I'm reading an excellent book by Bob Sorge called Exploring Worship. It has been over 30 years since the first time I voluntarily stood up in church and sang for God (I was about 10 years old and my cousin and I sang "I'll Fly Away") and I feel like I am just now beginning to get a glimpse of what praise and worship are designed to be.
Praise means, among other definitions, "to extol in words or in song; to magnify; to glorify." We can either praise God directly (like we do in the worship service) or indirectly, by praising Him to others. It starts with our minds set on God, who He is and what He has done, but it's not praise until it's put into action or given a voice. I grew up hearing people talk about how you can praise God in your own way and now I am learning that God Himself tells us in His word how He wants to be praised. Did you know that raising your hands in praise isn't just a personal preference? I sure didn't. God tells us in the Bible to raise our hands, just the way He tells us to sing to Him.
I'm probably not alone in thinking this, but I used to think that all praise was supposed to come out of a spontaneous wave of emotion, what some might call feeling the Spirit move. Now I'm learning that we are called to praise even when (and especially when) we don't feel like it. That's considered a sacrifice of praise. It costs something. It's easy to praise God and raise your hands in the middle of an emotional and Spirit-filled service. It's harder to do that when you're worried about how you're going to pay your bills this month. When I think about consciously raising my hands when I'm singing on the Praise Team, I admit to sometimes wondering if I'm being fake. But I have to ask myself whose purpose would it serve best for me to refrain from offering sacrificial (i.e., even when you don't feel like it) praise? The enemy, of course. So I raise my hands in honor of all God is and all He's done and all He's yet to do. If I'm raising my hands in praise even though I'm not necessarily overcome with emotion, there's still nothing fake about it. I don't know that any of us are qualified to judge each other's level of spirituality or worship anyway. That's for God to do. And it's easy to confine yourself to spontaneous worship, when the music and atmosphere are just right and you get those God-bumps up and down your spine. Bob Sorge talks about how some people are like lazy dogs - they sit in the worship service and wait for someone to come along and scratch their worship spot so they will start praising and worshipping spontaneously. Now, I don't personally know anyone like that but I'm sure they exist. I think a little discipline and self-control might be useful in this instance. Can you imagine what would happen in LifeSong Church if one morning every single person in the worship service stood up (another form of praise) and raised their hands in praise during the worship music? I think the roof might just fly off the building!
Along the lines of praising intentionally even if you don't feel like it, we still have to be honest about the condition of our hearts. It's hard to offer true praise when you've got something you need to confess to the Father and repent from. Larry tells the Praise Team and Band that we have to stay "close and clean," meaning stay close to God and keep our hearts clean. How can you offer yourself fully to God in praise when you're trying to hide something from Him? You can't. And how much easier it is to praise God when you are reminded of just how much He has forgiven you!
Monday, November 17, 2008
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Grudge Match
For some reason, I am having a terrible time with my anger today. It doesn't help to know that in this situation, I'm pretty sure I'm on the right end of the argument.
I don't believe in taking sides in the case of friends' marital problems, but I'm having trouble dealing with a particular ex-husband and I'm not sure I understand why. Let's call him T. No one can really know what goes on in a marriage except the two people involved and that's also true of the events leading up to a divorce. I also believe that there's not usually one person who is absolutely blameless in a divorce while the other person is completely at fault. For instance, in my own divorce while I was not the one who walked away and asked for a divorce, I can admit that I was not the easiest person in the world to be married to. I was not and am not perfect. Hopefully I've learned from that experience but you'd have to ask Jon. :-) Anyway, from all accounts T was leading something of a double life. This was not the first time T had been caught by his wife in the same type of behavior but in the past they had worked it out, or so she thought. Once they were separated and the evidence started coming out, the church leadership attempted to practice Biblical church discipline. First, a friend confronted him with his behavior and gave him an opportunity to turn away from it. T denied everything. Then his small group attempted to talk to him about it. No dice. Leaders of the church spoke with him and finally the church was forced to "put him out" because he refused to acknowledge the error of his ways, denying everything until the end. Even now, he has never once accepted responsibility for what he's done and I'm angry. I'm angry on behalf of his children whose home got torn apart. I'm angry because I thought we were friends and he's not who I thought he was at all. I just want him to feel some shame and show some remorse. Instead he just be-bops around like everything is just happy-happy and it drives me crazy! Oh sure, your daughter cries for you sometimes at night but you don't have to think about it because you don't live with her. Yeah, you visit and get to be the fun parent and when you go home, Mommy has to pick up the pieces, sometimes for days after the visit is over.
