The Clarity of Praise

I find that in the midst of praise, there is clarity and perspective.  When the world has me stressed out, or I am anxious about things unseen, I need only to worship, to praise my God, and I experience the stress and anxiety melt away.  This does not mean that the act of praising God causes Him to resolve your stressful situations, answer our questions, or reveal the future, though He certainly could if He chose.  Rather, I experience the clarity and perspective needed to understand that these uncertainties simply do not matter or carry any weight or power when compared to the certainties of God's sovereignty and His love. How can I allow any worry to take control when I know that God is God (Isaiah 45:22), He is good (Psalm 119:68),  and He loves me (John 4:19)?

I believe that praise helps us gain this clarity and perspective so quickly because God Himself dwells in our praises in a very real and completely mysterious way.  Psalm 22:3 tells us that God is "...enthroned upon the praises of His people." The King James states that God "inhabits"our praises.  When we praise, we enter in to God's dwelling place.

It is in the midst of unhindered praise that we are the most intimate with the Savior we know and long to know more.  The Apostle Paul understood that compared to knowing Christ, all else pales:

Philippians 3:8

More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ.

Followers of Jesus Christ are indwelt by the very Spirit of God, and I believe that when we praise God, we provide an outlet for the Spirit, shifting our focus away from ourselves (for once) and on to God and His presence, to the exclusion of all worldly distractions.  The realities of God's sovereignty and love are so poignant and tangible in those moments that they outshine and overpower the fears of the flesh.

The words of the old hymn resonate with truth:

Turn your eyes upon Jesus

Look full in His wonderful face

And the things of earth shall grow strangely dim

In the light of His glory and grace.

What's So Scary About Halloween?

With Halloween just a few days away, the discussion of whether or not to observe the holiday is coming up again, at least in my Facebook news feed. :)  So I thought I'd post an essay that I wrote on the subject a few years ago, just eight short months after Facebook had been launched, and long before I had ever heard the term "social networking."  Enjoy...

What's So Scary About Halloween?

So here we are a few days before Halloween, and some of us will soon have another collection of fun memories of candy, kids in costume, and kitschy, spooky décor.  Others are just waiting anxiously for it to all be over, thankful that there will then be a whole year before we have to deal with the offensive day again.  But regardless of how one feels about Halloween, I think it is worthwhile to expose some of the history behind Halloween and other holiday observances so we can all avoid inadvertently making hypocrites of ourselves when we claim to abstain from Halloween due to its “pagan origins.”

Halloween, or All Hallows Eve, is the eve of All Saints' Day, which is celebrated on November 1.  All Saints' Day falls on the same day as the Celtic pagan holiday, Samhain, which has much in common with other pagan “Day of the Dead” festivals across various cultures.  This is no coincidence.  When the early Christian Church began to expand its influence into Eastern and Western Europe, it encountered the indigenous pagan tribes of the region and their polytheistic, nature-based pagan religions.  In an effort to placate the people and make those new pagan “converts” as comfortable as possible with their new religion, the early church instituted Christian holy observances on the same days as the traditional pagan holy days.  One of these new holidays was Halloween, but it was not the only one.

Did you ever wonder why we celebrate Christmas on December 25th?  It is because that was also the time of the pagan celebration of the Winter Solstice.  The Winter Solstice is the shortest day of the year, typically somewhere between December 21 and December 26, when the sun is farthest from the Northern Hemisphere due to the earth's tilt.  The day was celebrated among pagans as a turning point in the year, when the sun was renewed – or “born” – and grew between the Winter Solstice and the Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year.  Early Christian leaders reasoned that it would be an easy transition for many pagans to go from celebrating the “birth of the sun” to the “birth of the Son.”

And what about Easter, perhaps the most sacred of Christian holy observances?  Well, Easter was originally the Vernal Equinox, or Spring Solstice.  As the newly reborn sun races across the sky, the days become longer, the air warmer, and once again, life begins to return to the land.  Twice a year, day and night become equal in length.  To the pagans of old these “equinoxes” (equinox means “equal night” in Latin) were markers reminding the people of when seeds would be planted and then harvested.  The first of these, the spring or Vernal equinox, occurs on or about March 21st.  The ancient goddess, Eostre, a Saxon deity who symbolized new life and fertility, was the key symbol of this celebration, which was known as Ostara.  You can see where we get the word “Easter.”  Legend has it that the goddess was saved by a bird whose wings had become frozen by the cold of winter.  This process turned the bird into a hare.  Yet this was no ordinary cottontail; this bunny could also lay eggs!  This is why we have the enduring symbols for Easter: the egg, for new life or beginnings, and the rabbit/hare for fertility.  The Vernal Equinox was often marked by drunken orgies.  While the new Christian version of the holiday lacked the orgies, the transition was easy because of the continued focus on the cycle of life, death, and rebirth as symbolized in Christ's ministry, death on a cross, and resurrection.

And that brings us back to Halloween and its pagan predecessor, Samhain, or the Day of the Dead.  For many pagan tribes, the Day of the Dead was a day (and night) on which all of the dead ancestors would rise from their graves to torment the living and hopefully drag them back to the netherworld.  Consequently, it was recommended that you stay inside your home and perhaps leave a spooky, glowing, carved turnip in front of your door to scare the spirits away.  If you did actually find yourself outside, it was best to have a big bonfire for protection, and also to disguise yourself as one of the dead in the hopes that they would mistake you for one of their own.  This, of course, is where we get the custom of dressing up in scary costumes and walking the neighborhood.

Of course the early Christian Church wanted nothing to do with all this fear and these malevolent spirits, but they did see value in acknowledging those who had left this world before us.  And they did not want to create unrest among the people by taking away their holiday.  So the Day of the Dead and Samhain became All Saint's Day during which we celebrate the lives, legacies, and sacrifices of those saints of the Faith that came before us, just as Memorial Day commemorates those who lost their lives in war.  But like the Easter bunny, some of the old customs held on, despite the new meaning of the holiday, and many pagans wanted to have their cake and eat it too.  They would celebrate All Saints' Day with their new Christian friends, but the night before (All Hallows Eve or “Halloween”) would find them enjoying the old pagan activities.

So we have a choice when it comes to Halloween: we can choose to draw attention to the holiday's ancient and somewhat unsavory origins that most people are not even aware of, or we can choose to have fun with our kids, candy, costumes, and carved pumpkins while taking a moment or two to say a prayer of thanks for the saints who came before us to whom we owe so much.  Our God is a God of renewal and rebirth.  He makes His living taking that which we mess up and turning it about for good.  He can take a sinful man or woman, redeem him/her by the blood of His Son, and then do mighty works through him/her for His Kingdom and His Glory.  He turns today's trials and temptation into tomorrow's testimony.  So why label a day (that the Lord has made) as belonging to the evil one when we could take it and claim it for God and have a fun family time in His Name and to His Glory?

Ultimately the decision to not observe or acknowledge Halloween is our prerogative, and it's a respectable choice.  Romans 12:2 calls us to “...not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”  Certainly no one could fault a family for choosing to abstain from any observance of Halloween in an effort to “not be conformed to this world.”  1 Peter 4:3 reminds us that as those with new life in Christ, we should live for God and not as we did before we knew Him: “For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do—living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry.”

Similarly, many believers choose not to listen to secular music, watch TV, or even dance, and I would not dream of condemning such choices.  I think we need more Christ followers who are willing to take a bold, uncompromising stand against a godless culture.  Others may not avoid secular music or TV entirely, but rather choose to be discriminating in these areas, seeking to fill their eyes, ears, hearts, and minds with “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute” (Phil 4:8).  This, too, is a valid and respectable approach, in my opinion, as is enjoying the harmless and even positive elements of Halloween with your family while skipping the revering of pagan deities and indulgence in orgies.

