Introduction
There are three American idioms that I want to share with you at the
start of my message this morning because we’re going to talk about worship on
this feast day of Christ’s Ascension – and how we might do it with more
intentionality and verve. That is, I
want to consider with you ways that we might worship the Lord our God more
deeply, more faithfully and even more passionately as a congregation.
The gospel text for today tells us that before Christ was raised beyond
our comprehension into the everlasting presence of God, “He opened the minds of
the disciples to understand the scriptures.” Before they had been afraid –
locked away in confusion and grief – but after their minds had been opened by
the wisdom of Jesus, they returned to Jerusalem with great joy. They were changed people – women and men who
not only understood the love of God in new ways – but now also embodied this
love. They became witnesses – the living
evidence that God’s love was greater than death and that Christ’s grace was
bigger than our sins – witnesses.
So as I started to organize my thoughts about this worship in light of
the Ascension earlier in the week, three old truisms kept popping up at me:
· The first belongs
to Satchel Paige, one of the greatest pitchers in American baseball history,
who played in both the segregated Negro League as well as with an integrated
Cleveland Indians team, who said: It
ain’t what you don’t know that hurts you, it’s what you do know that ain’t
necessarily so!
· The second is
ascribed to Earl Landgrebe, an Indiana businessman who while serving in the US
House of Representatives became a fierce partisan against the impeachment of
Richard Nixon in 1972, who said: My
mind is made up; don’t confuse me with the facts.
· And the third
comes from NY Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan who apparently told a television
journalist during a debate that: Everyone
is entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts.
And there are two facts about worship that I want to draw to your
attention today – facts and not opinions – essential truths about common prayer
not incidental personal preferences or habits.
· Fact Number One: worship is like theatre. As Kierkegaard once wrote authentic and
faithful worship starts with the knowledge that God is the audience, the clergy
and musicians are the prompters and coaches and the whole congregation the
actors. When the congregation becomes
the audience – or the consumer – and the pastor and musicians become the
actors… then something is rotten in Denmark and worship is reduced to
entertainment and commodity. The First
Testament of Israel calls this idolatry – a sin – something that separates and
distracts us from the love and grace of the Lord our God.
·
Fact Number Two: worship is an offering we bring
to God that paradoxically gives us back much more than we ever give up. The preacher, William Temple, who once served
as Archbishop of Canterbury during WWII spoke of worship like this:
Worship is the submission of our nature to God. It is the quickening of the conscience by His
holiness; the nourishment of the mind with His truth; the purifying of the imagination by His beauty; the
opening of the heart to His love; the surrender of the will to His purpose –
all gathered up in adoration and the most selfless expression possible…
In a word,
at our most faithful we don’t come to worship to receive a blessing – or to
hear
Insights
Those are
the two facts that shape worship – turning our attention away from
ourselves and bringing an offering of gratitude to God – but all too often
that’s not how contemporary people comprehend worship, right?
· How many times
have you heard someone say: “That
preacher was totally boring; he didn’t help me out at all?” Or this: “The music was really off – it didn’t touch
me at all?” Or even: “I didn’t get ANY
thing out of that service?”
· Have you ever
heard those things? I know I have – man,
I’ve SAID them – and more than once: I
didn’t get ANY thing out of that worship. To which someone should have said to
me, “Well, what did you BRING to it? Did
you enter the gates of the Sanctuary with praise or grumbling? Did you come to church to look in the mirror
or worship the Lord? Do you understand
that the celebration is NOT all about you but the very Creator of the universe
we know as Father, Son and Holy Spirit?”
Maybe Satchel Paige was right: It ain’t what you don’t know that hurts you,
it’s what you do know that ain’t necessarily so! Take, for example, the first
component of our worship on a Sunday morning.
Without looking at the bulletin, do you remember what we call this first
part? GATHER – think about that – what
does it mean? Right underneath this
worship heading there’s a short description that says: A time
to shift gears from the hustle of our everyday lives and become centered in
God’s love.
·
Hmmmmm…. a
time to shift gears from the hustle of our everyday lives and become centered
in God’s love. What do you
think that means? How do you practice
being centered for worship – any ideas?
·
What do most
people do, however, when they come into the Sanctuary for worship?
