It's on days like this that I begin to get a grasp and feel of the majesty of my Lord around me. The blue sky above me shines bright, deep, and thoughtful with a mind of its own. The wispy white clouds that streak the sky flow along with the gusts of wind that blow past my face, playing with me like an excited child and saying "Watch what I can do! Look, look!" I can't help but laugh. The warmth of the sun is so obvious as I walk from the shade to the sunlight streaming through the atmosphere. It heats up the skin that was previously so cold and dark and lightens it up, giving life and light.
All of these things I see around me in creation, each seemingly with it's own personality, flows from the breath and hands of the Creator. They are in place in perfect harmony by a Heavenly Composer, and the beautiful thing is: they know it!
They know they are here on Earth because of a Creator. They don't say to themselves, "I'm an amazing sky, look at my color," or "I am warming up this world with my light, and I'm proud of it." No! They simply say, "Look! Look at who made me! Isn't he amazing!" They know their proper place. They understand that they are here for His glory, reflecting His majesty, and pointing back to His grace. Wow! I hope I can learn from the blue sky and white clouds and playful wind and warm sun to praise my Creator that well. I want to glorify Him, because without Him, I am nothing.
D
Flesh-Heart
Recently, I've been wrestling with what true, biblical worship is. What does it look like? What does it entail? What are we supposed to do or say or sing or play? How important is it? So many questions, so there's an equal need for answers. It's a subject that I feel responsible to have at least a decent grasp on, seeing as I am a worship leader. How can I be a proficient leader in worship if I don't understand what it is I'm leading people in? So, here's what I've come up with so far, with help from worship leaders before me.
"Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship." -Romans 12:1
We were created for God's glory out of his unconditional, never-ending love. He didn't need us, but He desired us. He is perfect, holy, and complete without imperfect humans, but because of His love, he desired to show love to another. If we can grasp that off the bat, that's at least half of worship as I see it: we need God infinitely more than He needs us.
This may sound somewhat pessimistic and degrading to humanity, but in reality it is a beautiful thing. We are loved by the Creator of the universe, by the Alpha and Omega, by the Heavenly Father. It's not a love out of requirement, or a love expecting anything in return. It's a love beyond our grasp and comprehension because there is no perfect love that has ever existed here on Earth beyond that of Christ dying in our place. But it stands as a model, an example, which we are called to follow.
As we begin to see God's perfect love more clearly, we equally grow in our grasp on grace. We are depraved, evil-to-the-core, ugly beings who deserve every form of punishment and death available because of the rebellion we have headed against God, "for the wages of sin is death." God cannot stand the sight of sin, and we are stained with it. If it were of our own accord and strength to be made right in God's eyes, we would all fall flat on our faces "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." But there is beauty in our depravity.
Out of that perfect, unconditional love that God is made of, He sent His son for us, His only son, His perfect son, to cover us in grace. He died in our place. He took the punishment for sin, the wrath of God, the separation that we deserved to the grave. And after three days, he rose in victory, forever conquering death and sin. He is our atonement. He is our living sacrifice. His blood covers our sins and allows us to be accepted into God's family. And when we call on Him and give ourselves over to His calling for our lives, we begin our journey of worship. That salvation, the beginning of sanctification, is also our first act of worship.
We stand in victory with Christ over death, and it's not of our own accord or strength, it is through Christ's sacrifice this happens. When we point back to Him, we are worshiping. We are dying to our old selves and taking the new, flesh-heart Christ bought for us, and through that we are glorifying him. When we understand the first half of worship ("we need God infinitely more than He needs us"), the second part falls into place: because of the love-laced grace through which Christ saved us, the least we can do is give ourselves over fully and with nothing held back to God so that the world can see His glorious work in action.
That brings us full circle: ...in view of God’s mercy...offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. We do this for His glory, not our own. We praise and sing and read and pray and dance and breathe and cry and scream and laugh and live for His glory. The more we point back to Him through the gifts He has given us, the better we are fulfilling our purpose here on Earth: to love Him because He loved us, to pursue Him because He pursued us, to woo Him because he wooed us, to surrender ourselves to Him because His son surrendered himself, and to glorify Him because we were made in the image of His glorious self. That is worship in a nutshell. Hope that helps. :-)
D
"Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship." -Romans 12:1
We were created for God's glory out of his unconditional, never-ending love. He didn't need us, but He desired us. He is perfect, holy, and complete without imperfect humans, but because of His love, he desired to show love to another. If we can grasp that off the bat, that's at least half of worship as I see it: we need God infinitely more than He needs us.
This may sound somewhat pessimistic and degrading to humanity, but in reality it is a beautiful thing. We are loved by the Creator of the universe, by the Alpha and Omega, by the Heavenly Father. It's not a love out of requirement, or a love expecting anything in return. It's a love beyond our grasp and comprehension because there is no perfect love that has ever existed here on Earth beyond that of Christ dying in our place. But it stands as a model, an example, which we are called to follow.
As we begin to see God's perfect love more clearly, we equally grow in our grasp on grace. We are depraved, evil-to-the-core, ugly beings who deserve every form of punishment and death available because of the rebellion we have headed against God, "for the wages of sin is death." God cannot stand the sight of sin, and we are stained with it. If it were of our own accord and strength to be made right in God's eyes, we would all fall flat on our faces "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." But there is beauty in our depravity.
