THE PULPIT: bowing our lives at the feet of the father
It was such a beautiful beginning to the week. Monday was the best of the week. Almost 70 and sunny. They said Tuesday would be a little cooler with rain, so when I woke up and there wasn’t any rain, I packed my computer in my briefcase, along with a Bible and a couple books. I got the dog and took a ride down to the landing. The bright sun made the murky water shimmer. The leaves danced as the breeze blew across the West Virginian hillside. To borrow from Travis Tritt, it was a great day to be alive!
As I sat there, I thought of the many days before I’ve spent in some other place, but breathing in the same beautifully created air, and asking “why?” It seems like the most foundational question of life. It is one of the first words children learn, “why?” It is certainly the oldest question: “why live?” There’s got to be some purpose, some explanation, some reason why. The pursuit of this question alone helps people either find life, or prompt them to take their life. No other question is so important as, “why?”
Over the next four weeks, we will be looking at that very question…and its implications. We will look at the purpose of the church and what it means to be the church. Why bring the church into the question? Because it is only in the church that we learn what it means to be Christian. Apart from and outside of the community of faith there is no “Christian.” We will be looking at four key words that will for us define our church: bow, share, grow and give. In these four words, we will learn the answer to the why question. We will learn what it means to be the church, and in so doing, what it means to be Christian and will find the meaning of life.
The overarching text for the next four weeks is Acts 2:41-47. Acts is volume 2 of Luke’s history of Christianity. It picks up right where his Gospel leaves off. Quickly it moves from Jesus’ promise of the Holy Spirit to God’s fulfillment of that promise. The Spirit is poured out at Pentecost and 3,000 persons became Christian. It was quite a day and lives and history were forever changed. Hear the Word of the Lord:
Those who believed what Peter said were baptized and added to the church that day—about 3,000 in all. All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper[a]), and to prayer.
A deep sense of awe came over them all, and the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders. And all the believers met together in one place and shared everything they had. They sold their property and possessions and shared the money with those in need. They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord’s Supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity - all the while praising God and enjoying the goodwill of all the people. And each day the Lord added to their fellowship those who were being saved.
**************************************
It was the first day of a new semester. I had a professor I really admired, but that was very tough. I was not sure if I should be excited or afraid! It was a class I thought I would do OK in, after all, I was raised in the church and I’d been doing it all my life. We all sat joking and carrying on, but then it got quite when Dr. Sanders came in. “Clear your desks, get out a pencil and a sheet of paper,” he said as only Dr. Sanders could, “we’ve got a little quiz!” He paused while we grumbled. It was the shortest and hardest quiz I ever took. There was only one question: define worship. I was surprised how difficult it was to define then, and I am still amazed how difficult it is to define now. However, since that day, I have been committed to understanding worship as the defining characteristic of the church.
Some argue that the church’s real purpose is to get people saved. Some argue that the church’s real purpose is to care for the poor. Those are important, but there are organizations that do those things that are NOT churches. What makes a church a church is that it is a worshipping body. The first thing we see in our Acts story is the early church’s commitment to worship. “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” The early church was committed to worship, but not just the early church. Worship was the purpose of creation, it was central to Israel’s identity and it will be our single task in eternity. This morning’s text is the fourth and fifth chapters of John’s Revelation. Stand with me for the reading of God’s word.
READ REVELATION 4-5 (I'm not going to instert that lengthly of a passage here...you can look it up)
They fell down and worshipped! They bowed their lives at the feet of the Father! Worship is bowing our lives at the feet of the Father. Say that with me three times: bowing our lives at the feet of the Father, bowing our lives at the feet of the Father, bowing our lives at the feet of the Father.
John certainly paints us a vivid picture of heavenly worship. Can you imagine worship like that? Can you imagine finding yourself in a throne room as expansive as the sea, with a crystal floor? Everything is solid gold, with the rarest and most beautiful jewels encrusted upon them? The beauty and grandeur of these treasures pales in comparison to the one seated on the throne!
Then you look around. You are surrounded by every imaginable creature and many you could not have ever dreamed of in your wildest imagination. They all do nothing but tell of the greatness and sing the praises of the one on the throne. Beside the throne, there is a lamb, and all manors of creatures tell of its greatness and sing its praises too! It is almost too much to even imagine. Yet John tells us this is what heavenly worship will be.