In our tradition, there are three things we do to help us shift gears
from our usual busyness so that we can become centered in God’s love: we listen quietly and carefully to the
centering music, we participate consciously in the call to worship and we enter
joyfully into the hymn of praise. Three
very specific practices that have been time-tested for millennia to help us
shift gears and be embraced by God’s love – so let’s take a moment to consider
each of these practices so that we might open our minds to the promise of God’s
joy rather than be confused by our opinions and habits, ok?
First there is the centering music – instrumental sounds almost always played
on the organ – and that is not an accident. I’m going to encourage Carlton to
say something about the centering music he plays each week so as he’s making
his way to the microphone let me add these two observations:
· First, the sounds of the music played at the start of
worship have meaning: they are carefully designed to evoke
something within you that resonates with God. They are NOT background, elevator
or “wall paper” music, but a musical invitation connected to some aspect of
God’s truth. But you have to pay
attention, right? Jesus once told his
disciples not to throw pearls before swine… you have to give some focus to the
gift that is being shared musically or else you’ll stay caught in the busy-ness
of your everyday life.
· And second the centering music is almost always
instrumental – no texts are involved
– in order that you might go inward.
This is prayer time – quiet time – transition time not travelling music
or background noise.
·
What else is going on for you during our centering
music, Carlton…?
So first worship begins
with music that calls us inward to be centered in God’s love: did
· First, we have each been called by God into the body
of Christ – not into our personal
time of retreat – nor a private hour alone with the Lord – we have been called into
the body of Christ. The very word church – ekklesia in Greek – means to be
called or summoned out of one
thing and into another. In our case, we
have been called out of selfishness and into community – out of busy-ness and
into reflection and praise – out of ourselves and into Christ.
· Second, because we’ve spent all week being beaten
around by sin and fear and worry and brokenness, we need to recall the deeper
promises of God. The call to worship is like a reality check
that says: you may have been wounded,
but God doesn’t make junk. You are the
beloved of the Lord coming into the presence of God so wake up, pay attention
and rejoice in that peace that passes all understanding.
Are you still with me? This is what Jesus communicated to his disciples
just before he was raised beyond our understanding on the Ascension: he opened their
minds to understand the scriptures and said to them, ‘Thus it is written, that
the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, and that
repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all
nations, beginning from Jerusalem… then lifting up his hands, he blessed them. And while he was blessing them, he withdrew
from them and was carried up into heaven. So they worshipped him and returned
to Jerusalem with great joy.
First we let God’s love center us in sound. Second we
affirm together that we are God’s beloved and that the promises of the Lord are
greater than our fear, pain, sin or wounds.
And third we open our hearts to the Lord in songs of praise. Bono of U2 put it at least as well as Bach
when he said: Music introduced me to God – not belief in God – but an experience of God
that filled and touched me in ways that were greater than myself. We sing hymns of praise – not lament or
confession – but hymns of praise at the start of worship: do you know why?
· Music
is experiential – it puts into practice surrendering our hopes and fears to
God’s love – and opens us to the Spirit in ways thinking and speaking and
reading cannot.
· All
of God’s creatures sing in response to their creation: birds do it, bees do it, coyotes, dogs and
whales do it, too. Scripture tells us
that the angels in heaven sing songs of gratitude perpetually to the Lord. Why
else do we start off worship with songs of praise?
The brilliant contemporary scholar and composer of church
music, Brian Wren, puts it like this:
singing songs of praise to God is corporate, corporeal, inclusive,
creedal, ecclesial, inspirational and evangelical all at the same time. That is to say, singing together unites us in
joy and faith and connects heaven to earth all at the same time.
Conclusion
Throughout the month of May, we’ll be considering what it
means to live into the wisdom
We gather together to become grounded and centered in
God’s love. So let me ask you to think
about this:
· What
would happen if you came in to worship each week and let the sounds of God’s
love speak to you in quietness? Leave
the visiting until coffee hour – or after worship – what would happen if you
gave yourself 10 minutes to get centered in God’s love? What would have to change?
· What
would happen if you joined your voice with others in the call to worship like
it was a refresher course in grace? A
bold reminder that you were God’s beloved?
· What
would happen if you sang the hymn of praise boldly – as a proclamation that
heaven had embraced earth – and that God was the center of your life?
Jesus told his disciples:
You are my witnesses… and I am sending you into the world to pro-claim
and show what the Father has promised through me. Then he opened their minds to understand… and
they returned to Jerusalem with a great joy.
Lord, may be so among and within us, too.