But I would caution those who choose not to observe Halloween in any way to reconsider basing that decision on the holiday’s pagan origins.  For if we do, we need to consider also not observing Christmas and Easter, lest we make hypocrites of ourselves.  Instead, perhaps explain to those who question your decision that Halloween has become a part of secular culture in which your family has chosen not to participate.  Maybe use such conversations as opportunities to share some Scripture, and speak of a God who loved and loves us so much that we desire to live only for Him, and not for the things of the world or our pagan past.

If you will be participating in any Halloween activities, my prayer is that you’ll have fun, be safe, and make Philippians 4:8 your guide.  I also pray that God would provide opportunities for you to share His love and grace with all the little ghosts, goblins, princesses, and super heroes you bump into in the process. ;)

Lee Mayhew

10/23/04

The Fear of Accountability

Hard to believe it's been over a year since my last post to this blog!  Sorry about that... ;)


Let’s talk about rabies for a second.  Rabies was once commonly called “hydrophobia” because of a particularly bizarre collection of 2nd stage symptoms.  As the disease progressed, the infected would experience paralysis and be unable to swallow.  As thirst set it, the afflicted would find itself unable to quench that thirst.  Often by this time dementia had begun to set in so that the reactions to this inability to quench the thirst would be panic and agitation.  Before the disease was fully understood, people thought that animals and people suffering with rabies were actually afraid of the water.  Hence “hydrophobia.”  Of course it wasn’t fear of water, so much as extreme frustration and the fear associated with not being able to satisfy a fundamental biological need.  Even those reduced to such a diminished mental state understood this would likely lead to death.

So what’s my point?  Simply that I feel that we as Christians often suffer from an irrational fear similar to that which we once erroneously assumed was experienced by those afflicted with rabies.  We fear the thing that we most desperately need to survive: accountability.  We fear accountability so much that we avoid it like, well, like a rabid animal. :)  We maintain shallow, superficial relationships because we know that getting to know people will involve vulnerability that could lead to accountability.  After all, if people don’t get to know us beyond the facades we choose to show them, then maybe our dirty secrets will remain secret, and no one will call us on them.

But if someone does actually learn of something in our lives that is destructive and detrimental, and less than what God would have of us and chooses to bring it to our attention?  Oh boy, they had better watch out!  We’ll quickly accuse that person of “judging” and whip out some convenient verses of Scripture that seem to forbid this “judging” behavior.

Which leads me to my real frustration and my reason for writing this post.  I am tired of Christians refusing to be held accountable by their fellow believers and then using misinterpreted Scripture passages taken out of context to try and imply that we are not to hold one another accountable.  Because the truth is quite the opposite: we are called to hold one another accountable.  In fact it is one of the primary functions of the church.  It’s one of our obligations to our brothers and sisters in Christ.  And I am extremely grateful for those whom God has placed in my life over the years who have held me accountable, even when I didn’t want to listen and I had no desire to give up the sins I was enjoying.  God used those people in my life to shine the light of God’s Truth on my hypocrisy and my destructive sinful behavior, and because of the love – yes, the LOVE – shown to me through accountability, I am able to say today that God has won victories over shameful sin patterns that once ruled my life.

One of the most popular Scripture passages that those who do not want to be held accountable like to hide behind is Matthew 7:1-5 (and its counterpart passage in Luke 6).  Here is the passage:

(1) “Do not judge, or you too will be judged.  (2) For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. (3) Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? (4) How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? (5) You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”

This passage provides a strong case for the importance of effective Bible study.  At first glance, especially when looking only at the first two verses, it seems that what Jesus is saying here is pretty straight forward.  “Do not judge.”  We tend to apply our modern usage of the word “judge” here and assume that Jesus is saying “Don’t tell someone that what they are doing is wrong.”  Further in depth study reveals, however, that this is most certainly NOT what Jesus is saying here.


The word that is translated as “judge” in this passage is the Greek word “krinos.”  “Krinos” is a judicial term that was actually used in judicial proceedings, and it refers to a final decision as in sentencing. The implication when using the word “krinos” is that a punishment is being meted out.  It is most often translated in English as “judge,” but the same Greek word is also translated elsewhere in Scripture as “condemn,” “sentence,” “take to law,” and even “damn” or “damned.”  “Krinos” goes beyond determining whether or not something is wrong and steps in to the territory of determining what the consequence of that action will be.  And what Jesus is saying here is that making assumptions about what the consequence of someone’s action may or may not be is not something we should do, unless we want that same punishment visited upon us.

He then goes on to say in verses 2-4 that we should especially avoid this type of behavior if we struggle with the same issue.  However, in verse five Christ implies that there are circumstances in which it might be okay to address sin in this manner, namely when we do not struggle with the same issue.

Interestingly enough, this is the only time in the New Testament that Christ says “do not judge.”  And what he’s really saying is “do not presume to mete out punishment to someone else.”  We see elsewhere in Scripture that this role belongs to Christ, Himself, on the day of “judgment.”  Deciding our punishment is not our right, but His.

I suspect that this is the reason the word “damn” and phrases like “damn it” and “damn you” have become swear words in our culture: because we are presuming to have the authority to do something that is God’s province alone, namely to “damn” or sentence to Hell.

But I digress... ;)  Bottom line is that the admonition of Christ not to “judge” in Matthew 7 has nothing to do with our obligation to hold one another accountable.  We are called many times throughout Scripture to hold each other accountable.  When we see sin in the lives of our brothers and sisters, we are to address it.  We should address it in love and humility, seeking guidance from the Holy Spirit as to how and when, but we should definitely address it.  In fact, it’s the only loving thing to do.

And speaking of love, another verse I’ve seen misused from time to time to suggest that we should not hold one another accountable is John 13:35, wherein Jesus tells us, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”  I’ve actually heard people try to make the case that it is not loving to hold people accountable, when in fact the opposite is true.  Certainly accountability can be delivered with motives that are and in a manner that is less than loving, but accountability itself is the very essence of love.

John Piper in his book, Don’t Waste Your Life, defines love this way: “Love is doing what is best for someone.”  And what is best, he goes on to say, is God.  Piper points out that “If you don’t point people to God...you don’t love.” Pointing people to God and His best for them is the true definition of love. To see a brother or sister clearly living outside of God’s best for them and to ignore it is the opposite of love.

Unfortunately many Christ-followers have bought in to the world’s warped definition of love.  Our culture would have us believe that loving someone is making them feel good or making them happy.  And consequently when something does not feel good or make us happy, the world says that it can’t possibly be love.  But this is not love, it is coddling.  True love is doing what is best for someone else, and the harsh truth is that often the thing that is best for us is not going to feel good or make us happy in that moment.

God’s Word is full of passages instructing us to hold one another accountable.  Here are just a few:

• Matthew 18:15-17 ESV – “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.”

• Galatians 6:1 ESV – Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness.

• Colossians 3:16 ESV – Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. (Emphasis added)

• Ephesians 4:25 ESV – Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another.

• James 5:19-20 ESV – My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.

• Hebrews 3:13 ESV – But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

And again, those are just a few.  Note that in Colossians we are called to “admonish one another in all wisdom.”  To admonish means to warn or reprimand someone firmly.  We are called to do this! Hebrews tells us to “exhort one another every day...that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.”  To exhort means to strongly encourage or urge someone to do or not do something.

