It’s Not About Getting Fed - Psalm 100 (Wednesday Night Refection)
We
all like to eat, don’t we. I mean, just
consider this great covered dish meal that we have just finished, and all these
fellowship meals that we have enjoyed each Wednesday. Many of us are looking forward to next week
when we will enjoy our Thanksgiving feasts (a day that begins a season marked
by a tendency to overeat as much as anything else). Eating is a good thing, I mean, we need the
nourishment to give us the energy to do the things we all need to do,
right?
Yes. Eating is a good thing. Yes.
It gives us the energy we need to do what’s set before us. The trouble becomes, though, when we carry
the attitude about eating into every other aspect of our lives. Suddenly the value of anything becomes what
we are getting out of it, whether or not it is feeding us. An especially troubling area where we have
taken this attitude is “worship.”
Somehow,
somewhere along the way, we developed the notion that worship is about us. It’s not a recent development. It has been around as long as I have been in
the ministry…sadly, it was an attitude that I had before I entered the
ministry. What am I talking about? I am talking about the almost innumerable
times I have been told over the last twenty-two years, “I used to go to church
at (fill in the blank church)” or “I used to come to worship” or “We
need to change something, pastor,” “I wasn’t/I’m not getting fed.” We’ve made worship about what we get out of
it…it somehow has become about us…about our getting fed…and when we don’t get
fed at one church, we either start complaining or we start church hopping. The trouble is, my brothers and sisters, that
this notion about worship is not only wrong, it is blasphemous, because it
makes us the focus of worship.
The
problem with making worship about getting fed…with considering ourselves, as
members of the congregation, the audience…is that it is making the central
focus of worship not God, but us. The
focus of worship can never be about us.
A
big clue about how wrong it is to make worship about us, about getting fed,
should be the pitfalls.
First,
to make worship about feeding the people, the congregation, is a prescription
for failure. Why? Because we are all picky eaters. Let me give you some examples from what could
be any church.
There
is the question of traditional hymns versus contemporary Christian music…there
are more churches than you could possibly imagine where that is an ongoing
battle. One group really likes
traditional…the other group really likes contemporary. Both say they are not fed by the other.
There
is the order of worship. Some like the
sermon in the middle with everything from our prayers to our affirmation of
faith to the offering and communion coming as a response to the Word proclaimed. Others would rather keep the sermon at the
end, where there can be an Invitation during the final song and then everyone
goes home. Each claims that the other
does nothing for them in worship.
Then
there is the question of screens or other visual enhancements of worship. Some, particularly visual learners, claim
that the screen illustrations or “props” in the chancel area help them more
fully delve into the sermon…others claim it is a distraction.
If
you want proof that feeding the congregation by trying to make everyone happy
is the wrong route to go, forget all of these other things and simply be the
one in charge of the worship space’s thermostat.
Another
pitfall is that making worship about being fed, leads to worry and anxiety on
behalf of those leading worship…because it becomes about performance. Not only is there worry about whether or not
the matriarch or the patriarch of the church will like what is being served as
worship…or whether or not it will attract the younger crowd…there is simply
worry about performance, whether our efforts will meet the approval of the
connoisseurs of the congregation. What
if I mess up? What if I forget what I am
supposed to be doing? What if someone
laughs at me? (All of this worry stems
from a whole different sermon and that is that often we are not as gracious as
our loving God.) This is why when I talk
to a group of children or anyone getting ready to help lead worship, or offer a
program in worship, that they need to remember that what they are doing is not
something they are doing for their parents, or grandparents, or friends, or
even the congregation, whatever they are doing, they are doing it as an
offering to God
It
is not about what music we do or do not like.
It is not about what order of worship we do or do not use. It is not about whether we have screens or
not. It is not about whether the
preacher delivers a moving message or not.
It is not about us. It is never
about us. It is, always has been, and
always should be, about God.
True
worship is about turning the entirety of ourselves over to God. It is about gathering with our brothers and
sisters and turning our attention, not toward ourselves, not toward our
brothers and sisters, not even really toward those leading worship, but
together turning our attention to God.
It
is about, as Jesus told the Samaritan woman at the well, worshipping God in
“Spirit and in Truth.” It is about,
whether we like the music or not, singing to God with all our heart and soul
and mind and strength, praising His Name.
It is about baring our very souls before God in prayer, offering God
thanksgiving for the innumerable blessings He has poured out upon us, and, at
His invitation, casting all our burdens at His feet, and leaving them
there. It is about opening up our hearts
and our ears to hear the Word of God, regardless of how eloquent or how poorly
the person proclaiming the message is.
True worship is about emptying ourselves in the presence of God.
And
you know what, my brothers and sisters…if we do that…if we truly empty
ourselves before God…offering God all that we are. Then we will, surprisingly, find ourselves
filled. As a friend of mine from
Biscuitville put it once, when we were discussing worship, “It is not about
getting fed, but if we aren’t getting fed, it may be because we are holding our
mouths closed.”[ii] For you see, we all come into worship
full—full of struggles, full of happiness, full of confusion, maybe just full
of ourselves. God is already here. If we hold our mouths and minds closed, maybe
because we don’t like the way things are or for some other reason, we remain
full of all we brought in…leaving no room for God to pour himself into us. However, if we open and empty
ourselves—through prayer, praise, and hearing, seeking to worship God rather
than get fed, emptied, we have made room for God to fill us with Himself…and we
depart, fed and full.
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the
Holy Spirit. Amen.
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