Hey everyone
it has been a while but i thought that i would give this blog thing a try again. i am reading a book called “The Worshiping Artist”. It is awesome. It is written by rory noland who works over at willow creek as the director of Heart of the Artist Ministries.
This weeks post is about encountering God.
Rory writes:
“Romans 1:20 asserts that, ’since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – his eteranl power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.’ Thus to encounter God is to experience his character. God reveals to us his grace, for example, or his love, or his power and, unless we’re oblivious to his presence, we are moved to worhsip him.”
WHATEVER CHARACTERISTIC GOD REVEALS IS EXACTLY WHAT WE NEED
“According to the Puritan writer Thomas Books, it’s as if God is saying: ‘You shall have as true an interest in all my attributes for your good, as they are mine for my own glory…My grace, saith God, shall be yours to pardon you, and my power shall be yours to protect you, and my wisdom shall be yours to direct you, and my goodness shall be yours to relieve you, and my mercy shall be yours to supply you, and my glory shall be yours to crown you.’”
“I have an embarassing confession to make: I suffer from Worship ADD, Worship Attention Deficit Disorder…Apparently I’m not the only one suffering with Worship ADD. Gary Thomas writes: ‘It amazes me how casually I can sing songs of deep, almost heroic commitment. It’s as if I think, As long as I’m singing, the words I say don’t really matter. God knows it’s just a song.While my mind wanders I promise to bow before the Lord, to proclaim his name to the ends of the earth, and to go so far as to die to express my faith. Yet these words may be sung with scarcely more emotion than I feel when I’m ordering a hamburger. How often do we Christians ‘take the Lord’s name in vain’ during our worship?”
“To remedy my Worship ADD, I’ve been trying to be more attentive to the names and attributes of God during corporate worship…Don’t allow corporate worship to digress into merely a sing-along time before the sermon. In 1 Corinthians 14:15, Payl says, “I will sing with my spirit, but I will also sing with my mind.”
“The way we approach corporate worship impacts our ability to engage. For that reason, the Puritan author Stephen Charnock suggests we set our sights on the attributes of God as we enter into worship: ‘God…is a Spirit of infinite majesty, therefore we must come before him with reverence; he is a Spirit infinitely high, therefore we must offer up our sacrifices with the deepest humility; he is a Spirit infinitely holy, therefore we must address him with purity; he is a Spirit infinitely glorious, we must therefore acknowledge his excellency in all that we do.’”
“The poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote: ‘ Earth’s crammed with heaven, and every common bush afire with God; But only he who sees, takes off his shoes, The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries, And daub their natural faces unaware.”
I hope these words impact you this week as they have impacted me while reading them. Each chapter ends with some questions and i would like to extend some of those questions to you if you feel led to answer any of them.
1. Have you seen any movies latley (or any other artistic presentation) that spoke to you on a spiritual level? Please describe it.
2. How can those planning worship services be more effective in helping a congregation experience the attributes of God?
Some personal action steps to take.
1. Read Psalm 111 and pick out all the attributes of God listed.
2. As you read Scripture this week, pick out a name or attribute of God as a springboard for worship and prayer.
