Blog: A Reflection on Worship
There is an interesting story in II Samuel 6. David had established his capital in Jerusalem and David’s enemies were being defeated. In a period of peace David called for the Ark of the Covenant to be brought into Jerusalem. The Ark had been left out in the countryside with minimal attention. David knew this Ark was a visible sign of God’s presence among the Israelites. He called for it to be brought to his new capital.
You can see the details in II Samuel 5 and 6. David brings out thousands of people to escort the Ark to the city. As the Levites carried the Ark, we are told that every six steps a sacrifice was made, trumpets sounded, food was handed out, and David danced. Yup, the King put aside his royal persona and he danced. He jumped and clapped and shouted and praised God with every ounce of his being. All the people watched this extraordinary moment and it was NEVER forgotten.
What I find most striking is that David was free. Free of being judged, free of fear of his enemies, free to let his faith ooze out of his skin pores. Jesus said, “…you will know the truth and the truth will set you free…” Jesus has called us, given us freedom, and I see that freedom in King David. Freedom always casts out fear. David had absolutely no concern of what other people thought; he honored God with his whole being.
I wish for this same freedom. I wish to do the dancing and jumping and shouting and clapping. I wish for the freedom to celebrate that God in Christ redeemed me and Called me by name and I am His – no questions asked. No conditions. I belong to the King Maker. David wrote 73 of the Psalms. A number of them are like Psalm 100,
“Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.
Worship the Lord with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs…”
or, Psalm 146:1-2,
Praise the Lord
Praise the Lord, O my soul.
I will praise the Lord all my life;
I will sing praise to my God as long as I live.
As David wrote and lived out his faith, it was done with passion and energy. His life became a testimony of worship and that worship was lived out in the rituals of prayer and formal celebration at the Tabernacle.
Just as David created an experience with the arrival of the Ark, I want worship to be an experience for Living Water. Think about our service. We do have opening songs. We do approach God in confession and receive his absolution. We do hear a teaching from the Scriptures and we receive Jesus’ body and blood in communion. All of this is to be an experience. Even with these great pieces of worship there is a danger of our worship being caught into dead ritualism where we speak liturgical words but, as they are spoken, the congregation isn’t engaged. In fact, for some of them it has become “blah, blah, blah.” As much as these liturgical words are biblically solid, the mundaneness of their use has taken all energy and passion away. Now, it becomes a negative experience.
In my 27 years of teaching the Word, I never wanted to hear is that I was boring. Boring was the nail in the coffin. Boring meant no matter what I said the classroom wasn’t hearing it. Okay, students can always say they are bored but the reality is that I know when I’m boring. When I yawn through a lecture, it has to be death to a student. And a student is obligated to come to class.
What about Sunday morning? I sat through many years of worship services that were incredibly boring. All the right pieces to make worship an experience were there but boring. It was beyond me why people even attended. Why get out of bed in the morning? Why drive through the cold, the rain, or the snow to sit through an hour of pain to flip pages, sing hymns with difficult music, and hear a sermon that never related to the life of the listener. Why get up? And I was a passionate believer in Christ Jesus, a sacramental Lutheran who was drawn to creative and energizing worship but spending Sunday mornings in pain.
When Living Water birthed in October 2004, I pledged to God and the congregation that I would do everything within my being as a pastor to create a worship environment that would hold the attention of the listener. I would do everything to avoid being boring or mundane, and I would resist the jargon and clichés of the church. It isn’t easy. It is way too easy to slip into jargon and just go through the motions of a Sunday service when one is busy during the week. I want what David did in II Samuel 6, a heartfelt passionate experience that would lead people to see the love of God in Christ. I want them to see the relevancy of the gospel.
David’s desire to bring in the Ark with shouting and clapping and dancing was to teach the people the extraordinary goodness of God. The Ark reflected all that goodness and love. If he had just had it delivered to Jerusalem with a short dedication service when it arrived, the moment would have been lost. David intentionally crafted an experience that would validate the importance of the Ark and the Covenant promise given to them through Abraham. Each step toward Jerusalem with thousands present and gifts of food to the people that lead up to the arrival of the Ark spoke volumes to the nation.
One thing that is clear from II Samuel is that David’s heart was God’s heart. This means, prior to getting the Ark, David was in prayer. David was in worship. David was in the Word. David was in a small group. David was attentive to his own faith walk and yearned for it to mature. His life was not easy with enemies seeking to harm him. His Psalms speak to that hopelessness (Psalm 55). He did make mistakes, and he was contrite and repented when confronted. This is also our journey. And all this faithfulness expressed itself in the arrival of the Ark.
Are we taking the Ark to Jerusalem or going through the motions of another Sunday service?
It is the danger for all of us that we simply go through the motions, another song, another confession and absolution and then communion. We simply create worship into a ritual with little meaning. This is why David’s celebration of the Ark is so important. David was deliberate in creating the experience, and this is what I want to do with a Sunday morning worship service.
And as with David, it is understood that in order for worship to be a valuable experience, we (and certainly me as the pastor) must have an active prayer life, yearn to read the Word, desire to be in community. In essence, we come into worship with the heart prepared.
I think about this constantly as I prepare a service or write a sermon. Is the preparation we are doing going to engage the congregation? Are we (or simply me) just going through the motions? What I do know is that I want people to be in awe in the presence of God, and I want them to know that God loves them beyond words. And I want us all to recognize that God desires to use us and we really are part of a bigger story, a Kingdom story.
The interesting point to the story of David and the Ark is that it is NEVER forgotten. What David did was passed on to all the generations after him. It is what I wish for the Living Water experience.
- That our children are moved deeply by the experience and will be faithful to their Calling when they are adults. I want the young, both young by physical and spiritual age, to be given a deliberate well-designed service that will point them to the Cross.
- That our worship service always points to God in Christ Jesus. The entrance of the Ark demonstrated that the king was secondary and that God is primary. I wish that for us.
- And, most certainly, worship comes from the heart. Genuine, authentic, transparent, worship reflects what is in the faithful heart.
For me, every week is a wrestling match to create an “experience.” I go home after the service always asking, “Did I/we hit the mark today?” Were people encouraged/ convicted in their faith walk or was it mundane and predictable? My blessing is that I know I am not alone in asking this question. I do feel honored to partner with all of those Sunday morning leaders from band to computer to Sound Board to Altar folk to worship metaphors. So, yes, let us make a lot of noise when we worship and do some clapping and jumping and, just maybe, a little dancing. Let’s be free!