As I was recently browsing the internet, I came across a powerful song in which the lyrics and music captured my attention. What made the particular video so powerful, beyond the stated, was the broken individual who was leading the song. I watched as the passion and heart of this man called out with a voice of faith to the "Healer" of the sickness that was taking his life. With oxygen tubes attached to his nose, it seemed as if every struggling breath he took was for the glory of the Lord. My heart welled up with compassion as I thought about the humility portrayed by this dying man who was not giving up his faith in the midst of the fight and who decided with every breath that he would worship the Lord.
My curiosity always seems to get the best of me when I come across stories that inspire me to further consider my walk with the Lord. As I searched for more information about this man, the Lord used his story to challenge me but not in the way I would have expected. As beautiful as I thought this story was, it had a shocking outcome. This man who had beautifully sang his praise before the Lord had a dark secret that not even the closest to him knew about and as with all things, the truth was finally revealed: this man was not dying nor was he sick! To make matters worse, thousands of dollars were collected on his behalf as he attracted the sympathies of those who connected with his story. In the end, it was revealed that the man created this lie in order to attempt to ease his pain from an addiction to pornography.
My interest in this story continued as a scripture came to me in the middle of the night. Isaiah 29:13 states "The Lord says, 'these people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is made up only of rules taught by men." I begin to think about how in the case of this worship leader, this verse spoke truth; however, as I thought about the verse I realized it was also speaking to me! One thing in which often forget is that when it comes to sin, God sees it all the same. Yes, it was an incredibly selfish act on part of this worship leader to have deceived so many people in the name of Christ; however, does God see my selfishness any differently? What about the times I "worship" Him and my thoughts are thinking about what I have to do for the day? What about the times in which I offer a "shout of praise" while the whisperings of sin exist in my heart?
At the very heart of worship lies an integrity of spirit. To pretend to honor the Lord with my words while there are things in my life which do not honor him is missing the heart of worship. Worship is not an "act" of my faith. It is the very essence of my faith. All of my life---my thoughts, my words, my activities should reflect the fact that I am a worshiper of the Lord Jesus Christ! By attempting to convince myself otherwise is to be a friend of hypocrisy. I may relish in the fact that I am a "Christian" and that God's "grace is enough," but I cannot call myself a worshiper if there are areas of my life that do not please the Lord. We can pretend that God accepts our worship on our own terms (...worship made up of only rules taught by men)but in the end, we would only be fooling ourselves.Worship is not about God accepting us. Our lives in Christ are not meant to remain the same. Worship is about us accepting God into our lives----our actions, thoughts, activities, motives, and in the things that bring us pleasure. If we will strive to become like Christ in all things, then we will find that we have grasped the heart of worship.
I have two $2 words for you, Jay. Compartmentalism and sycretism...I agree and appreciate your thoughts and encouragement. Sounds like thoughts born of experience; good and not so.
ReplyDeleteThe place of learning and trusting for me is leading a flock and praise teams in worship. I can't look out on our congregation and make judgements based on the outside 'worship' or lack of 'worship'. It's been a hard road to reserve judgment and simply let God's love flow through me. And yet as I type this, isn't my responsibility to lead the people one step closer to an intimate encounter with the living God? So the Holy Spirit can penetrate the hardness of our hearts.
Any of this making sense?
Totally understand the difficulty of finding that balance of "being the worship leader" and yet, not coming to lead with any presuppositions that would allow yourself to "gauge" how the worship is going based on what we see with our eyes. I've been thinking about sycretism for sometime as I see more and more of it creeping into the church. It's our challenge to allow ourselves to be so transparent that only the Holy Spirit can be seen in what we do. I think that greatest travesty concerning sycretism in the church is that the other "gods" that we keep on the "high places" is ourselves. I wrote a song that kind of sums us where we need to be when it comes to this sort of thing----"More of you, less of me, this is my prayer, it's what I need. To see you there, magnified, where I am dead and you're alive..." Every time I lead worship, I try to remember that "he must be more and I must be less." Thanks for your response
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