Also note that we’re not instructed in these passages to mete out punishment or decide for others what the consequence of their sin may be.  And this is the difference between “judging” as the term is used in Matthew 7:1 and true biblical accountability.  To say, “Man, I really don’t think you should do that.  That behavior is contrary to God’s Word and not what He would want for you” would be accountability.  Whereas to say, “Man, I really don’t think you should do that.  You’re gonna go to hell!” would be judging.

Now of course there are right and wrong ways to hold one another accountable.  We can all probably find verses calling us to treat one another with love, to not be self-righteous, and to approach our brothers and sisters with, as Galatians 6:1 states above, “...a spirit of gentleness.”  And as Matthew 18:15 points out, we should whenever possible start by privately addressing concerns directly with the person for whom we are concerned.  Facebook may not be the best tool for accountability. :)

But ultimately we are called by God in His word to keep each other accountable.  This means holding others accountable and being willing to be held accountable ourselves.  This is a major part of what it means to be the Church.  We are to encourage, exhort, and admonish each other.  As Proverbs 27:17 puts it, we are to “sharpen” each other “as iron sharpens iron.”  And it likely won’t feel very good.  But we need to recognize it as the loving act it is meant to be.  For someone to take the time to show me an area where I am experiencing less than God’s best for me – and what’s more, how I am grieving the heart of my Father in Heaven, whom I love – is a true act of love.

What I find ironic is that today in the evangelical church in America, the buzz word is “community.”  The church is calling its members to engage in community, to be vulnerable and real, and to build relationships.  And none of this can happen without accountability.  A community that does not hold its members accountable is not beneficial, it’s destructive.  Our flesh – and our enemy – wants nothing more than to find another way to rationalize and ignore the sinful behaviors that we secretly cherish and don’t want to release to God.  What if we could find a group of “fellow Christians” that we could hang out with who would give us nothing but edification, encouragement, and pats on the back while they turn a blind eye to our sin, and keep smiling as if the stench of it didn’t fill the room?  How convenient would that be?

Or what if we could find a group of “Christians” who would do more than just remain silent and pretend our sins weren’t there?  What if we could find some “Christians” who would actually tell us that our sinful behavior was not sin at all?  Wouldn’t that be great!  Of course the book of Proverbs has something to say about such people in Chapter 24, Verse 24: “Whoever says to the wicked, ‘You are in the right,’ will be cursed by peoples, abhorred by nations...”

As the Church – as the very Bride of Christ – we need to do a better job of holding one another accountable in love, and we need to do a better job of letting our brothers and sisters hold us accountable, and count it as the grace that it is.  Our faith and values as followers of Christ are under attack in our culture.  We need to stand up for truth and acknowledge sin for what it is.  And we need to commend and encourage – not reprimand or ostracize –  those who are courageous and faithful enough to take a stand and hold us accountable, even in the face of ridicule.  Ridicule that too often comes from people who are supposed to love one another and hate sin.

We need to open our eyes and realize that the culture that surrounds us runs counter to God and His Truth in every way.  Very often the things that our culture esteems and admires are things that are despised by God.  The culture is out to convince us that God’s standard for righteousness and purity is unrealistic, old-fashioned, or just flat out wrong.  The mantra of our sinful culture is “Oh, it’s not a big deal,” and we nod and are tempted to agree.  And when we turn to our fellow “believers” to see what they have to say, we find that there are legions of them eagerly waiting in the wings to affirm us in our sin.  “It can’t be sin,” they say, “because I do it, and so does everyone else.”

And that one brave person who stands for truth and calls us out?  Oh, we fear them.  We fear like a rabid dog fears water.

Lee Mayhew
July 24,

How Pro Sports Could Save Our Schools

Yikes! Almost five months since the last post. A busy season, to be sure.

This post deals with the current budget crisis in our public schools. "What does this have to do with worship," you ask? Well, perhaps not much. Or perhaps quite a bit, since faithful stewardship of our resources is a key worship element. And Christ, Himself, said that how we care for the children among us is indicative of how we view Him, and by extension, the Father (paraphrasing and interpreting Mark 9:37). So perhaps it has everything to do with worship.

Before I go to my point, let me first say this: I am a capitalist. I believe in an open, free market. I make my living as a salesperson (selling primarily to public schools, it so happens). I believe a person or organization should have the right to leverage the principle of supply and demand and sell a product or service for whatever price someone is willing to pay, provided he do so legally, and ethically. And said person or organization has every right to get rich doing so, and no one and no government should have the right to limit that earning potential or redistribute that wealth that was fairly earned.

But I also believe in compassion and charity. In altruism, benevolence, and philanthropy. We should look out for our fellow man. I believe that those who are blessed with much should use those blessing to help those less fortunate. In fact, I would go so far as to say that is WHY they have been blessed: so that they might help others. But such an attitude cannot and should not be forced or mandated.

Now to my point: I said I believe in compassion and charity. Compassion and charity of the sort demonstrated by Dallas Cowboys player, Marion Barber, who just last week donated $500,000 worth of computers to the struggling Dallas Independent School District. That touched me. It impressed me. And it got me thinking: our professional sports leagues, teams, and players could rescue our public schools from their current budget crises, if they wanted to. Or at the very least, lesson the burden dramatically. And it would be honorable. Noble. Praiseworthy. It would feel right, because it would be right.

Let's face it: there is probably not a single person in America who truly believes it is right that the teachers who teach our children should make $30-50k per year, while pro Athletes make 10 times that amount to warm a bench, with marquis players making $10-20 million/year. Do these players have the right to make that much money? Of course. They are a commodity in high demand, and those salaries are fueled by a consumer culture that is obsessed with pro sports. They are the most skilled in their field. They are the elite and have the right to get paid whatever the market will bear. But we have to remember that having a right doesn't make it right.

Of course the pro sports industry is not responsible for the budget crisis in public education. It's not their responsibility to fix it. What's more, throwing money at a problem without identifying and addressing root causes is not a long term solution. And I believe there is MUCH more wrong with our public schools that just a lack of funds. But there is an immediate and desperate need, and the pro sports industry has the means to help out now in that time of need. Just like the plight of the hungry in our nation is probably not your fault or mine, but if we have the means to provide some meals to those in need, wouldn't it be the right thing to do?

Detroit Public Schools are facing a budget shortfall of $327 millions. I heard that story and it occurred to me (which will probably surprise some of you who know me well) that Detroit is one of those larger cities that boasts a franchise from each of the four major pro sports leagues: Lions (NFL), Tigers (MLB), Pistons (NBA), and Red Wings (NHL). Oh my. The combined player's salaries from those four teams? $369 million, according to various Internet sources, including ESPN.com, Sportscity.com, and others. That $369M is spread across 145 players.

Imagine for a moment if those four teams came together and said, "We are going to cover the budget shortfall of Detroit Public Schools. 100% of it. That would leave a combined player salary budget of $42 million. Spread equally among 145 players, that's $289,000 per year. Which is the top 1.5% of salaries in the U.S. The schools have what they need, and the players get to stay rich. Just not as rich.

How about Marion Barber's home town? The Dallas/Ft. Worth Metroplex also boasts four pro franchises. The player salaries for those teams equal $233 million spread across approx. 103 players. Not as much as Detroit. And Dallas area schools are in almost as much trouble. The combined 2011 budget shortfalls for the area's top 3 districts (Dallas, Fort Worth, and Arlington) is $329 million. But if DFW's pro athletes were willing to take that same $290k salary, they could cover $203 million of that shortfall.

I imagine the numbers would present similar opportunities across the country. And what if the PGA, and NASCAR, and *gasp* Hollywood joined in the fun?

But it won't happen. It would require unprecedented acts of selflessness, humility, cooperation, and compassion from leagues, teams, unions, and players. A pipe dream, I am sure.

Maybe there are whole teams full of Marion Barbers just waiting for the right moment. Now is the moment.

