Worship part II: From Ignorance to Arrogance

So...This is the last of my two posts on the subject of worship (though I'm sure it will come up again at some point). Worship is a huge part of my life, as mentioned before, but there's this love-hate relationship that I keep coming back to about the narrow definition of worship that we have as 20 something middle class Americans who (let's face it) have spent most of their lives in relative comfort. I run into this problem because I don't feel like we can actually ever grasp the true meaning and purpose of worship. I feel like money solves so many problems here. Are we as grateful for God as we are for our ability to move autonomously in this economy? Should we be worshiping money? Don't we already do that?

Worship is a reflection of our need for God. If we could really understand that, I feel like worship would be constantly flowing out of us, in every form, from singing and dancing, to poetry and photography, and sacrificial love and acts of servant hood. Worship is our response to God's romance. I have several friends right now who are in love. As an outside observer, sometimes I find this annoying, because they talk about their significant others so much, as though I am as in love with this person as they are. The only response I can think of is "wow, you really like him/her a lot, don't you?" I think that is how our worship should be. That we are so in love with God that we are constantly singing and dancing, and talk about him so much, because we forget that everyone else isn't as in love with God as we are. And as God removes certain forms of bitterness from me, I've come to see my friend's (and siblings) relationships in a new light. I have grown to love people through that constant observation of my friends/brothers/sisters love for them. Love is more contagious than bitterness, envy, or even apathy. I actually think that's how evangelism is supposed to work too. Love is contagious.

So, I guess the question really is this: Is all that stuff I just said really what happens when I worship?

The answer is actually kind of complicated.

Sometimes when I am in the middle of worship, and I feel like my heart just isn't in it, I don't sing. I know how dangerous it is to base you spirituality on your emotions, so, sometimes when I feel that way, I sing even louder. I don't really think there's any real pattern to when and why I do this. I'm just confused a little, I guess. I want to be this person who is completely in love with God, and sings constantly about how good he is to me (I have a lot of things to sing about).

But sometimes I'm not.

Sometimes, in fact, worship is a chore. An activity. Something to check off my christian itinerary. I want it to be like that Jars of Clay song where they just keep singing over and over again "I want to fall in love with you." Is it worth singing when it's not about falling in love? I really honestly don't know. Maybe I'm too simplistic, or idealistic. Maybe there are times when our worship is passionate devotion, and others when it is patient dedication. I hope someday to be married. I hope to be a good husband. I plan on leaving notes on the bathroom mirror for my wife to find. I plan on going for walks with her along the beach at sunset, just for the occasion of holding her hand. I'm going to sing to her (lack of skill notwithstanding). I also know that being a good husband involves doing the dishes, taking out the garbage, driving kids to soccer games and changing poopy diapers. Which proves my love more? That I feel like doing these things for you because I love you, or that I am going to do these things for you that I don't feel like doing because I love you? I guess you need both.

Here's the thing: I've seen a lot of things when it comes to worship. I've seen elderly men and women singing the same hymns that they have sung since childhood. I've seen crackheads on the street crying out to God (with no musical accompaniment) because they know without him they'll die. I've been to trendy churches where some abercrombie guy who thinks he's Bono leads "worship for a new generation" complete with a drum and bass solo. I've seen hardcore kids, pierced and tattooed, screaming at the top of their lungs, worshiping God on their knees above a sweaty, sometimes bloody pit filled with kids who have no concept of who Jesus is. I've seen the laborers of the LA Urban Project worship as naturally and beautifully as breathing after a successful harvest. I've seen kneeling, crying, spiritual laughter, and speaking in tongues. It's not always emotional, and it's rarely pretty, but doesn't it all have its place? Even when we don't "feel it?"

I really don't know what my point is anymore.

Here's the thing, God. I know I need you. I really don't know how much, but somehow amid that fog of apathy I've surrounded myself with, and the distractions that keep me up at night, I know you, and I need you. I want to be grateful for any opportunity to speak about you and your romance. And if my emotions don't come with it, I will sing all the louder, because I know who I am, and who you are, and I don't deserve you. I doesn't matter to me anymore how I come to you, just that I come. Can you take care of the rest?

We worship God through our understanding of our own inefficiencies. It truly is ignorance to refuse to admit that fact, and arrogance to think that worship should always be accompanied by some feeling, even more fleeting than the lillies of the field, beautiful as they are.

Noise

If anyone ever gets a chance to read a children's book called Duck on a Bike, got for it. I guarantee you will not be disappointed. High quality literature.



Worship has been on my mind lately. I guess that usually means music. Worship music is something that I see as a constant in my life. Weather I like it or not. Every time Christians get together, there's always some dude in the back of the room with an acoustic guitar, strummin' his heart out for Jesus. Or trying to impress girls with his spirituality. You wanna know how you know which one it is? If he ever says that his next song "is a song that I wrote for my future wife," then you know. Every dumb Christian kid with an acoustic guitar wrote a song for his future wife. (as a side note, I don't even know why that is supposed to be romantic, considering the fact that it's based on a relationship with some fantasy woman who is likely nothing like the woman this guy's actually going to marry)

Wow.

