Sermons

FILTER BY:

← back to list

Apr 29, 2018

Worship Is Not a Spectator Sport (click here to read or below to listen)

Worship Is Not a Spectator Sport (click here to read or below to listen)

Passage: Psalms 96:1-6

Speaker: Rev. Vivian McCarthy, Pastor

Series: Awe and Wonder

Category: Discipleship: Your Relationship with God

Worship, in other words, takes place when we focus our hearts and minds completely on God. ~Rev. Billy Graham

 To listen to the recorded sermon, click here

Recently, I did a very brief survey. I admit it was not scientific. I only asked about 10 people the following question: What helps you experience God in worship? or What makes you feel like you are in God’s presence? There were primarily 2 answers: silence and music. Trying my best not to be even a tiny bit sarcastic, I did point out that the two are almost mutually exclusive, but I think we all can understand what the folks were saying.

So, let’s do another one – another survey. But this time I want to ask a little bit different question: What is worship?

Here are just a few definitions from Christian leaders:

  • Delesslyn Kennebrew, in an article for The Christian Century, wrote: There are numerous definitions of the word worship. Yet, one in particular encapsulates the priority we should give to worship as a spiritual discipline: Worship is to honor with extravagant love and extreme submission (Webster's Dictionary, 1828). True worship, in other words, is defined by the priority we place on who God is in our lives and where God is on our list of priorities. True worship is a matter of the heart expressed through a lifestyle of holiness.1 
  • John Piper, on his website entitled Desiring God, wrote: True worship is a valuing or a treasuring of God above all things.2
  • And in answering a question on his website, Billy Graham wrote: When we truly are worshipping God, our whole attention is on [God]–who [God] is, how great [God] is, what [God] has done for us, how much [God] loves us. Worship, in other words, takes place when we focus our hearts and minds completely on God.3

Some of you may remember that we honored the memory of one of my seminary professors 2 years ago. After his death, a friend of mine posted a poem that Dr. Stookey wrote. He taught worship design and leadership to several generations of pastors, and this poem contained a seed of inspiration for today’s message:

What Worship is About
By Larry Stookey

Worship is not first of all about me.

It is above all else about GOD—
God’s marvelous glory,
God’s boundless compassion, and
God’s stubborn insistence
On transforming the world
That divine love created and redeemed in Christ.

Next:
Through worship God wills and works
To change all of us,
To empower us by the power of the Holy Spirit to minister as those
Who renounce injustice
in favor of justice
who reject greed
in favor of generosity
who forego self-direction
in favor of interdependent discipleship.

Only then is worship about me
As I am a part of God’s “us.”

(Laurence Hull Stookey, Professor of Worship and Preaching, Wesley Theological Seminary, Washington, D.C.)

Services these days often begin with music – usually congregational song. However, many a worship service has begun with someone saying verses 8-9 of Psalm 96:

Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; bring an offering, and come into his courts. Worship the Lord in holy splendor; tremble before him, all the earth.

Or, from the King James Version which some of us know and love…

Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name: bring an offering, and come into his courts. O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness: fear before him, all the earth.

Perhaps some are now using Eugene Peterson’s version from The Message –

In awe before the beauty, in awe before the might, bring gifts and celebrate, bow before the beauty of God, then to your knees—everyone worship!

No matter what version of the Bible is used, this Psalm and many others call us to worship God. The scripture reminds us of God’s goodness to us and urges us to praise – to worship – to bow down – to sing and give thanks.

Would you please take a look at the image on the bulletin cover –and on the screen?  Really look at the people in the photos:
Look at their Postures – sit and listen, hands raised, kneeling -- and at the expressions on their faces – joy, awe, wonder, intensity

The worshipers are deeply engaged. In most of the photos we can see that they have immersed themselves – whole selves. They are not simply receiving but are engaged. Some of you may be asking – “Hey, what about those people who are just looking at the altar?” Well, I’m taking a little pastoral license here and engaging my pastoral imagination and I’m just sure that those folks are engaged in the interpretation of the scriptures.

Here’s what I mean by that. It may surprise you! Even the meditation (aka the sermon) is a time of engagement. Every pastor I know does his or her dead-level best to share an inspiring or meaningful or engaging interpretation of the week’s scripture. We ask ourselves, what is God saying to us in this passage this week? What is my congregation struggling with? What word do we all need to hear? Then we write a sermon to share, praying that the word of the Lord comes through.

But then the funniest thing happens. People will say, Pastor, I felt like you were talking right to me. Or, they say weeks later, remember when you preached on such and such? You said just what I needed to hear and then they proceed to tell me about an issue I supposedly helped with. (True confession – sometimes when you tell me that, I have no clue what I could have said that helped you with that particular issue!) Or, the word gets around that the pastor never has anything to say that I want to hear. You know, I’ve even heard it said that the sermon is just exactly the right length of time for folks to write out their grocery lists!

Beloved, worship – including the message – is not a one-way street. We don’t come to worship to observe or simply to receive. Worship requires that we all engage – engage in seeking God in every aspect of what we do. John Wesley listed worship as the first in the list of the means of grace – also known as the ordinances of God – things that Christians must do in order to grow in discipleship and know God better.

Worship is about God. Praising God, thanking God, learning more about God through the Word. I want to leave you with one question to ponder: When you come to worship, what do you need to do to focus on God and what God is saying to you?

In about 1847, Soren Kierkegaard wrote Purity of Heart in which he examines worship, using the theater as the metaphor:

…In regard to things spiritual, the foolishness of many is this, that they in the secular sense look upon the speaker as an actor, and the listeners as theatergoers who are to pass judgment upon the artist. But the speaker is not the actor—not in the remotest sense. No, the speaker is the prompter. There are no mere theatergoers present, for each listener will be looking into his own heart. The stage is eternity, and the listener, if he is the true listener (and if he is not, he is at fault) stands before God during the talk. The prompter whispers to the actor what he is to say, but the actor's repetition of it is the main concern—is the solemn charm of the art. The speaker whispers the word to the listeners. But the main concern is earnestness: that the listeners by themselves, with themselves, and to themselves, in the silence before God, may speak with the help of this address.

The address is not given for the speaker's sake, in order that men may praise or blame him. The listener's repetition of it is what is aimed at. If the speaker has the responsibility for what he whispers, then the listener has an equally great responsibility not to fail short in his task. In the theater, the play is staged before an audience who are called theatergoers; but at the devotional address, God himself is present. In the most earnest sense, God is the critical theatergoer, who looks on to see how the lines are spoken and how they are listened to: hence here the customary audience is wanting. The speaker is then the prompter, and the listener stands openly before God. The listener ... is the actor, who in all truth acts before God.4

Psalm 65: Praise is due to you, O God, in Zion; and to you shall vows be performed. Indeed. Amen.

Notes/Credits:

1. http://bit.ly/2rgpgqr

2.  http://bit.ly/2raY2R8

3.  http://bit.ly/2JH8fMP

4.  Søren Kierkegaard, Purity of Heart, pp. 180-81 (SV XI114-15); reprinted in Parables of Kierkegaard, Thomas C. Oden, ed.