Divine Economics

The Scriptures are full of reminders that we are not like God, and our ways are not his ways. Here are some examples:

1 Cor 1:25 – For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.

1 Cor 3:19a – For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight.

Isaiah 55:8-9 – “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,/neither are your ways my ways,”/declares the LORD./“As the heavens are higher than the earth/so are my ways higher than your ways/and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

Matthew 16:25 – For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.

We, the creatures, are incapable of fully comprehending the Creator. And I thank Him for that! Frankly if the God of the Universe could be fully grasped by a brain like mine, then we would all be in trouble! :) And woe to us if we assume that God is bound by our logic, or somehow subject to the laws of a physical universe that He created and outside of which He dwells.

And yet we limit God in this way every day. Whether consciously or subconsciously, we doubt that God has any power over natural circumstances; we do not have faith that God can do the miraculous, that His power, abilities, and even His Will supersede the laws of our physical universe or our own natural compulsions. This is why the sick go unhealed, the hard-hearted remain unconvinced, and believers in bondage to sins they have fought against for years, continue in their chains: because in our heart of hearts, God is not big enough or strong enough to overcome the obstacle before us. And certainly not if it requires some sort of supernatural intervention outside of our understanding of what is possible.

We do this with our finances – specifically our tithes and offerings – and we and the Church at large suffer as a consequence. In Malachi 3:8-11, we find the Lord delivering a message to Israel through the prophet, Malachi:

“Will a mere mortal rob God? Yet you rob me.
“But you ask, ‘How are we robbing you?’
“In tithes and offerings. You are under a curse—your whole nation—because you are robbing me. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the LORD Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it. I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not drop their fruit before it is ripe,” says the LORD Almighty. “Then all the nations will call you blessed, for yours will be a delightful land,” says the LORD Almighty.

Most of us know that a “tithe” literally means a tenth. Tithing was established as part of God's Law in Leviticus 27. The people were told that 10% of everything – every crop, every herd, all that they owned – belonged to Him. God wasn't asking for a gift, He was informing His people that the first 10% was His property, and it was to be returned to Him. This is why God tells the people in Malachi that they are robbing Him: because they are not giving the full tithe, not returning His property. And consequently the nation is cursed.

Flash forward to today, in the U.S. We are no longer an agrarian society, but we certainly labor, and that labor produces fruit, primarily in the form of income. I have yet to read anywhere in Scripture where God rescinded His claim upon His property, that first 10% of of the fruits of our labors. But a recent study conducted by the non-profit organization, Empty Tomb, revealed that the average American churchgoer gives 2.56% to the church.

I'll let you draw your own parallels between the America of today and the Israel of circa 400 BC. We are blessed as a nation in many, many ways. But a case could certainly be made for America being under a curse as well. But what cannot be debated, in my mind, is whether or not we are robbing God. If 10% of our income is God's property, yet we only give Him 2.56%, then we are certainly robbing God!

My family and I were once guilty of robbing God. But I want to share with you how the Holy Spirit convicted us in this area, and we took a step of faith – a very difficult one – and chose to believe God's Word, and he responded and continues to respond to our obedience in amazing ways! We have never looked back, and God has never faltered in His faithfulness. I want so much for all of God's people to experience the blessings He has for us, our families, and our churches if we would only “test Him” in this area.

Times are tough. We're in a recession, perhaps the worst since the Great Depression. Money is tight for many of us. And sometimes the math does not work. “If I give 10% to God, then the remaining 90% will not cover my bills,” one might say. “Surely God does not want me to default on my obligations?”

Entire sermon series, entire Bible studies, and thousands of books have been written dealing with managing money in a Biblical, God-honoring way, so I'm not going to get in to how good financial decision making can keep you from being so overextended that you cannot afford to give God what is His. Because frankly I do not believe that is the root of the problem. I believe we simply do not believe God can do what He says He can do. We do not believe that God is able to miraculously do things that confound the conventional wisdom or fly in the face of logic. And for many of us, we do not even KNOW what He says He will do if we are faithful in our tithes, because we are not in His Word. (That's another topic for another day). Basically we don't believe in the God who empowered His Son to feed thousands with a few loaves and fishes. It's a nice story, but not real for us today.

Of course God does not want you to default on your bills! But He wants you to trust in HIM to provide what you need, not your account balance, your employer, the economy, or anything else. He wants you to take a step of faith and obey His commands regarding tithing. Remember, Hebrews 11:1 tells us that faith is “trusting in what you cannot see.” You may not be able to see the money you need in the bank. You may not be able to see how God is going to be able to provide for you if you give 10% of income away. But if you could see, it would not be faith. As we pointed out at the beginning, God's ways are not our ways. Our wisdom is foolishness to Him! His math is not our math! If God wants 10 minus 1 to equal 11, He can make that happen. And he's done it for me and my family countless times.

“'Test me in this,' says the Lord...” These words are so intriguing to me because in Deuteronomy 6:16, God tells His people that they are not to test Him. Jesus even uses that very command to rebuke Satan in the wilderness. And yet here in Malachi we are invited to test God! He REALLY wants to show us something! In my mind, I liken this to a loving parent who really wants to bestow an exciting gift on his child, but he also knows he can't reward or reinforce bad behavior. So the gift goes ungiven if the child is disobedient.

About 14 years ago my wife and I were newly married, working several jobs, and didn't have two dimes to rub together. We were living on love, baby! Rent was coming due: $485 (boy, those were the days!). We prayed, and we talked about tithing. The money just was not there. By our math, if we gave 10%, rent would not be paid. But we felt the Holy Spirit really convicting us to test God in this, as His word said, so we tithed. A few days later, just days before rent was due, we received an unexpected dividend check in the mail from our insurance company. The amount? $487! We tested God, and He responded!

In 1999, we felt God calling my wife to pursue her graduate degree at a Christian school. Much prayer and research pointed to Dallas Baptist University. This would mean a move to a big city where we knew no one, and had no family support system. And frankly we could not afford a move. But God's call was undeniable, so we took a scary step of faith. We blew our savings on a trip to Dallas to find jobs and line up an apartment. We sold our little house, and pulled away from our home with everything we owned in a U-Haul, and $33 in the bank. But God was faithful! Within months, our household income was almost double what it was before the move. We continued to tithe, and hoped to save up to buy a house in a couple of years. But God honored our faithfulness by having my truck get stolen. How was that a good thing? Because the settlement allowed us to buy a house much sooner than we had hoped! We were working long hours, and Em was working hard at school, but we continued to be faithful in our giving, even when we did not have a home church. We found other Christian organizations to give to. We were dog-tired, and needed a break, but there was no money for a vacation. And then just a few months after that, we won a trip to Hawaii on the radio! God was faithful!

The examples above are just a few of the many, many examples over the years. Most recently, just a few months ago we felt God calling my wife to go back to school, and also felt strongly that we needed to keep our daughter in private Christian school. These things cost money, and we didn't see where it would come from. But once again, the call was unmistakable. So we began to move forward in faith, trusting God to provide as He always has. My wife registered for school. Just last week I learned that I would be receiving a raise at work! Enough to cover school for my wife, and to allow us to keep our daughter in private school!

For over a decade we've seen God bless us in amazing and miraculous ways, and I fully believe that it is in large part because we made a choice many years ago to stop robbing God, and we have never faltered in that since. Sure, God has had to deal with some of the ways we've managed the other 90%, and this can still be a struggle. But we tested God, and thereby gave Him the freedom to “throw open the floodgates of heaven with blessing.”

