You Cannot Generate Worship!

Back in the late 80’s and Early 90’s, our small university church was one of a handful that found themselves on the cutting edge of the contemporary worship music scene. There was a group of brave university students that agreed to partner with my father to create a worship service that was meaningful and filled with authentic worship, liturgy and prayer. 

The leader of this group who actually stayed on till I joined university in ‘97 used to say something to us all the time when we were on retreats building our spiritual muscle... he used to say, “You cannot generate worship!” 

What he was really trying to tell us is that you cannot transform yourself into an authentic worship facilitator on the platform in front of an audience when you are not an authentic worshipper in the privacy of your personal life. He taught me that while you may think that you are doing a good job trying to channel something that you are not familiar with, the audience that you seek to inspire in worship can see through you - either consciously or subconsciously. 

He was the first person that helped me see that I could in fact tell when I was being led in prayer by somebody that did not have a well visited prayer closet. He helped me see the times that I was being led in liturgical worship by a person for whom the liturgy held no meaning and it was through his example that I came to realize the importance of congruence between my personal worship time (if any) and the moments where I facilitated worship during the weekly services or fellowships. 

It is no secret that I place a high premium on authenticity as I seek to facilitate worship at woodvale and my prayer and hope has been that this would become a cornerstone value of all the worship facilitators at woodvale. My charge to the worship team members that have been at recent practices is to re-discover on their own their passion for worship and a desire to meet with God. This is not so that Pastor Paulo is pleased with  us and what we have done, but that the worship experience that we seek to engage the congregation in is something that flows easily from within us and not an act that we put on when we find ourselves on woodvale’s massive stage. 

About a month ago, I was having a chat with the choir and one of the guys in the choir spoke up and said that it is not right for us to be two different people; one week an expressive exuberant group when we are standing on the choir risers and another week a disinterested and sedate group when we are sitting in the pews. His charge to us that evening was a stark reminder of my team leader’s words to us back then: 

YOU CANNOT GENERATE WORSHIP! 

All of this comes into sharp perspective when you realize that God cannot be mocked by our lack of authenticity. Our worship falls flat and it is reduced to flattery,  meaningless repetition and babbling because of the disconnect between the people we are pretending to be and the people we really are. 

Let us therefore be exhorted by the words of John 4: 21 - 24. 

Jesus declared, "Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."

blogus interruptus ...

... the medical sounding term that my sister who is a wordsmith coined for the dry spell that bloggers go through in which they are unmotivated to update their blogs or unable to come up with any posts that articulate anything of sense... 

Blogus Interruptus! 

The gathering 2008 - Citywide worship and prayer

I'm a firm believer in doing everything to promote the unity of the body of Christ in the National Capital Region of Canada. I have become convinced that through the local churches and congregations, God intends to do a great work in our city - Ottawa - but before we see any progress in the "natural", there must be movement in the "spiritual". This week, we get to gather with people from all around ottawa for one purpose - to worship with passion, pray with conviction and unite with purpose. 

For more information, click the banner below

Straining forward... there must be more

Philippians 3: 1 - 16

This is one of my favorite passages of scripture. There are lots of reasons why I love it, but what strikes me in particular about this passage of scripture is the honesty that Paul writes it with.

He starts out in verses 1 – 3 by pointing us all to the fact that our walk as Christians is something that we cannot do successfully on our own. Human effort, human rules and regulations just do not cut it. His reference to circumcision shows that perhaps there were those that had fallen into the trap of thinking that the Jewish laws and customs were a prerequisite to a relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

In verses 4 – 6, he presses this point further by making statements like, “If others have reason for confidence in their own efforts, I have even more!”

From what we know about Paul, it is safe to assume that Paul was a highly educated man and had achieved a lot not only in terms of his education and scholarliness as shown through the complexity of some of the letters that he writes, but also in his zeal to follow the Jewish law to the letter. He was widely traveled and had been highly successful with planting and building churches all throughout the Roman Empire and yet he looked at all his achievements and still considered them nothing.

Verses 7 – 11 give us a little insight into his thoughts. He says that once he thought of all of these things as important and he worked hard to get them all, but when compared to what Christ had done for him, they paled in comparison.

I could spend time talking about other people and how this should challenge them, but let me make it a little more personal. I think that I’ve done a lot with my life, and one of the things I promised myself is that I would try to spare no expense to experience new things, learn new concepts, and give my time, energy and resources to my faith and profession both in my former life as an IT specialist and in my current role as a paid facilitator of worship.

As I have continued to use whatever gifts God has given me, I have seen doors open and I have seen lives be changed. I have led worship and played music for a handful of people, and I have played before thousands. I’ve been able to use my gifts on more than 2 continents and for the past 3 years I led the really large worship and prayer gathering at the scotiabank place. I have every reason to be confident in these things and boast about them…

However, Paul says something that cuts me down to shape. Compared to the priceless gain of just KNOWING Jesus, everything I can do, have done, or will ever do is nothing! Why? Because I have not yet achieved as much as he had back then; I probably never will! He counts his achievements as garbage and therefore, I MUST count mine as garbage too when compared to knowing and experiencing the fullness of God in Christ Jesus.

Paul resolves that the only way his life shall really count for something is through really knowing Christ, and EXPERIENCING the power that raised him from the dead.

The next couple of verses, 12 – 14, are equally challenging for me. These verses paint a picture of a man in a race. Not a sprint and definitely not a stroll. A marathon! They show a man who has determined that he will continually strive, and focus all his energies on being ALL that Christ Jesus saved him to be. They show a man who realizes that it will not be a short and sweet process, but a long and sometimes painful process. They show a man who is not content to bask in today’s victories and achievements until they become the stagnation and rot of past glory; they show a man who is hungry for more… a man that constantly says to himself:

“There must be more to Christianity than this and I will not stop straining forward to know and experience it! There must be more to Christianity than this and I will not stop straining forward to know and experience it!”