Earthly worship can never live up to heavenly worship, but John’s picture of heavenly worship has always helped us to understand what worship is. If you’ve never been to a worship service in an Eastern Orthodox Church, like Greek or Serbian Orthodox, then you should. They take most seriously this image of worship. Everything is exquisite: from the architecture, to the artwork, to the incense, to the solid gold altar table…their theology of worship attempts to make earthly worship an icon or an image of heavenly worship.
We don’t all take the passage quite that seriously, but it informs our understanding of worship none-the-less. The first thing we notice about worship is its content. What is worship all about? What is the object of worship? I talk frequently of summing up Christianity in one word: service or ministry, which ever word you prefer. Both of those words require an object. Just like I cannot simply throw, I must throw and object, a ball for instance. I cannot just throw; I must throw something. Neither can I simply serve or minister; I must serve or minister something. In worship, the object of our service or ministry is God. God alone is the object of our worship. God alone is the content of our worship.
In making God the content of our worship, worship become all about God. Many want to ask what worship should accomplish. It should nourish me. It should make unbelievers welcome, it should be entertaining, and on and on the list goes. These are all simply wrong because worship is about nothing but God! John shows us worship should proclaim God. Most foundationally, God is Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Worship proclaims God as Trinity. 4:2 shows us worship is in the Spirit. The rest of the chapter shows us worship is of the Father who is seated on the throne. Chapter 5 shows us worship is by the redemption of the Son.
Also, God being the content means worship tells the story of God. God who always has been and God who always will be. God who created all things. God who became human and lived, died and was raised that we might live. God who will come again to redeem all of creation. It is a story that must be told in many ways in our worship: in our music, in our preaching, in our art, in our actions. God alone is the content of worship.
In Luke’s account of early church worship, we see that God is the content of the worship as well. The apostle’s teaching is what became for us the scripture – the preached Word of God. Fellowship was not understood as casually as it is today, but it was an expression of unity and reconciliation – a statement that we are one in God. The breaking of bread is a direct allusion to Christ breaking the bread. It is the reenacting of the story of Christ’s body being broken for us – God’s self-giving sacrifice. The prayers are communication…open and honest – conversation with God. The story of God may take many forms in our worship, but it God and God’s story that is alone the content of our worship.
The second thing we see in John’s revelation is worship has structure. It is not just that worship has structure, but that worship has a structure. That structure is: revelation and response. Worship is not just the telling of the story of God, but it is also our response to God’s story. It is our participation in God’s story. The response is just as important as the story. John constantly swings back and forth from a revelation of God – the telling of God’s story – to an act of response. He begins with the story of the throne room, but then goes straight to the response of the creatures and elders. He tells the story of the lamb, and then goes straight to the response of the creatures and elders.
We see this structure of story and response quite clearly in Luke’s description of early church worship as well. The first and foundational part of worship is the apostles’ teaching. The preaching and hearing of the scriptures is always foundational to worship. But Luke continues listing three responses of the early church to the preaching of the Word.
Fellowship as a statement of unity gives time for reconciliation. We cannot take seriously the reconciling work of Christ and not be reconciled to one another. We cannot bear grudges or harbor unforgiveness, so early church worship included an expression of Christian unity. Fellowship also likely included the taking of an offering for those in need. How can we be together and unified if I am well off and my brother is starving?
The breaking of bread is a second response. Now that the word has been proclaimed and everyone is in a right relationship with God and one another, the early church responded with the highest act of unity. In the Lord’s Supper, they put the words of the gospel into action and participated in it.
The prayers are a third response. The offering of praise and thanksgiving for the revelation of God in the preaching, reconciliation and the celebrating is a fitting conclusion. At every level, worship has the structure of proclamation and response. Words must be followed by actions!
The final thing we see in John’s Revelation of heavenly worship is the posture of worship. We have looked at the content and the structure, but now we must examine proper posture. Twice we are told “the elders fall before the one who is seated on the throne.” We have all been in worship services where it felt like everyone was mindlessly going through the motions. That is not worship! As much as worship is what we do, it is also how we do it.
John paints for us a picture of a throne room. When one comes before the throne, the proper position is one of falling flat on my face – of bowing. When we bow to another, we give them respect and honor. “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power.” In bowing, we ascribe to God glory and honor and power! Beyond that, however, we make a statement about our own position, not just God’s. Bowing is a posture of obedience and submission. To truly worship God is to be obedient to God. To truly worship is to willingly submit our lives to will of God. We are never forced to bow, we are asked to bow. We are asked to submit our lives to God, and worship is our willing response. This is true worship: bowing our lives at the feet of the Father. To the glory of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; Amen.
