It seems that for a person seeking after God, the worship of God has something to do with love and service. I've read enough about both to see a kind of chicken-or-egg relationship between the two, but the sum of - or, maybe more illustratively, the relationship between - the two is where worship happens. My love for God compels me into service unto him. My desire to serve teaches me more about love, namely its tendency to consume a life from every angle.
I believe this works the same with things other than God. We worship that which we love and serve, but, of course, these two terms are corrupted to a certain extent depending on what is the object of our worship. If I am consumed by a desire for a certain person (as I recall myself being in college for a certain girl), my thoughts are blessed/plagued by said person, my actions adjust to that which will please/impress that person, and my speech is measured, to the best of my ability, to interest/attract that person. The same behavior, only slightly altered to specifics, goes for anything really. A certain job, a particular status, a large savings account, a new car, an iPhone.
That which affects are level of love (the devotion we feel) and service (the things we do) for something is what we worship. And if this is so, then not only can loving and serving become corrupted, but our target of worship can be become skewed by confusion. Thus, we can think we're worshipping God, when in reality, we're worshipping our limited, selfish construct of him. The same goes for a person. Pornography owes a lot of its popularity to this concept.
So how does one avoid corruption of love and service, and keep from confusing that which is worshipped?
I really don't have an answer for that, at least not at this point in my life. However, I have begun to understand that what we choose to worship - and how we love and serve - seems to be directly related to our environment, the trappings and cosmetics that fashion our physical, social world. For example, I worship a certain status/lifestyle because pretty much everything around me validates that lifestyle. In essence, I'm tempted to love and serve something that really doesn't deserve to be loved and served at all. I've been duped. I suppose this is partly what idolatry is all about.
What is interesting is how easily our love and service can become confused, and our worship corrupted. My assumption is that there are churches all across this country that unknowingly specialize in corrupting our worship, feeding us an edited image of God for us to worship. And, at the same time, there are people coming to participate in "worship services" with the baggage of a selfish, manipulated image of God.
I'm not advocating the deconstruction of religion or doctrine or anything of the sort. What I'm searching for is worship that has been simplified. Love and service that flows directly out of relationship, rather than the rules or common practices of a particular environment. We should be compelled to worship, not tempted. Within such a distinction is a life change that I believe God desires for us all. That which draws us into a dance with him. Religion is the dance hall, and doctrine is the music, but the dance is all our own. Anyone who has ever shared a dance with someone they truly love can tell you that other than maybe remembering the name or chorus of the tune, nothing else really mattered at the time than the person whom they were holding and sweeping and twirling across the floor.
True worship, therefore, is authentic. We must be transparent - honest in full. No one wants to dance with someone who pretends to know the moves when they really don't have a clue. I think God would much rather dance with someone who isn't afraid to admit they need him to lead.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
A Voice of One Crying from a Dead Church
For a long time now, I have been reading a lot of blogs that contrast good churches vs. bad churches, and/or address the symptoms and evidence of what constitutes a dead or dying church. There is so much written in cyberspace about this subject it would not surprise me if I found out the subject dwelt within its own sort of cyber-subculture ... and I would place money that such a network would be pessimistic in tone and outlook.
To be a part of a church or mega-church that is more concerned with image or status quo safety, or to look around and see the many churches and "Christian organizations" that seem to have this following-Jesus thing all wrong, is indeed a frustrating thing. We want to see change. Some of us want to incite that change. Many others want to discuss that change. Unfortunately, few of us actually desire to work toward that change, and to dig into the work so completely that we shut up about the problem long enough to involve ourselves in the fix.
I realize by writing this entry, I immediately align myself with one of the former groups. However, I've decided that if I'm going to write about this subject, I might as well be as honest as I can...
The thing that frustrates me even more than dead or dying churches are the many people who label such churches this way. Call them cynical, or pessimistic, or just judgmentally sardonic, but rarely are these people apt to give a particular struggling church or mega-church a chance if an alternative congregation/community is, in their opinion, getting it right where the others are getting it so wrong. Whether the alternative community is emergent, relevant, innovative, or all of the above, to a person who has learned how to judge the Church, it is simply one thing: greener pastures. In essence, it is the congregational equivalent of a white flight. A neighborhood changes in outlook or becomes too crowded, invaded by people different from me, and I look to the suburbs outside of town where it is safer and I like the look of the landscape a lot better, where people think like me and don't mind my condemnation of the old neighborhood because, instead of staying there to enact change, they escaped to the greener pastures as well. The more I apply this metaphor, the more I see the new, hip, alternative congregations as the greener pastures, and the old model churches (or, even sometimes, the mega-churches) as the old neighborhood many of us are leaving behind for the cause of returning Jesus, and true Christianity, to the Church.
How do we justify planting new congregations if we abandon old ones to do so? If there is a place with a "need," fine. But if the need is just to plant a church that isn't as frustrating or backward, I'm not as quick to appreciate the plant. Did anyone try to affect change in the old community first? Or were they just too close-minded, too set in their ways?