But why? Am I feeling all this on behalf of his family? Actually, I think some of it is misplaced anger from my own childhood and my failed first marriage. My Dad did eventually tell me one time that he was sorry for what he did to my mother, and you wouldn't believe how affected I was by that apology. My first husband has never apologized to me. Maybe it's the difference between a mother and a father, but I don't know how he could have chosen to leave his own child. OK, so I wasn't the easiest person to live with but I never cheated on him. I can't think of any man I would leave my child behind for. A great deal of my grief over my divorce was because of Dana and the realization that no one else would ever understand the impact it would have on her the way that I could. I'd like to think that she came out of the divorce unscathed but in my heart I know she didn't. No child of divorce is EVER totally unscarred by it. My parents divorced when I was 4 and although I can say with certainty that I had a better life with my mother and stepfather than I would have had if my parents had stayed married, that doesn't mean that I don't carry some wounds. Dana's pretty well adjusted and loves Jon dearly but I know that she carries wounds too. What's startling is that I'll be going on with life and having a pretty smooth ride when all of a sudden I hit a brick wall of anger and slam into it headlong. Just when I think I have it all together I get reminded that I'm not in control.
In the end, I'll have to hold my tongue and let the parties involved work it out the best way they know how. As for my own wounds, I'll have to give them over to God and trust Him to heal me in His time, and stop ripping the scabs off to see if they're healed yet.
I don't believe in taking sides in the case of friends' marital problems, but I'm having trouble dealing with a particular ex-husband and I'm not sure I understand why. Let's call him T. No one can really know what goes on in a marriage except the two people involved and that's also true of the events leading up to a divorce. I also believe that there's not usually one person who is absolutely blameless in a divorce while the other person is completely at fault. For instance, in my own divorce while I was not the one who walked away and asked for a divorce, I can admit that I was not the easiest person in the world to be married to. I was not and am not perfect. Hopefully I've learned from that experience but you'd have to ask Jon. :-) Anyway, from all accounts T was leading something of a double life. This was not the first time T had been caught by his wife in the same type of behavior but in the past they had worked it out, or so she thought. Once they were separated and the evidence started coming out, the church leadership attempted to practice Biblical church discipline. First, a friend confronted him with his behavior and gave him an opportunity to turn away from it. T denied everything. Then his small group attempted to talk to him about it. No dice. Leaders of the church spoke with him and finally the church was forced to "put him out" because he refused to acknowledge the error of his ways, denying everything until the end. Even now, he has never once accepted responsibility for what he's done and I'm angry. I'm angry on behalf of his children whose home got torn apart. I'm angry because I thought we were friends and he's not who I thought he was at all. I just want him to feel some shame and show some remorse. Instead he just be-bops around like everything is just happy-happy and it drives me crazy! Oh sure, your daughter cries for you sometimes at night but you don't have to think about it because you don't live with her. Yeah, you visit and get to be the fun parent and when you go home, Mommy has to pick up the pieces, sometimes for days after the visit is over.
But why? Am I feeling all this on behalf of his family? Actually, I think some of it is misplaced anger from my own childhood and my failed first marriage. My Dad did eventually tell me one time that he was sorry for what he did to my mother, and you wouldn't believe how affected I was by that apology. My first husband has never apologized to me. Maybe it's the difference between a mother and a father, but I don't know how he could have chosen to leave his own child. OK, so I wasn't the easiest person to live with but I never cheated on him. I can't think of any man I would leave my child behind for. A great deal of my grief over my divorce was because of Dana and the realization that no one else would ever understand the impact it would have on her the way that I could. I'd like to think that she came out of the divorce unscathed but in my heart I know she didn't. No child of divorce is EVER totally unscarred by it. My parents divorced when I was 4 and although I can say with certainty that I had a better life with my mother and stepfather than I would have had if my parents had stayed married, that doesn't mean that I don't carry some wounds. Dana's pretty well adjusted and loves Jon dearly but I know that she carries wounds too. What's startling is that I'll be going on with life and having a pretty smooth ride when all of a sudden I hit a brick wall of anger and slam into it headlong. Just when I think I have it all together I get reminded that I'm not in control.
In the end, I'll have to hold my tongue and let the parties involved work it out the best way they know how. As for my own wounds, I'll have to give them over to God and trust Him to heal me in His time, and stop ripping the scabs off to see if they're healed yet.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Change is A-Coming
I'm trying not to be bitter, really I am. I confess that John McCain didn't really strike me as the best possible candidate for President, but he was certainly better than Obama in my eyes. And while I didn't think "my" side had much of a chance of winning I still got out there and voted. So now what? My first instinct is to be afraid but God tells me very directly in His word "Do not fear." I know that Obama only won because God allowed it and I know that God has everything in His control. Now if I can only convince my heart to be still and know.