I do not believe in the so-called “Prosperity Gospel,” which is the idea that faithful Christians somehow have a right to wealth, and that God always blesses the faithful with material prosperity. I find no Scriptural basis for this doctrine, and God will not be treated like a big vending machine in the sky. The blessings He bestows can come in many forms, some material and/or financial, some not. The ways He chooses to bless one family will be very different from the ways He chooses to bless another family. Sometimes it's just giving us a new perspective or showing us where we can be more faithful, or helping us realign our priorities. Or just simply removing anxiety and replacing it with peace and security. And there are those who feel called to lives of meager asceticism, and count themselves blessed for it.

I say this because I would hate for anyone to approach faithful tithing as if it were some get rich quick scheme. We're not rich, at least not by American standards. Upper middle-class, I guess. I will admit that some months can still feel pretty tight. (Actually I take that back, because to say “I'm not rich by American standards” is a bit like Warren Buffett saying “I'm not rich by Bill Gates standards.” We can always find someone richer than us to compare ourselves to, but the fact is that even those below the poverty level in the U.S. are richer than 80% of the world. Of the 6 billion people on earth, 4.7 billion of them live on the equivalent of $7500 or less per year. If you own more than one set of clothing, have a consistent place to sleep at night, clean water to drink, and will eat a meal today, then you are better off than 75% of the world's population. So we're all rich, make no mistake.) The real blessings that have been poured out from heaven are freedom from fear and anxiety, peace and security in troubled times, and the incredible comfort that comes from knowing that a God who loves us is in complete control, and wants to bless us. God has always met our needs, and even blessed us with a few of our “wants.” Not once in 14 years has a bill ever been paid late, even though I have written tithe checks many times knowing there was not enough in the account to cover the tithe AND the bills. He has ALWAYS responded in faith when we have stepped out in obedience. Consequently, we do not worry about money any more. If we are faithful in our work, and faithful in our tithes, we know that God will bless beyond what we could hope for or deserve.

I so want this freedom and blessing for you all! But it will require a major step of faith on your part, a step that can be pretty scary. But I cannot encourage you enough to take that step! God is good, and He does what He says He will do! Give Him the freedom to bless you, your family, your church, and this nation as He longs to do.

A few additional words of guidance as you (Perhaps? Hopefully!) embark on this journey:
1.The Bible speaks over and over about “tithes AND offerings.” The two terms are not synonyms. The “tithe” is God's property that we are commanded to return to Him. “Offerings” are gifts given over and above out of respect, honor, and love for God. But sometimes we treat our insufficient attempts to tithe as offerings. That's sort of like if you owed your brother $20, but you put $10 in his birthday card and expect him to be grateful for the gift! :) I want to encourage you and challenge you to give God His property, and THEN pray about what sort of offering would express your love, respect, and appreciation for God and all He is and all He does in your life.
2.Many churches preach that the law of tithing is no longer applicable because we are under the New Covenant in Christ Jesus. Of course we are under a New Covenant, but I do not believe this relieves us of an obligation to obey God's commands. Jesus said in Matthew 5:17, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” Our righteousness comes from the blood of Jesus, and not from our performance against the Law, but God's commands are still His commands, and we show that we love Him by obeying those commands (John 14:15). But now because of God's grace and the sacrifice of Christ, and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, it is possible for us to keep the law, whereas before Christ, it was not. 2 Corinthians 9:7 is often cited in these discussions: “Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” This statement refers to gifts, not tithes, at least as I read it and can discern from the original Greek.
3.I've been asked many times whether or not a tithe should be calculated based on pre-tax or post-tax earnings. In my opinion, an obedient tithe should be calculated before taxes. Taxes are just another debt that we owe. Most of us just happen to have them withheld via payroll deduction, which can give the illusion of our “real” pay being after taxes, but of course that's not the case. And we wouldn't ask, “Should our tithe be calculated before or after our electric bill?” At least I hope we wouldn't. If we calculate 10% of our post-tax income, then that's not 10% of our actual income, and therefore not a tithe. What's more, throughout Scripture, tithing is tied to the giving of “firstfruits,” which means that we give first to God, and we give out of our best. If we are paying taxes first, and then giving to God out of what is left, that is hardly giving to God first. Lastly, Jesus said in Matthew 22:21, “So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” I believe Jesus was making it pretty clear that we should pay our taxes AND meet our obligations to God.

Keep the faith,

Lee

We Have It Backwards

It's been a long time since the last post. Two months, in fact. Alas, the busyness of life! But this one is a long one, so feel free to read it in multiple sessions and pretend it's multiple posts, if you like. :)

I've had a sense of unrest in my spirit for some time regarding the state of praise and worship in the modern church. Something has just seemed “wrong.” To be sure, there are pockets of “right,” but at large I've just sensed something “wrong,” I've been trying to put my finger on what exactly the problem is, all the while praying for guidance and revelation. On the local level at my own church we've had issues with things like sound quality, musicianship, preparedness, and just a general air of mediocrity. But it was more than that (I should point out here that much of this has been addressed by a recent change in leadership). There was just a feeling that something was “wrong,” and I couldn't describe it, except to say that it seemed as if the Holy Spirit was simply absent in so much of the praise and worship I was witnessing, just as the Holy Spirit's presence is palpable when things are “right.”

God is faithful, and lately He's been answering the desperate question I've been lifting up to Him for months: What's wrong? The answer? In short, I think we have it backwards.

We've made our times of corporate worship about us, and not about God. We are coming to worship – to church – to get something for ourselves rather than to bring an offering to God.

We do not approach our worship services with a sense of awe and reverence. We casually walk into a building (running late, more often than not) moments away from participating in what should be a sacred event: the Church – the very Bride of Christ – coming together to bring offerings, sacrifices of praise before Him and His Heavenly Father and lay them at the foot of his Throne of Grace – a Throne that, by the way, we can only approach because of and through the death and resurrection of Jesus. And we do it by rote, perhaps even flippantly in some cases.

But A.W. Tozer says in That Incredible Christian that “No one who knows Him intimately can ever be flippant in His presence” (pg. 129). Our times of corporate worship should be times of response to God, but how can we respond to God if we are not experiencing Him intimately? If we don't know Him? Are we encountering God in significant ways during the week so that we come to worship together filled up to the point that our praise offerings overflow in songs of adoration? I think for many of us the answer is “no.” For many of us, encounters with God are all but absent Monday through Saturday, and are lives are indistinguishable from that of anyone else, Christian or no. We've consigned God to 90 minutes on Sunday. And cynical as it may sound, I would not be surprised if He didn't even bother to show up, if that's all we have for Him.

God has been trying to get this through my head for a very long time, I now realize. This conviction that worship is a time of offering that is meant to be a response to God and who He is, what He has done, and what He is doing in our lives. It is a time that is all about God. It is for Him, to Him, and through Him.

At first God was subtle, using lyrics to the praise songs I was drawn to over and over:

• “How can I stand here with You and not be moved by You?” – Lifehouse, Everything
• “How can I keep from singing Your Praise?....I know I am loved by the King/And it makes my heart want to sing” – Chris Tomlin, How Can I keep from Singing
• “I'm coming back to the heart of worship/And it's all about You/All about You, Jesus/I'm sorry, Lord for the thing I've made it/When it's all about You/It's all about You, Jesus.” – Matt Redman, Heart of Worship
• “From the top of the world I will sing/Of the joy that flows from my glorious King” – MercyMe, Beautiful
• “So Heaven meets earth like an unforeseen kiss/And my heart turns violently inside of my chest/I don’t have time to maintain these regrets, When I think about, the way… He loves us!” – John Mark McMillan/David Crowder, How He Loves
• “You make everything glorious/And I am Yours/What does that make me?” – David Crowder, Everything Glorious
• “You reached down and lifted us up/You came running, looking for us/And now there's nothing/And no one beyond Your love/You're the overflow/You're the fountain of my heart” – Chris Tomlin, Let Your Mercy Rain
• “Let me tell you what He/Has done for me/He has done for you/He has done for us/Come and listen to what He's done...” – David Crowder, Come and Listen
• “Oh, You bring life and breath/In You we live and move/That's why I sing!” – Shane&Shane, Yearn
• “If we could see how much You're worth/Your power, Your might, Your endless love/Then surely we would never cease to praise!” – Matt Redman, Let Everything that Has Breath Praise The Lord

Plus dozens of others!