I realize some of what I'm writing here is biting into my own thoughts and behavior, but I read so much subtle (and sometimes non-subtle) condemnation of the mega-church Christian subculture, and rarely, if ever, read of the dangers of escaping these churches that might have some things - if not many things - wrong with it.
My church is one that many of the blogs I read would label as dead or dying. Our attendance is down, as many people are leaving as are visiting, we are consolidating bible studies and Sunday classes because we don't have enough of any one age or station in life to meet on their own. There are people in our church that see missions as nothing more than giving money, and we are involved in very few direct outreach programs to the community. All in all, for many people in my church, life on Sunday morning is lived much different than life during the week. Such criteria is the fodder for these blogs, and it screams, "Abandon this church and find yourself a relevant community that is making an impact!" And a part of me would love to, but then, whether like a loyal captain or Lot's wife, I look back and think, "What will become of them if I, too, leave them behind?" Do I just cut and run and leave them to die? Do I do nothing ... when I certainly could do something ... anything ... EVERYTHING I can to try and save the church?
Maybe this entry is simply the squeaking voice of a person too scared to abandon a sinking Titanic unaware of the certain death that awaits ... or maybe it is of a person who is not ready to give up on a community of people who might have a lot of it wrong, but is still a community with blood running through its veins, with a life that can still be seized and lived toward impact. I do not agree that a dying church is not worth saving. I do not even believe that a dead church (containing whatever criteria makes them that in your opinion) is not worth saving. My church may not be relevant right now, but we're working on it. Who knows whether we'll get there, but there's more to serving God than simply correcting our motivations.
To be a part of a church or mega-church that is more concerned with image or status quo safety, or to look around and see the many churches and "Christian organizations" that seem to have this following-Jesus thing all wrong, is indeed a frustrating thing. We want to see change. Some of us want to incite that change. Many others want to discuss that change. Unfortunately, few of us actually desire to work toward that change, and to dig into the work so completely that we shut up about the problem long enough to involve ourselves in the fix.
I realize by writing this entry, I immediately align myself with one of the former groups. However, I've decided that if I'm going to write about this subject, I might as well be as honest as I can...
The thing that frustrates me even more than dead or dying churches are the many people who label such churches this way. Call them cynical, or pessimistic, or just judgmentally sardonic, but rarely are these people apt to give a particular struggling church or mega-church a chance if an alternative congregation/community is, in their opinion, getting it right where the others are getting it so wrong. Whether the alternative community is emergent, relevant, innovative, or all of the above, to a person who has learned how to judge the Church, it is simply one thing: greener pastures. In essence, it is the congregational equivalent of a white flight. A neighborhood changes in outlook or becomes too crowded, invaded by people different from me, and I look to the suburbs outside of town where it is safer and I like the look of the landscape a lot better, where people think like me and don't mind my condemnation of the old neighborhood because, instead of staying there to enact change, they escaped to the greener pastures as well. The more I apply this metaphor, the more I see the new, hip, alternative congregations as the greener pastures, and the old model churches (or, even sometimes, the mega-churches) as the old neighborhood many of us are leaving behind for the cause of returning Jesus, and true Christianity, to the Church.
How do we justify planting new congregations if we abandon old ones to do so? If there is a place with a "need," fine. But if the need is just to plant a church that isn't as frustrating or backward, I'm not as quick to appreciate the plant. Did anyone try to affect change in the old community first? Or were they just too close-minded, too set in their ways?
I realize some of what I'm writing here is biting into my own thoughts and behavior, but I read so much subtle (and sometimes non-subtle) condemnation of the mega-church Christian subculture, and rarely, if ever, read of the dangers of escaping these churches that might have some things - if not many things - wrong with it.
My church is one that many of the blogs I read would label as dead or dying. Our attendance is down, as many people are leaving as are visiting, we are consolidating bible studies and Sunday classes because we don't have enough of any one age or station in life to meet on their own. There are people in our church that see missions as nothing more than giving money, and we are involved in very few direct outreach programs to the community. All in all, for many people in my church, life on Sunday morning is lived much different than life during the week. Such criteria is the fodder for these blogs, and it screams, "Abandon this church and find yourself a relevant community that is making an impact!" And a part of me would love to, but then, whether like a loyal captain or Lot's wife, I look back and think, "What will become of them if I, too, leave them behind?" Do I just cut and run and leave them to die? Do I do nothing ... when I certainly could do something ... anything ... EVERYTHING I can to try and save the church?
Maybe this entry is simply the squeaking voice of a person too scared to abandon a sinking Titanic unaware of the certain death that awaits ... or maybe it is of a person who is not ready to give up on a community of people who might have a lot of it wrong, but is still a community with blood running through its veins, with a life that can still be seized and lived toward impact. I do not agree that a dying church is not worth saving. I do not even believe that a dead church (containing whatever criteria makes them that in your opinion) is not worth saving. My church may not be relevant right now, but we're working on it. Who knows whether we'll get there, but there's more to serving God than simply correcting our motivations.