Out of that perfect, unconditional love that God is made of, He sent His son for us, His only son, His perfect son, to cover us in grace. He died in our place. He took the punishment for sin, the wrath of God, the separation that we deserved to the grave. And after three days, he rose in victory, forever conquering death and sin. He is our atonement. He is our living sacrifice. His blood covers our sins and allows us to be accepted into God's family. And when we call on Him and give ourselves over to His calling for our lives, we begin our journey of worship. That salvation, the beginning of sanctification, is also our first act of worship.
We stand in victory with Christ over death, and it's not of our own accord or strength, it is through Christ's sacrifice this happens. When we point back to Him, we are worshiping. We are dying to our old selves and taking the new, flesh-heart Christ bought for us, and through that we are glorifying him. When we understand the first half of worship ("we need God infinitely more than He needs us"), the second part falls into place: because of the love-laced grace through which Christ saved us, the least we can do is give ourselves over fully and with nothing held back to God so that the world can see His glorious work in action.
That brings us full circle: ...in view of God’s mercy...offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. We do this for His glory, not our own. We praise and sing and read and pray and dance and breathe and cry and scream and laugh and live for His glory. The more we point back to Him through the gifts He has given us, the better we are fulfilling our purpose here on Earth: to love Him because He loved us, to pursue Him because He pursued us, to woo Him because he wooed us, to surrender ourselves to Him because His son surrendered himself, and to glorify Him because we were made in the image of His glorious self. That is worship in a nutshell. Hope that helps. :-)
D
A Perfect Fit
I have learned recently the necessity of grace, the fact that no matter what I do, no matter what I think, no matter how many good things I try to do to cover up all the bad things, the evilness within myself far outweighs them. It's a lesson that's been a long time coming. For so long I have leaned on my own sense of grace and my own sense of strength that I didn't realize until now that this crooked crutch I've depended on has had me on a path I was never meant to stumble down. Last night, as I was reading Romans 2 and 3, God's words hit so close to home I began to bawl.
I cried for the fact that I have been running from God, wanting to do the things I wanted to do, the things I thought would fulfill my sick desires. I cried for the fact that I had turned my back on my Father. I cried for the fact that I had felt so little remorse for so long for the sins I had used to nail Christ to the cross. I cried out for forgiveness. I cried out for mercy. I cried out in anger towards myself and for the fact that I knew that justice must be served, and that I deserved every bit of it. I prayed in agony for God to just take away this pain, and even more painful was that I knew I deserved it.
This separation from my Creator, my Redeemer, my Savior was hell, in the fullest sense of the word. I knew my sins and I saw them standing there, laughing at me and scoffing at this small, sickly being that knew nothing and had done even less for my Lord. These sins that I had no way of shedding on my own, of my own accord. I was stained to the very bone marrow with sins as crimson as the thickest blood, and there was nothing I could do about it, and that overtook me.
But in my pain, sorrow, anger, emptiness, depravity, I heard a voice through the darkness that was calling my name. I heard a voice that seemed so familiar and so close, I thought it was there with me. It said, "Get up, David. Get up and take my hand. You are my son, my creation, my love, and I have paid the price for you. You are mine. You are wholly mine and you don't have to be captive to these sins any longer." I saw him in my mind, reaching out for me with a hole in one hand and holding a robe of the whitest white in the other. I stood up, cowering in his glorious presence, but he touched my tear-drenched cheek and looked into my eyes.
This was my Father. This was my Savior. This was the One who had conquered death for me and the rest of the world. He was alive in front of me, holding my new robe that he had cleansed by his own blood. The darkness was gone. The pain was gone. The anger was gone. All I felt was acceptance into his family. I knew I was still not perfect, and I knew I had a long road to travel to grow closer to this man, but in his presence, anything was possible. I had found my life in him.
He put it on the white robe he had been holding for me and I put it on...it was a perfect fit.
I cried for the fact that I have been running from God, wanting to do the things I wanted to do, the things I thought would fulfill my sick desires. I cried for the fact that I had turned my back on my Father. I cried for the fact that I had felt so little remorse for so long for the sins I had used to nail Christ to the cross. I cried out for forgiveness. I cried out for mercy. I cried out in anger towards myself and for the fact that I knew that justice must be served, and that I deserved every bit of it. I prayed in agony for God to just take away this pain, and even more painful was that I knew I deserved it.
This separation from my Creator, my Redeemer, my Savior was hell, in the fullest sense of the word. I knew my sins and I saw them standing there, laughing at me and scoffing at this small, sickly being that knew nothing and had done even less for my Lord. These sins that I had no way of shedding on my own, of my own accord. I was stained to the very bone marrow with sins as crimson as the thickest blood, and there was nothing I could do about it, and that overtook me.
But in my pain, sorrow, anger, emptiness, depravity, I heard a voice through the darkness that was calling my name. I heard a voice that seemed so familiar and so close, I thought it was there with me. It said, "Get up, David. Get up and take my hand. You are my son, my creation, my love, and I have paid the price for you. You are mine. You are wholly mine and you don't have to be captive to these sins any longer." I saw him in my mind, reaching out for me with a hole in one hand and holding a robe of the whitest white in the other. I stood up, cowering in his glorious presence, but he touched my tear-drenched cheek and looked into my eyes.
This was my Father. This was my Savior. This was the One who had conquered death for me and the rest of the world. He was alive in front of me, holding my new robe that he had cleansed by his own blood. The darkness was gone. The pain was gone. The anger was gone. All I felt was acceptance into his family. I knew I was still not perfect, and I knew I had a long road to travel to grow closer to this man, but in his presence, anything was possible. I had found my life in him.
He put it on the white robe he had been holding for me and I put it on...it was a perfect fit.
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