And when the songs were not quite getting the job done, He led me to read some specific books:

• Praise Habit, by David Crowder
• Facedown, by Matt Redman
• The Air I Breathe, by Louie Giglio
• Mere Christianity, by C.S. Lewis
• Exalt Him!, by Terry Howard Wardle

And to cap it all off, I attended Crowder's Fantastical Church Music Conference in Waco, TX earlier this month, and the speakers (Crowder, Giglio, and Redman among them) and workshop moderators would come back to this idea again and again: that we have it wrong. We have it backwards. We've made what should be about Him about us.

Louie Giglio in his book, The Air I Breathe, addresses this concern:

We aren't designed to operate on a weekly worship cycle, but on a moment-by-moment connection of personal worship that's as much a part of our lives as the air we breathe... Most of my life, I thought that you went to church to worship. But now I see that the approach is to go worshiping to church.
Church is a lot better when our gatherings are filled with people who have been pursuing God for six days before they get there. Church as a “refill” or a “tank-up” is a disaster. Corporate worship works best when we arrive with something to offer God. As opposed to only coming to get something for ourselves from God...
Church is supposed to be a celebration of our personal journeys with God since we were last together...
What would happen if we came worshiping to church, filled with an awareness of His presence before we even reached the door...?
Usually no one has given the service a moment's thought until they arrive. We come through the door like we're shopping at the mall. We sit and chat. We wait for someone to guide us before we ever stop and connect with the privilege of it all. (pages 114-117)

The privilege of it all! What a blessing – an undeserved honor – to be able to worship our Heavenly Father! A privilege paid for with the blood of His Son. But we – I – rarely contemplate this before worship. I'm thinking about the chaos in my house trying to get out the door so we could be on time. I'm thinking about the yard work that is waiting for me later that afternoon. We're thinking about the arguments we had with our spouses that morning, or how much of the football game we're going to miss because of this inconvenience called worship.

I have come to realize that to some degree, the frustrations that led me to question what was wrong with our worship were actually symptoms of the very thing that was wrong. I was dissatisfied with my experience during our praise and worship times. It did not measure up to my standards or expectations, nor those of many of my fellow congregants. We were not getting what we wanted out of the services. We weren't “experiencing the presence of God” as we had in the past. I was frustrated.

Notice all of the pronouns in the previous paragraph. “I” appears three times. “Me/my” appears four times. “We/our” appears seven times. My concerns were almost all about myself or “us” collectively, the congregation. And it's not even supposed to be about us! It's all about God! But honestly, did I ever really ask myself if the worship was pleasing to God? Acceptable in His sight? I don't know, perhaps I did. But certainly not much. That was not my primary focus.

Isaac Wardell of Bifrost Arts put it this way speaking recently at Crowder's Fantastical Church Music Conference: “We come to worship full of expectation, looking for a moment of transcendence, and we get disappointed when we don't experience it.” We have become almost hedonistic in our approach to worship, judging its success or failure by how it made us feel, or whether or not we were satisfied or “filled-up.”

Terry Howard Wardle, in his book, Exalt Him!, states similarly:

Those in the pews sit and watch as the person up front performs. They evaluate the service based on what they receive rather than on what they put into the experience...We are a generation of spectators who watch television, sports events – most everything. And this has affected our understanding of the worship service. It has become another place where we watch and where we expect to be entertained (page 15).

Francis Chan, also speaking at Crowder's Conference, said this: “The goal is not that we leave and say 'that was good,' but rather that God would look down from heaven and say, 'that is good!'” Francis went on to share the following words from Amos Chapter 5 wherein Amos, the prophet of God, is delivering God's words of judgment to Israel. Israel had been neglecting and oppressing the poor, taking bribes, tolerating corrupt courts, and generally loving evil more than good. And God had this to say to them through Amos:

I hate, I despise your religious feasts;
I cannot stand your assemblies.

Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them.
Though you bring choice fellowship offerings,
I will have no regard for them.

Away with the noise of your songs!
I will not listen to the music of your harps.” (Amos 5:21-23, NIV)

As I look back now on the past several months, I see my motives more clearly. But my observations were no less valid, and I think that even had my motives been more rightly aligned, and I had been asking myself if our worship was pleasing to God, I'm not sure what the answer would have been. Because so much of what makes our worship pleasing and acceptable to God is based on what is going on outside of the time of corporate worship. How are we living our lives? If we are not right with God, if the church is not living as the Church should live, ministering to a fallen, hurting world, loving justice and mercy and walking with God in humble obedience (to paraphrase Micah 6:8), then no matter how good our worship is – how polished and prepared – we cannot expect God to accept it or even listen. Woe to us if God were to ever say to us “I cannot stand your assemblies...Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps.”

What does all of this say about our perception of God? Because let's be honest, our worship is a direct representation of our view of God. C.S. Lewis said, “Praise is the culmination of our enjoyment of anything.” In other words, if we enjoy it, we'll praise it. Watch any NFL game or rock concert, and you see this truth at work. Do we enjoy God? Are we enjoying him throughout the week, and coming to worship on Sunday (or whenever/wherever you gather to worship) to deliver the culmination of our enjoyment of God up to Him?

In The Air I Breathe, Louie Giglio writes:

When you break it all down, true worship is simply catching sight of the greatness, majesty, glory, and grace of an infinite God.
When God is not greatly praised, it's only because we don't think He's that great of a God. When our worship is small, it's because our concept of God is small. When we offer God little-bitty sacrifices, it's because we've somehow reduced Him in our hearts to a little-bitty God (page 60).

David Crowder, in Praise Habit, writes:

Remember how effortlessly we sang the praises of things we enjoyed? It was so easy and fluid and natural. What if this kind of praise freely leaked from us in delightful response to God? What if life were like that all the time? What if we were so moved by who God is, what He's done, what He will do, that praise, adoration, worship, whatever, continuously careened in our heads and pounded in our souls? What if praise were on the tip of our tongues like we were a loaded weapon in the hands of a trigger-happy meth addict and every moment might just set us off? This is what we will do for eternity. What makes us think our time on earth should be any different? What keeps it from being so? (page 23)

I think what keeps it from being so is that we've turned our worship – our entire spiritual lives – into a spectator sport. We are not participating. We're not experiencing God in our lives and in the lives of others, and so we have nothing to which we can respond. As my Pastor, Kurt Horting of Still Water Community Church in Rowlett, TX, likes to say, “Don't stay on the sidelines! Get in the game!”

But what causes someone to get off the sidelines and into the game? It's one thing to just love the game. But you can love the game and be satisfied watching it on your big screen from the comfort of your couch. Getting on the field and facing down a 280 pound defensive lineman who wants nothing more than to roll over you like a Sherman tank requires that you love something more than just the game. Kids put themselves into the game, take the hits, put in the practice, the sweat, the tears, suffer the injuries, dance in the end zone, and celebrate the victories because they love a coach, or an alma mater, or their parents, or their teammates. Something or someone beyond the game. When you love, respect, and desperately want to please the One you are playing for, the sidelines no longer satisfy.

