the ramblings of a curmudgeony guy complaining about all the new-fangled things the kids are doing these days, with their drums and tom-toms and electric geetars. You’re reading the heart-cry of a normal guy who’s worried about what worship leaders are doing to themselves and their congregations.
People are tuning out and giving up and just watching.
Note: Consider this post in conjunction with the previous post about Rich Mullins.
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The profoundly talented writer, Dorothy Sayers, offers her insights on work and vocation. In a day when many view work as drudgery and a necessary evil, Mrs. Sayers sees it as a way of life in which the nature of man should find its proper exercise and delight and so fulfill itself to the glory of God. That it should, in fact, be thought of as a creative activity undertaken for the love of the work itself; and that man, made in God’s image, should make things, as God makes them, for the sake of doing well a thing that is well worth doing.
In this 8 minute video, Daniel Darling interviews Mike Cosper about how stories shape our lives and our beliefs. There are many good insights here about how our culture tells stories and how our worship can tell a great story about God. (more…)