Worship inspires change
Worship inspires change
Second musing resulting from last week's Tomlin/Redman/Giglio "worship concert"...
I believe that the genuine experience of God and Christ through musical worship should always leave the worshipper changed - either orienting him to a new truth, or to repentance because of the reminder of a truth he already knows. To do this, it needs to engage the heart through emotion, and the mind through doctrine. Additionally, the worship service ought to frame the music within the context of Scripture to help the worshipper engage God on many levels.
I particularly like this quote by singer/songwriter Shaun Groves on the topic, when getting ready to lead worship:
You guys ready to worship with me tonight? Worship is not a song. Worship is my response to God with all that I am. It's all that He is: all that He has done, is doing and will do - in me, through me, around me and in spite of me - but it's not just a song. Worship is our response with all of our lives and everything that we've been given to all that God is. And so, if we come in here into this place and we raise our hands and we raise our voices but we don't stretch these hands out when we leave this place to feed the hungry and clothe the naked and fight for the poor, for the oppressed then what you and I have done is worshipped a singer or song and not a God. So let me ask you again, are you ready to worship with me tonight?
During the first half of the night last week, I was concerned that there didn't seem to be a clear purpose for the evening - whether it would be an actual concert, or a corporate worship service. There's certainly nothing wrong with Christians using musical talents for the purposes of entertainment, as I believe that exercising these gifts with excellence to point to God is their own form of personal worship. However, the church has become a significant buying force in America that is specifically marketed to (see: the tremendous success of the Passion movie and all the worship music that has been expressly created more because people will buy it than because the musician wanted to do it), and for many American Christians, I think we fall into the trap of worshipping a singer or a song. So, I was concerned that as Tomlin and Redman bounded out to screaming voices and blazing lights, that "worship" was just going to be used as a marketing tool to sell more CDs and give people happy, bouncy feelings - that they would come out and sing all of their most popular songs, without so much as a corporate prayer to frame the music within truth.
Thank God for the mini-sermon by Louie Giglio. When I heard him speak at another Passion event back in college, I didn't really learn much, but this time, I felt that he was able to preach truth about God's eternal and expansive perspective simply and clearly. He was able to bring a clear purpose and focus to the evening, and this connected beautifully with all of the music that we got to sing together afterwards. I believe there was a genuine experience of Christ in that our hearts and minds were fully engaged with the Scriptural picture of God's bigness, and lives were re-oriented to this new perspective. Reading people's responses through blogs indicates that God did indeed change people.
May we raise our hands in worship, and then be inspired to stretch them out to help impact lives of those around us, so that they too might be changed.
Second musing resulting from last week's Tomlin/Redman/Giglio "worship concert"...
I believe that the genuine experience of God and Christ through musical worship should always leave the worshipper changed - either orienting him to a new truth, or to repentance because of the reminder of a truth he already knows. To do this, it needs to engage the heart through emotion, and the mind through doctrine. Additionally, the worship service ought to frame the music within the context of Scripture to help the worshipper engage God on many levels.
I particularly like this quote by singer/songwriter Shaun Groves on the topic, when getting ready to lead worship:
You guys ready to worship with me tonight? Worship is not a song. Worship is my response to God with all that I am. It's all that He is: all that He has done, is doing and will do - in me, through me, around me and in spite of me - but it's not just a song. Worship is our response with all of our lives and everything that we've been given to all that God is. And so, if we come in here into this place and we raise our hands and we raise our voices but we don't stretch these hands out when we leave this place to feed the hungry and clothe the naked and fight for the poor, for the oppressed then what you and I have done is worshipped a singer or song and not a God. So let me ask you again, are you ready to worship with me tonight?
During the first half of the night last week, I was concerned that there didn't seem to be a clear purpose for the evening - whether it would be an actual concert, or a corporate worship service. There's certainly nothing wrong with Christians using musical talents for the purposes of entertainment, as I believe that exercising these gifts with excellence to point to God is their own form of personal worship. However, the church has become a significant buying force in America that is specifically marketed to (see: the tremendous success of the Passion movie and all the worship music that has been expressly created more because people will buy it than because the musician wanted to do it), and for many American Christians, I think we fall into the trap of worshipping a singer or a song. So, I was concerned that as Tomlin and Redman bounded out to screaming voices and blazing lights, that "worship" was just going to be used as a marketing tool to sell more CDs and give people happy, bouncy feelings - that they would come out and sing all of their most popular songs, without so much as a corporate prayer to frame the music within truth.
Thank God for the mini-sermon by Louie Giglio. When I heard him speak at another Passion event back in college, I didn't really learn much, but this time, I felt that he was able to preach truth about God's eternal and expansive perspective simply and clearly. He was able to bring a clear purpose and focus to the evening, and this connected beautifully with all of the music that we got to sing together afterwards. I believe there was a genuine experience of Christ in that our hearts and minds were fully engaged with the Scriptural picture of God's bigness, and lives were re-oriented to this new perspective. Reading people's responses through blogs indicates that God did indeed change people.
May we raise our hands in worship, and then be inspired to stretch them out to help impact lives of those around us, so that they too might be changed.
posted by Bob at
10:02 PM
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