Those of you who know me know that sports analogies are not my forte. I apologize if that one was a little clumsy! Here's how a better writer than I describes this spectator/participant challenge as it pertains to our worship:

Worship isn't something you watch, contrary to the thinking of many of us who attend church. That may be hard to believe, given that in most churches the rows of seats (or pews) are arranged so that you have the best view of what's happening onstage. If that's not enough, the action is often magnified on the big screens. The lights also point to the platform. And to help you with your viewing pleasure, you're handed a program at the door – a lineup card for what's happening in today's “show,” if you will. After all, it's all put on for your enjoyment, right?
But here's a news flash for you. Worship isn't something you attend, like a movie or a concert. Worship is something you enter into with all your might. Worship is a participation sport in a spectator culture. (Louie Giglio, The Air I Breathe, page 54)

We need to get to know God and experience Him every day, every moment of our lives, so that our times of worship – whether alone or corporate, in our prayer closet, our cars, or gathered in our houses of worship – overflow as we pour out our response to an Almighty God who sacrificed His son so we could enter in to His presence. Matt Redman puts it this way: “God reveals and we respond. God shines, and we reflect.” (Facedown, page 14)

We have it so much better than the Israelites had it! We get to approach God, the Father. We get to come before the Mercy Seat and place our offerings at His feet. For the Hebrew Children, God, while present in their daily lives, was personally out of reach. He dwelt inside the Holy of Holies, which was at the center of the Tabernacle behind a veil, and inaccessible to all except the High Priest, and even he could only enter once a year and only after offering a blood sacrifice.

The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ has provided for us a final atonement for sins, making those who accept Him as Lord and savior holy in God's sight and allowing us to enter into the Holy of Holies – to have a relationship with God the Father directly. The Gospels tell us that when Christ died, the curtain separating the Holy of Holies was torn (Matthew 27, Mark 15, Luke 23), and Hebrews Chapter 10 goes on to say that the very Body of Christ was the veil, and that when the body was broken, the veil was torn, and therefore “we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus” (Hebrews 10:20)

But the Israelites had us beat hands-down when it came to understanding that times of corporate worship were to be about, for, and to God – a response offering to all He is, has done, and is doing in our lives. The Song of Ascents is a title given by the Jews to 15 Psalms, 120-134 in our modern Bible. These Psalms were sung by people as they went up to – ascended to - Jerusalem for the three Jewish pilgrim festivals, and by the priests as they would climb the steps to minister at the Temple. The Jews understood the importance of preparing to enter in to worship, of rightly aligning their hearts and thoughts so that they would not profane the sanctity of what was about to take place: a coming close to God. For Christians, who know Jesus Christ as Messiah, it is a time during which Jesus Christ presents his Bride, the Church to His Father, and we respond to all the Father is and has done.

I won't quote all 15 Psalms here, but I encourage you to read them, and read them often. They are songs to God, songs of humbling ourselves before our Maker, acknowledging our need for Him. They are songs about rightly aligning ourselves with our creator and acknowledging that we are the created, and that all that is good comes from God. And they are songs about what separates a people of God from the rest of the world.

This is one of the reasons I miss liturgies in our modern worship services sometimes. I understand the Church's desire for cultural relevance and I've heard church leaders say that for some, the trappings of traditional church can have negative connotations. So we've done away with those trappings in an effort to make people more comfortable in church. But that begs this question: should we be comfortable in church? If we can truly enter in to worship comfortably, haven't we lost a sense of who we are and who God is? God is in Heaven, and we are here on earth. We should be guarding our steps when we go to the house of God (Eccl 5).

And what's more, aren't we kidding ourselves if we think it's the Church's traditions or rituals or the buildings or the décor that have turned people off of church? No, rather I believe it is hypocrisy, self-righteousness, and a lack of love – whether perceived or real – that turn people off of church; or more accurately, turn people off of Christians. The truth is that the Spirit of God is attractive. God is pursuing his people, and everyone in their heart of hearts yearns to be restored to God. If we preach truth with grace in our churches, testify to the redeeming, life-changing power of Christ and the Holy Spirit in and through our lives, and we love others – love EVERYONE – as Christ first loved us, then I believe our sanctuaries will be filled to overflowing with people drawn by God to Himself, hungering for more of what they have only just begun to taste. And they won't care one little bit about the décor or whether or not there is a worship order or choir or whether they are sitting in a pew or chair, or whether the pastor is in a suit or jeans, or even if there's a pipe organ or an kick drum. *gasp*

Traditional liturgies serve a similar purpose as the Song of Ascent. They help prepare our hearts for worship, for responding to God. There are as many different liturgies as there are denominations, but almost all of them begin with a call to worship where we acknowledge God's holiness, followed by a time of confession where we have a chance to prepare ourselves to receive His Word. We hear of our forgiveness and then enter in to a time of response, after we've been reminded Who and what we have to respond to.

For the better part of 1200 years, the Roman Catholic Church was the Christian Church, and one of the most powerful forces in the Western world. This period in church history saw more than its fair share of shameful acts committed in the name of God and His Church. From the Crusades to the Spanish Inquisition, from the selling of indulgences to the burning of heretics, it was a dark time for the Church.

But there were bright spots as well. This period, especially the latter part, gave the world some of the most glorious and beautiful architectural achievements it has ever seen, namely in the Gothic Cathedrals built to glorify God. The basic design of these cathedrals, the traditional Basilica layout, formed the shape of a cross when viewed from above. This was during a period when the builders lacked the technology to fly above and see the symbol for themselves, but it was also during a time when God and Heaven were still thought of as “up.” This design was for God alone. Inside, the cathedral layout was designed to lead to the sacristy and the altar, and the architecture was grand and lofty, drawing the eyes upward toward heaven and reminding the people of the majesty of God and their own relative insignificance.


The designers and builders of the great Gothic Cathedrals understood worship. They must have had a definition similar to the famous definition from Dr. Bruce Leafblad, Professor of Church Music and Worship at Southwestern Theological Seminary: “Worship is centering our mind's attention and our heart's affection on the Lord.” You could not – cannot, even today – enter a cathedral and not have your mind's attention and heart's affection instantly directed toward the things of God.

Again, Louie Giglio from The Air I Breathe:

The corporate gathering is a sacred thing. A special thing. A holy thing. Maybe we need bigger buildings after all. Cathedrals that remind us that we're really small and God is really big. Buildings that force us to look up.

Matt Redman in his book, Facedown, quotes David Crowder as saying “I want to build cathedrals. I want to use words and notes rather than stone and mortar.”

But somehow we've come from a place where we built buildings to show the grandeur of God to remodeling churches that look and feel like our living rooms. I'm not sure that's such a good thing. Any time we try to mold that which is of God into something that looks like ourselves, we're on dangerous ground.

Now I'm not saying we need to spend gazillions of dollars building lavish modern cathedrals while our country wallows in a recession, people are out of work, children are homeless, and there are entire people groups in the world that have yet to hear the good news of Jesus Christ. We are called to be good stewards of the resources God has given us and to help those less fortunate. But I am saying that perhaps we need to make houses of worship that look more like somewhere God would dwell and less like somewhere I would kick my feet up and watch TV. Something that hints at the majesty and mystery of God – the otherness of God. Something I can respond to vs. something I can relate to. Because if I can relate to God, then I have lost track of who God is. He is so far above me, beyond me, that I can never relate to Him. But I can certainly respond to Him, submit to Him, honor Him, worship Him, love Him, adore Him. And be loved by Him.