Life at my house is mass chaos right now. Our friend Tracy has temporarily moved in with us, along with her three children (ages 7, almost 2 and almost 2 - yep, twins). We've been friends for 5 years now and when things got tough out there in Vegas she finally agreed to come here, after we nagged her repeatedly for a many months. We're happy to have her and the kids close by but I'd be lying if I said it was easy to go from a family of five to a group of nine. God has been faithful and so far we've not wanted for anything. Tomorrow she has two interviews and I would be shocked if she does not get an offer for at least one of those positions. She's a smart girl with excellent experience in the insurance industry and won't go unemployed for long. One of the best parts has been seeing Karis and Harper enjoy being together. Those two have been friends since the age of two, as I wrote in an earlier post. I think Christmas this year is going to be a blast! And when the time comes for Tracy and the kids to move into their own place, it's going to seem so quiet around here. Dana is planning to move into a dorm at USC-Upstate in January and when Tracy goes we will be reduced from 9 to 4.
The only constant in life is change and change would have come no matter which candidate won the office of President. I'm not sure I can sincerely pray for Obama just yet but God's working on me to get me there. Just another change coming my way...
Life at my house is mass chaos right now. Our friend Tracy has temporarily moved in with us, along with her three children (ages 7, almost 2 and almost 2 - yep, twins). We've been friends for 5 years now and when things got tough out there in Vegas she finally agreed to come here, after we nagged her repeatedly for a many months. We're happy to have her and the kids close by but I'd be lying if I said it was easy to go from a family of five to a group of nine. God has been faithful and so far we've not wanted for anything. Tomorrow she has two interviews and I would be shocked if she does not get an offer for at least one of those positions. She's a smart girl with excellent experience in the insurance industry and won't go unemployed for long. One of the best parts has been seeing Karis and Harper enjoy being together. Those two have been friends since the age of two, as I wrote in an earlier post. I think Christmas this year is going to be a blast! And when the time comes for Tracy and the kids to move into their own place, it's going to seem so quiet around here. Dana is planning to move into a dorm at USC-Upstate in January and when Tracy goes we will be reduced from 9 to 4.
The only constant in life is change and change would have come no matter which candidate won the office of President. I'm not sure I can sincerely pray for Obama just yet but God's working on me to get me there. Just another change coming my way...
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Me and Jesus
I just love the song by Stellar Kart called "Me and Jesus", because it talks about community and friendship as I think maybe God intended it to be. "Someone loves you, even when you don't think so; don't you know you've got me and Jesus?" What a blessing to know that you have friends around who will not judge you, who will instead love you with the love of Christ! Judging is easy; loving people in spite of who they are is hard, but if it was easy we wouldn't need God's help to do it, I guess.
I don't know why I'm getting all soppy and sentimental today. I just want my friends to know that no matter what goes on in their lives, they'll always have me and Jesus. Yes, I do reserve the right to tell you when I think you're heading in the wrong direction. I will try to be open-minded when you tell ME that I'm heading the wrong way. None of us is any better than anyone else - we are all sinners. It says so right there in Romans. Likewise we are all children of God. Christ died for ALL of us, the murderer and the saint. We are all equal under the cross.
I'm really burdened today for the Mortality Room - Choices? production at LifeSong. Anytime you try to do something good for the Lord the enemy is going to try to mess it up so maybe we should consider it a good sign that he's working really hard to try to sabotage this thing. Spiritual warfare is going on all over the place and we all need to be praying against it. That sounds like theological-speak but what I take it to mean is that we need to just pray. Pray for the cast, for the church, for the people who will come to see it, for Larry (has he slept in the past week?), for the lighting and tech crew, for anyone remotely connected to the production, and pray for their protection. God isn't sitting there waiting for you to get all the words right - He just wants to hear your heart.
I don't know why I'm getting all soppy and sentimental today. I just want my friends to know that no matter what goes on in their lives, they'll always have me and Jesus. Yes, I do reserve the right to tell you when I think you're heading in the wrong direction. I will try to be open-minded when you tell ME that I'm heading the wrong way. None of us is any better than anyone else - we are all sinners. It says so right there in Romans. Likewise we are all children of God. Christ died for ALL of us, the murderer and the saint. We are all equal under the cross.
I'm really burdened today for the Mortality Room - Choices? production at LifeSong. Anytime you try to do something good for the Lord the enemy is going to try to mess it up so maybe we should consider it a good sign that he's working really hard to try to sabotage this thing. Spiritual warfare is going on all over the place and we all need to be praying against it. That sounds like theological-speak but what I take it to mean is that we need to just pray. Pray for the cast, for the church, for the people who will come to see it, for Larry (has he slept in the past week?), for the lighting and tech crew, for anyone remotely connected to the production, and pray for their protection. God isn't sitting there waiting for you to get all the words right - He just wants to hear your heart.
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