Monday, July 02, 2007
The Steaming Cup
It seems the attitude of the day is denial...
This morning, during a much needed time of quiet, I read over these words Thomas Merton wrote 67 years ago. "What (besides making lists of the vices of our age) are some of the greatest vices of our age? To begin with, people began to get self-conscious about the fact that their misconducted lives were going to pieces, so instead of ceasing to do the things that made them ashamed and unhappy, they made it a new rule that they must never be ashamed of the things they did. There was to be only one capital sin: to be ashamed. That was how they thought they could solve the problem of sin, by abolishing the term."
And then, in the Liturgy of the Hours for today, I read the story of Peter, following the arresting party of Jesus at a somewhat safe distance, and warming himself by a fire just a stone's throw from Jesus' travesty of a trial. He's fingered three times, and each time, to preserve himself, he denies his relationship to Jesus. And so it is with us, one way or another.
Denial is the easy way out, and I think it drives more of our thoughts and actions than we realize. Denial can separate us from guilt, and it can draw us closer to another person by casting a shadow over truth. Merton's words hit home this morning, not because I knowingly avoid shame by denying the wages of my mistakes, but because, at times, I find myself denying the stark reality of the gospel - of a God who is both love and wrath, mercy and justice. Forgetting this makes it a bit easier to forget the troubling consequences of my mistakes and misdeeds.
Denial works for most of us, until the shame we successfully elude finally does catch up to us. Denial worked for Peter, until that rooster crowed and the Gospel of Luke reads, "Jesus turned and looked directly at him." In those eyes was the simple, unflinching truth that denying who you are only works in one certain way, and it isn't for hope of self-preservation and avoidance of guilt.
This same Jesus who finds us and looks directly at us when we seek to conceal ourselves by denying the kind of people we are - the kind of person our thoughts and actions naturally reveal us to be - is the one who says quite plainly, "If someone wants to walk in my way, they must deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow me." Yes, those who deny themselves in this way are, as Jesus promised, saved. But this denial is an embracing of shame and guilt rather than an avoidance of it, hence the "take up their cross" clause. C.S. Lewis explained such a concept as if it were a steaming beverage that we have to gulp down, finding out only afterward that we are able to handle it.
So, may the wonder of denying who I am and all I seek to protect myself from work to cleanse me of the dirty shadows of this world. Perhaps, on the other side of this denial, I'll find the strength to see completely past my shame, and that of others.
This morning, during a much needed time of quiet, I read over these words Thomas Merton wrote 67 years ago. "What (besides making lists of the vices of our age) are some of the greatest vices of our age? To begin with, people began to get self-conscious about the fact that their misconducted lives were going to pieces, so instead of ceasing to do the things that made them ashamed and unhappy, they made it a new rule that they must never be ashamed of the things they did. There was to be only one capital sin: to be ashamed. That was how they thought they could solve the problem of sin, by abolishing the term."
And then, in the Liturgy of the Hours for today, I read the story of Peter, following the arresting party of Jesus at a somewhat safe distance, and warming himself by a fire just a stone's throw from Jesus' travesty of a trial. He's fingered three times, and each time, to preserve himself, he denies his relationship to Jesus. And so it is with us, one way or another.
Denial is the easy way out, and I think it drives more of our thoughts and actions than we realize. Denial can separate us from guilt, and it can draw us closer to another person by casting a shadow over truth. Merton's words hit home this morning, not because I knowingly avoid shame by denying the wages of my mistakes, but because, at times, I find myself denying the stark reality of the gospel - of a God who is both love and wrath, mercy and justice. Forgetting this makes it a bit easier to forget the troubling consequences of my mistakes and misdeeds.
Denial works for most of us, until the shame we successfully elude finally does catch up to us. Denial worked for Peter, until that rooster crowed and the Gospel of Luke reads, "Jesus turned and looked directly at him." In those eyes was the simple, unflinching truth that denying who you are only works in one certain way, and it isn't for hope of self-preservation and avoidance of guilt.
This same Jesus who finds us and looks directly at us when we seek to conceal ourselves by denying the kind of people we are - the kind of person our thoughts and actions naturally reveal us to be - is the one who says quite plainly, "If someone wants to walk in my way, they must deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow me." Yes, those who deny themselves in this way are, as Jesus promised, saved. But this denial is an embracing of shame and guilt rather than an avoidance of it, hence the "take up their cross" clause. C.S. Lewis explained such a concept as if it were a steaming beverage that we have to gulp down, finding out only afterward that we are able to handle it.
So, may the wonder of denying who I am and all I seek to protect myself from work to cleanse me of the dirty shadows of this world. Perhaps, on the other side of this denial, I'll find the strength to see completely past my shame, and that of others.
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