Louie Giglio, in his foreword to Matt Redman's book, Facedown, addresses this tendency to shrink our God down to a more comfortable size and offers tips on how we can avoid it:

Without true glimpses of God we will invariably try to shrink Him down to our own size rather than allow even the tiniest taste of His infinite glory to stretch our mind and soul upward as we try to Fathom His. That's why worship without revelation is so lackluster, dull and void of the awesome wonder that belongs to God alone – the kind of nearsighted worship we can comfortably offer standing up or sitting down. But when our eyes are opened to the drink in His matchless beauty, we are intrinsically drawn facedown to the ground – that place of worship where we are both secure and somewhat afraid, in love and in awe, bowed low yet somehow lifted high. (page 9)

Because as Christ followers, our entire lives should be lived as responses to God. Matt Redman expands on the responsive nature of our relationship with God:

Worship is our response to God. In other words, we don't initiate worship; God does. … Our whole relationship with God works the same way:
He loves. We love in return.
He calls. We answer.
He leads. We follow. (page 55)

Unless we see God, we cannot worship Him. Worship is what spontaneously flows out of us when we come face-to-face with Him. It's the natural response to all of who He is – our uncalculated response to all He has done... At it's core, worship is all about God. It's for Him. Our worship is to Him. (page 59)

When someone says, “Worship is not really my thing,” then clearly they have not come face-to-face with God. We need to glimpse His greatness. We need to be ministering to each other in such a way that we provide opportunity to come face-to-face with the loving Creator of the universe. We throw around words like “mighty,” “majesty,” and “awesome,” but the meanings have become watered down and lack the potency they once had.

Louie Giglio spoke on the second day of Crowder's Fantastical Church Music Conference, and he called on God's people to restore the Church's awe of God:

To restore the awe – to keep the awe –you must stay orbiting around the cross of Jesus Christ. Christ has awakened us from the dead. Awakened people – alive people – sing. That's what they do. (Giglio, Fantastical, 10/1/2010)

I know that I am an Awakened Person. Christ has awakened me from the dead! And so I will sing! Every time I experience God, I pray I will respond with authentic worship that is for Him, through Him and to Him. I challenge you – and myself – to purposely seek God out this week. This day. This moment and every moment. Be on your knees in prayer, be in God's Word, and take risks daily to take the message of God's grace, healing, and love to every person He puts in front of you. Seek out opportunities to experience God so that when we meet together again to worship, it will be a “gifted response,” not about us, but all about Him, and His Son who's blood makes our worship possible.

I'll leave you with a little bit more from Matt Redman in Facedown:

The more we delve into the otherness of God, the more we grasp the truth that worship is quite simply “all about Him...” The whole of our existence – our creation, our salvation, and our sanctification – is first and foremost all about God...We are the created, and He is the uncreated. Isaiah 43. (page 30-31)

It's time for the singing Church to once again encounter the beautiful otherness of God. But we cannot sing of that which we have not seen. ( page 36)

Amen.

Metallica in Church?!!

Ultimate-Guitar.com is one of my favorite websites. It's a user-driven forum for posting tabs and chord charts for guitar and bass, and their database is enormous. When I'm looking for a chart or tab for a song, I'll find it on Ultimate-Guitar.com probably 8 out of 10 times, including praise and worship songs.

The site was initially started by metal guitarists for metal guitarists, but it's power was quickly recognized by players of all genres, and it's refreshing to find a Joe Satriani tab on the same site as a Chris Tomlin chord chart. Not that I could ever play the former, but it's good to know they are there. ;)

Another great feature of the site is that they comb the web for articles relevant to their primary audience (metal guitarists) and re-post them on their site, along with links to the original articles. These are often articles I would never see otherwise (the one I'm blogging about was in the Calgary Sun), and might be about upcoming albums, artist interviews, or obits for guitar legends that have passed away, etc.

One of the feature articles from 8/13 really caught my eye: "Pastor talks about 'The Day Metallica Came to Church.'" What a provocative title! I had to read it, and you should, too.

I also encourage you to view the video excerpt (below) from the pastor's (John Van Sloten, pastor of New Hope Church in Calgary) sermon, as well as read the PDF sample from his book.



At the core of what Rev. Sloten is saying in this sermon and in his book is that God can and does speak to us through our culture at large, or at least we can, by the Holy Spirit, find Spiritual truths in secular culture and its art forms, heavy metal music included. Sloten, a pastor of a Reformed Christian congregation, fully supports John Calvin's idea that "all truth is inspired by the Holy Spirit," whether or not those espousing the truth acknowledge it's source.

What's more, Van Sloten challenges believers to not ignore our secular culture or we risk missing its cries for help. Our world cries out for God, and we miss those cries as we fearfully turn a blind eye (after one last, contemptuous, self-righteous glare, of course) to anyone and anything outside of the church. God tells us through the Apostle John in his first Epistle that we are to be "in the world, but not of the world," but many of us have decided to not be in it either, if we can help it (1 John 2:15-17). I made this very point myself in one of my blog posts from back in July Sloten reminds us that Christ himself had no time for the self-righteous, hypocritical church establishment, but rather spent His time with those who most needed Him. Jesus states boldly in Mark 2, ""It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners" (verse 17).

The challenge here, of course, is to safely walk that fine line between being aware of our culture so we can hear and respond to its cries for help with the love and grace of Christ, and allowing ourselves to be led away from God and into temptation. It can be very easy to rationalize our participation in activities that we know are contrary to what God would want for us by saying, "I'm just getting understanding of our culture so I can minister more effectively."

Wayne Watson (I'm dating myself here, I know!) clearly understood this balancing act when he penned the lyrics for his 1988 song, "The Fine Line:"

There's a fine line
Between taking bread with a lost man
And being consumed by his way
While reaching out in love
Temptation's right at your door
Guard what you're thinking of
It's a fine line
When I hide my eyes
From the darkest of our life's insanity
From the worst of the world's profanity
I've gotta be careful
I don't miss anyone in need of me
It's a fine line--Oh yes, it's a fine line

We cannot follow Christ's example and be willing to reach out to a lost and hurting world and simultaneously ignore God's warnings elsewhere in Scripture. God tells us to "flee from sexual immorality," (1 Cor 6:18), and to fill our minds with "...whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable...,excellent or praiseworthy" (Phil 4:8). This could be difficult to do while watching an R-rated movie to see if God has anything to say through it. You don't have to watch porn to understand that our world has twisted God's design for sexuality, or to understand that many people turn to sex for a feeling of affection and self-worth that only God and God-centered relationships (parent, spouse, etc.) can provide.

I have not read enough of Sloten's book to know whether or not he addresses this. I hope he does. But I absolutely intend to read the whole book, which will probably result in a few more posts.

But overall, I applaud Rev. Sloten's efforts here, and I agree with at least some of His points about finding God's truth in our culture at large, and often in very unlikely places. I also strongly believe that all of us individually and the Church as a whole need to do a better job of understanding secular culture and reaching out to people where they are, instead of cloistering ourselves inside our sanctuaries and waiting on the world to come walking through our doors. We'd be waiting a long time, I think, and what's more, I think deep down inside, many traditional church-goers would be quite content if the unwashed -- and unsaved -- masses never darkened the doors of the church at all. Heaven forbid anything upset the sterile, self-righteous status quo! :)

And who knows? Perhaps Sloten's sermon and book will help overcome the stigma surrounding heavy metal music. Certainly there's heavy metal music out there that any believer would want to avoid, but that can be said of just about every genre of popular music. Metal has a lot to offer. Many instrumental virtuosos ply their trade in the metal arena, and as Pastor Sloten and droves of metalheads around the world know very well, there is an emotional power and lyrical authenticity found in heavy metal that is hard to find elsewhere.

Rock on!