That was a tangent.

I think that there are two main reasons I find it difficult to decide if I want to be surrounded by worship music all the time.

First of all, most worship music is such a narrowly defined genre. You can go into any book/music store and find the worship section to see what I mean. You'll find a bunch of white guys (sometimes white girls) clutching their acoustic guitars in some sort of forresty or beach type background with this misty eyed, whimsical look on their face like they just finished watching a Full House marathon and they want to hug somebody. And they always sing the same songs, with the same super-dramatic voice, and the same four guitar chords. I have a book with charts for over 900 chords in it. I should loan that book to one of those people. How did we start thinking that worship music was this and nothing else? The Bible instructs us to sing unto the Lord a new song. It says that we should make joyful noises throughout the earth. Noise is worship to God. Really? Just noise? I love that. That the very noise from our mouths is pleasant to God's ears. Especially since that probably best describes my singing style anyway. But it's not just singing. In his letter to the Romans, Paul describes the daily sacrifice, and offering up of our bodies as a spiritual form of worship. Those are our everyday actions and our posture towards God. That also is worship. Sometimes even singing worship songs isn't really worship. Jesus says that all disciples will one day worship in spirit and in truth. There's something about our posture towards God that makes what we are doing worship or not. Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy worship music. I sing it to myself all the time. I'm going to sing some tonight with my IV peeps. I even play the guitar, so what am I complaining about? This is the real problem. It's too narrow of a focus. We haven't even begun to figure out how to worship God, and we're already resorting to formulas? Why? Are we scared to go on, or did we just think we had found something so good that nothing could top it?

I'm reminded of my sister, Deborah, when she was a toddler. My mom had made her a doll for Christmas. She was insecure about it because she had never made anything like that from scratch, so she showed the doll to Deborah before it was finished, just to see if she would like it. Deborah took one look at the doll, and with a big smile on her face, grabbed it and hugged it tight with a squeal of delight. Mom was satisfied, so she tried to go back to work on the doll. She had to first wrestle it out of Deborah's hands. Deborah loved her new doll and thought it was just time for her to play with it forever. She didn't get that this wasn't the end. She wanted her doll, and my mom wanted to give her something more. I can see my mom pleading with little Deborah (we used to call her "Boo") to let her fix the doll, telling her that she would get it back, that it would be even more beautiful in time, and that my mother loved her and wanted to give her something good, if she would only trust.

I think that describes worship for me pretty much. What we now have is not everything, a part, but not the whole of the picture. A gift half completed. If we would only trust. Worship is an extent ion of our bodies, a reflection of our posture towards God. A joyful noise, and so much more.





I just realized I said there were two things about worship that make me uneasy. I'll talk about the other one later.

Jars of Clay-Hymn

This song describes my life more accurately than anything. I will worship God in the midst of uncertainty.

HYMN

Oh refuge of my hardened heart
Oh fast pursuing lover come
As angels dance 'round Your throne
My life by captured fare You own

Not silhouette of trodden faith
Nor death shall not my steps be guide
I'll pirouette upon mine grave
For in Your path I'll run and hide

Chorus:
Oh gaze of love so melt my pride
That I may in Your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto Thee

When beauty breaks the spell of pain
The bludgeoned heart shall burst in vain
But not when love be pointed king
And truth shall Thee forever reign

Oh gaze of love so melt my pride
That I may in Your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto Thee

Sweet Jesus carry me away
From cold of night, and dust of day
In ragged hour or salt worn eye
Be my desire, my well sprung lye

Oh gaze of love so melt my pride
That I may in Your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto Thee

Spring worship unto Thee
Spring worship unto Thee

Lots of different colors, but they're all the same

Sooo...I did something stupid today. Actually, I did it on Sunday, but I didn't realize I had done it until today, after a good nights sleep. I lost my wallet. That stupid, ugly thing that I've had FOREVER with the embroidered flames on the front (I thought they were cool when I was 12) is gone, and it took with me all my forms of identification, plus my debit card. Funny how the instant you realize you have no access to money, you need a lot of it. Anyway, I got paranoid (as I often do) and called my bank and cancelled my card. Good move, says I, before someone finds my card and a good place for a shopping spree (like the Internet). Moving on, the next step is to get a new driver's licence. I went to the DMV today, hoping I could prove that I am myself by the only form of identification I have left: my passport. Ironic, isn't it? Most days, I'm not even sure I WANT to be me, but today, I am fighting for the legitimacy of my existence, armed with the only weapon/document at my disposal.

I would now like to stop what I was talking about and discuss something completely different. I feel like this is fair since I gave you all an advance warning.