As I sat there, I thought of the many days before I’ve spent in some other place, but breathing in the same beautifully created air, and asking “why?” It seems like the most foundational question of life. It is one of the first words children learn, “why?” It is certainly the oldest question: “why live?” There’s got to be some purpose, some explanation, some reason why. The pursuit of this question alone helps people either find life, or prompt them to take their life. No other question is so important as, “why?”
Over the next four weeks, we will be looking at that very question…and its implications. We will look at the purpose of the church and what it means to be the church. Why bring the church into the question? Because it is only in the church that we learn what it means to be Christian. Apart from and outside of the community of faith there is no “Christian.” We will be looking at four key words that will for us define our church: bow, share, grow and give. In these four words, we will learn the answer to the why question. We will learn what it means to be the church, and in so doing, what it means to be Christian and will find the meaning of life.
The overarching text for the next four weeks is Acts 2:41-47. Acts is volume 2 of Luke’s history of Christianity. It picks up right where his Gospel leaves off. Quickly it moves from Jesus’ promise of the Holy Spirit to God’s fulfillment of that promise. The Spirit is poured out at Pentecost and 3,000 persons became Christian. It was quite a day and lives and history were forever changed. Hear the Word of the Lord:
Those who believed what Peter said were baptized and added to the church that day—about 3,000 in all. All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper[a]), and to prayer.
A deep sense of awe came over them all, and the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders. And all the believers met together in one place and shared everything they had. They sold their property and possessions and shared the money with those in need. They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord’s Supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity - all the while praising God and enjoying the goodwill of all the people. And each day the Lord added to their fellowship those who were being saved.
**************************************
It was the first day of a new semester. I had a professor I really admired, but that was very tough. I was not sure if I should be excited or afraid! It was a class I thought I would do OK in, after all, I was raised in the church and I’d been doing it all my life. We all sat joking and carrying on, but then it got quite when Dr. Sanders came in. “Clear your desks, get out a pencil and a sheet of paper,” he said as only Dr. Sanders could, “we’ve got a little quiz!” He paused while we grumbled. It was the shortest and hardest quiz I ever took. There was only one question: define worship. I was surprised how difficult it was to define then, and I am still amazed how difficult it is to define now. However, since that day, I have been committed to understanding worship as the defining characteristic of the church.
Some argue that the church’s real purpose is to get people saved. Some argue that the church’s real purpose is to care for the poor. Those are important, but there are organizations that do those things that are NOT churches. What makes a church a church is that it is a worshipping body. The first thing we see in our Acts story is the early church’s commitment to worship. “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” The early church was committed to worship, but not just the early church. Worship was the purpose of creation, it was central to Israel’s identity and it will be our single task in eternity. This morning’s text is the fourth and fifth chapters of John’s Revelation. Stand with me for the reading of God’s word.
READ REVELATION 4-5 (I'm not going to instert that lengthly of a passage here...you can look it up)
They fell down and worshipped! They bowed their lives at the feet of the Father! Worship is bowing our lives at the feet of the Father. Say that with me three times: bowing our lives at the feet of the Father, bowing our lives at the feet of the Father, bowing our lives at the feet of the Father.
John certainly paints us a vivid picture of heavenly worship. Can you imagine worship like that? Can you imagine finding yourself in a throne room as expansive as the sea, with a crystal floor? Everything is solid gold, with the rarest and most beautiful jewels encrusted upon them? The beauty and grandeur of these treasures pales in comparison to the one seated on the throne!
Then you look around. You are surrounded by every imaginable creature and many you could not have ever dreamed of in your wildest imagination. They all do nothing but tell of the greatness and sing the praises of the one on the throne. Beside the throne, there is a lamb, and all manors of creatures tell of its greatness and sing its praises too! It is almost too much to even imagine. Yet John tells us this is what heavenly worship will be.
Earthly worship can never live up to heavenly worship, but John’s picture of heavenly worship has always helped us to understand what worship is. If you’ve never been to a worship service in an Eastern Orthodox Church, like Greek or Serbian Orthodox, then you should. They take most seriously this image of worship. Everything is exquisite: from the architecture, to the artwork, to the incense, to the solid gold altar table…their theology of worship attempts to make earthly worship an icon or an image of heavenly worship.
