Our Worship
I've been thinking quite a bit about the worship songs that we sing, and I am beginning to feel more and more convicted. Do we really mean the words that we sing? Are they really the true expressions of our heart or merely lies that fall from our lips.
Confession time now. I am not always content with where God has me in life. There are many times in which I think I should have, or deserve, more than I do. There are times in which I have a difficult time trusting God with every area of my life. In times such as these, can I honestly and truthfully sing songs like
All of You
Is more than enough for all of me
For every thirst and every need
You satisfy me with Your love
And all I have in You is more than enough
You are my supply
My breath of life
Still more awesome than I know
You are my reward
Worth living for
Still more awesome than I know
What a great song! I love to sing it, and I think I mean it. I wonder sometimes though.
What about this one...
Holy Fire burn away,
my desire for anything
that is not of you and is of me.
I want more of you and less of me.
Another great song that I enjoy singing. Another song that brings a great deal of conviction to my heart. Perhaps that is one of the purposes of such songs, to help us re-align our hearts. Whether it is or not, it certainly serves that purpose in my life.
May we not sing lies to our God, but rather express the deep longings of our heart and honor Him with our words.
I do not want to be included in God's judgement of His people found in Isaiah.
The Lord says: "These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is made up only of rules taught by men. Isaiah 29:13
I am also haunted by the words of Brennan Manning.
The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians, who acknowledge Jesus with their lips and walk out the door, and deny Him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.
Let us acknowledge Jesus with our lips as well as our lifestyle. After all isn't that would genuine worship is anyway?
Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Romans 12:1
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5 comments:
HI Brian,
I'm a friend of Chris's and found your blog through hers...
I've been thinking about the songs we sing lately also and had a slightly different thought - would it be possible to actually fill up our "worship" time on sunday with songs that have nothing to do with us? songs that are only about God and his holiness, majesty, and glory and actually have nothing to do with how he interacts with us? it seems like we sometimes only worship god for what he does for us instead of who he is. what do you think?
I am with both of you . . . as a worship leader it is a struggle to find songs to sing that aren't self centered, or consumer oriented, and that we can actually sing with a true heart.
Amos 5:24-25 has always been convicting, "Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps. But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!."
Now that is beautiful imagery if you think about it . . . May our lives be worship first, for that is the most important, then maybe our songs will catch up with us.
Excellent comments Sarah and Jon!
Worship truly is all about God. When we sing we should direct our songs/thoughts toward God, not our selves. You are right we spend too much time singing about us.
When it's about us we should be serving, not consuming. When we are offering our lives (our time, talents, gifts, etc.) to meet the needs of people, we are worshipping. It puts feet to what we are singing.
yeah i agree with u pastor brian.i think we should sing more songs like the one that went like
"is it ok if i dont feel like kneeling" or something like that. i forgot the lyrics except i remember there was this one line that said something like that.i like those songs because they r truthful and not like the songs that r like oh i love god with all my heart and i live my life just for him.
-kelly
I don't need to say stuff that's already been said, so read Isaiah 1.
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