The world is a scary place. One word I would use to describe it is conflict. Constant conflict (if I were allowed two). It seems like every time someone bothers to venture an opinion or take a stand on an issue (and we're doing that less and less these days) there's some person, or group of people who are offended, or feel attacked, or simply refuse to see the merits of another person's opinion. Fights ensue, people get hurt, and in the end, we usually go our separate ways. Conflict is so common. Resolved conflict is so rare. I don't vote anymore. I used to vote. I used to go to protests, and shout my opinion at the top of my lungs. I don't do any of that anymore. Sometimes I think that everything beautiful and moving has already been said. So how does one move a mass of people whose hearts are so heavy with apathy, and unresolved conflict when we have nothing new or moving or beautiful to say? Nothing that could make all these people who can't agree about anything look at the world like it's a place of possibility. Like the reasons we all hate each other could be just misunderstandings. It's something I want so badly, but it just got too hard. The world was so heavy that I had to put it down. I don't think I was ever meant to lift it on my own, but I didn't see anyone else around to do the job, and now that I've set it down, I can only see it sinking, and I can't stop myself from thinking that there's nothing I can do to stop it. I think that's why I don't think about it much. Too depressing, the state of the world. There are some beautiful things going on with individual people that I'd rather focus on. But I realized something today.

Passports.

My roommate has a passport, and so do I. My roommate is from Korea. I am American. My passport is blue, with an emblem of an eagle in Gold. My roommate's passport is red, with a similar emblem (I think it's a statue or something?) also in gold. Same size, same color paper on the inside, same purpose. I remember a scene in the 1959 film Charade, where Walter Mathau Is showing Audrey Hepburn the passport of her deceased husband. "Is this your husband?," he asks. "Yes that's him," she replies. "And this?" He shows her another passport, similar looking, but from a different country. He shows her about eight different passports, all from different countries, but basically all the same general design. Gold (sometimes silver) lettering, an emblem on the front. Same size, same paper on the inside, same purpose. Maybe we're all a lot like passports. Some of us come from different places, and the marks on the inside show that we've been a lot of different places. Maybe we're decorated a bit differently on the outside, but really, when you get down to it, don't we all have the same purpose? Maybe I'm stretching this a little bit, but I find it oddly encouraging that somehow all the nations of the world came to a consensus that passports should be small books with an emblem in gold lettering on the front. Same size, same paper, same purpose. We agree about something. Maybe, just maybe, we could agree about something else, something more important someday. Hope comes in the form of little booklets with gold letters. We all have the same purpose.

Further Seems Forever - Hide Nothing

I listened to this song in High School. Never really thought about the words. Surprisingly, five years later, it's more relevant than it was then. I especially like the part about change being impersonal, like it's just something that happens, even though sometimes it makes me feel like a victim. I hope it helps someone out there as much as it has me...

HIDE NOTHING

We live and we learn
and crash and we burn
and we're gone

We take what we know
and we learn as we go
and we run

Run until that day
We can see who we are
Have the final say
We can be who we are

As love lights the way
to the last day
And no one can take it away

Run and hide
Don't hide at all
Change is coming,
no it's nothing personal

Live our lives
Not hide it all
Change is coming,
no its nothing personal

We live and we learn
and crash and we burn
and were gone

We take what we know
and we learn as we go
and we run

We live and we learn
and crash and we burn
and were gone

We reap what we sow
and we come and we go
when were young

Just What Kind of State of Mind is Doc, Anyway?

I have to work today. I spent a good amount of the morning in the hot (very hot) glass shop, making a cup, and putting a bowl into the annealing oven. I'm sleepy. I went to go get coffee to keep myself awake. On the way to MJ's, I decided instead to use the machine in the TSU because I had no desire to interact with another human being at that moment. I'm grumpy. I called my sister before I started work, just to see how she was doing. I talked to her for about 20 minutes, but realized that I had only about 5 minutes worth of things to talk toher about. I'm dopey. I keep having to excuse myself to go to the bathroom, so I can blow my nose. I'm sneezy. My emotions are personified by the seven dwarfs. My emotions are cartoon characters. Sounds good to me. I've been thinking a lot lately about the way things make me feel, or the patterns of my emotions. I've been trying to make and emotional "map". A view from the top. Something I can use to navigate with. After all the thinking and stressing I do, I've managed to make an important discovery: it's really not that complicated of a map. I succeed, and I feel good. Someone hurts my feelings, and I am angry. Someone corrects me, and I question myself. I'm told I can't have something, I want it more. I'm told I can't be something, I try harder. I get a criticism, and I feel worthless. I get a compliment, and I feel invaluable. It's a map of simple math. A+B=C. And it's temporary every time. I like that the negative feelings are temporary, but I wish the nice ones stuck around a little longer. I like liking myself. I should base how I feel on something besides what just happened to me. That seems like a good idea. That's the problem with having emotions like cartoon dwarfs. There's only seven of them (and I still have no idea what "Doc" is supposed to mean). I want a wider palette, and a more stable base. I want to feel something...different. I want to draw my own pictures and color them in. Then I want them to move for me. I want them to move me. I want to be neither grumpy, nor sleepy, nor bashful. I want to be happy.


I don't mind being dopey either.

Let Someone Else Talk For A While

"God doesn't require us to suceed; he only requires that you try"

-Mother Teresa


I guess I can't really argue with Mother Theresa...I think I'll be allright.