We don’t all take the passage quite that seriously, but it informs our understanding of worship none-the-less. The first thing we notice about worship is its content. What is worship all about? What is the object of worship? I talk frequently of summing up Christianity in one word: service or ministry, which ever word you prefer. Both of those words require an object. Just like I cannot simply throw, I must throw and object, a ball for instance. I cannot just throw; I must throw something. Neither can I simply serve or minister; I must serve or minister something. In worship, the object of our service or ministry is God. God alone is the object of our worship. God alone is the content of our worship.
In making God the content of our worship, worship become all about God. Many want to ask what worship should accomplish. It should nourish me. It should make unbelievers welcome, it should be entertaining, and on and on the list goes. These are all simply wrong because worship is about nothing but God! John shows us worship should proclaim God. Most foundationally, God is Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Worship proclaims God as Trinity. 4:2 shows us worship is in the Spirit. The rest of the chapter shows us worship is of the Father who is seated on the throne. Chapter 5 shows us worship is by the redemption of the Son.
Also, God being the content means worship tells the story of God. God who always has been and God who always will be. God who created all things. God who became human and lived, died and was raised that we might live. God who will come again to redeem all of creation. It is a story that must be told in many ways in our worship: in our music, in our preaching, in our art, in our actions. God alone is the content of worship.
In Luke’s account of early church worship, we see that God is the content of the worship as well. The apostle’s teaching is what became for us the scripture – the preached Word of God. Fellowship was not understood as casually as it is today, but it was an expression of unity and reconciliation – a statement that we are one in God. The breaking of bread is a direct allusion to Christ breaking the bread. It is the reenacting of the story of Christ’s body being broken for us – God’s self-giving sacrifice. The prayers are communication…open and honest – conversation with God. The story of God may take many forms in our worship, but it God and God’s story that is alone the content of our worship.
The second thing we see in John’s revelation is worship has structure. It is not just that worship has structure, but that worship has a structure. That structure is: revelation and response. Worship is not just the telling of the story of God, but it is also our response to God’s story. It is our participation in God’s story. The response is just as important as the story. John constantly swings back and forth from a revelation of God – the telling of God’s story – to an act of response. He begins with the story of the throne room, but then goes straight to the response of the creatures and elders. He tells the story of the lamb, and then goes straight to the response of the creatures and elders.
We see this structure of story and response quite clearly in Luke’s description of early church worship as well. The first and foundational part of worship is the apostles’ teaching. The preaching and hearing of the scriptures is always foundational to worship. But Luke continues listing three responses of the early church to the preaching of the Word.
Fellowship as a statement of unity gives time for reconciliation. We cannot take seriously the reconciling work of Christ and not be reconciled to one another. We cannot bear grudges or harbor unforgiveness, so early church worship included an expression of Christian unity. Fellowship also likely included the taking of an offering for those in need. How can we be together and unified if I am well off and my brother is starving?
The breaking of bread is a second response. Now that the word has been proclaimed and everyone is in a right relationship with God and one another, the early church responded with the highest act of unity. In the Lord’s Supper, they put the words of the gospel into action and participated in it.
The prayers are a third response. The offering of praise and thanksgiving for the revelation of God in the preaching, reconciliation and the celebrating is a fitting conclusion. At every level, worship has the structure of proclamation and response. Words must be followed by actions!
The final thing we see in John’s Revelation of heavenly worship is the posture of worship. We have looked at the content and the structure, but now we must examine proper posture. Twice we are told “the elders fall before the one who is seated on the throne.” We have all been in worship services where it felt like everyone was mindlessly going through the motions. That is not worship! As much as worship is what we do, it is also how we do it.
John paints for us a picture of a throne room. When one comes before the throne, the proper position is one of falling flat on my face – of bowing. When we bow to another, we give them respect and honor. “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power.” In bowing, we ascribe to God glory and honor and power! Beyond that, however, we make a statement about our own position, not just God’s. Bowing is a posture of obedience and submission. To truly worship God is to be obedient to God. To truly worship is to willingly submit our lives to will of God. We are never forced to bow, we are asked to bow. We are asked to submit our lives to God, and worship is our willing response. This is true worship: bowing our lives at the feet of the Father. To the glory of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; Amen.
posted by EF + at 8:27 AM
1 Comments:
I would say this fits in with your interest in PhD in Worship Theology. This is good. Too many times we get all tied up in the order of the service, what kind of music to sing etc. Those things are all about us. We need a reminder every once in a while that worship is about Him not us.
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