I missed our Worship Gathering yesterday because I wasn’t feeling well. By “missed”, I don’t just mean I was absent; I mean I felt the loss of being part of our church family singing together to the Lord. Nothing makes up for sitting among God’s people and hearing our voices lifted in praise to him.
This morning I read a Desiring God blog that lifted my soul with the possibilities of what our worship might continue to grow into. You can read Joseph Tenney’s post here (http://us2.campaign-archive1.com/?u=94431c7fc1ffa54485d1c84fe&id=ce4ba09c20&e=fc22e1508a or just my references to it below. I especially found it interesting when he referred to beauty and mystery in worship.
BEAUTY.
. . . some of us might have a tendency to value songs for their usefulness rather than their beauty . . . While we rightly elevate theological richness in the songs we sing, we also would do well to appreciate music’s God-given beauty and power to lead people to the Transcendental Beauty himself, our Triune God.
This will require pastors and artists to recapture a vision of beauty that is not at odds with accessibility or practicality, but one that’s mindful of context and insistent on a rich theological aesthetic. We would do well to avoid reducing the role of music entirely to service to the spoken word. It may be that our good desire for right doctrine has so taken priority in our thinking that we’ve diminished the importance and possibilities of aesthetic in our gatherings, let alone our songs.
His language tends to soar over my head. But here’s what stays on my brain level: music’s beauty and power can lead us into the presence of our beautiful God. ” . . . we would . . . do well to appreciate music’s God-given beauty and power to lead people to the Transcendental Beauty himself, our Triune God.” Music isn’t merely something to connect correct doctrinal words to. Music certainly demands correct doctrinal truth, but music itself has beauty and power from God to lead us into the beauty of his presence.
Frankly, “beautiful” isn’t the adjective that comes to mind when I think of our worship team. I’m not disparaging our keyboard, drums, guitars and vocalists. I’m simply saying that we’re a handful of moderately-gifted musicians who play and sing to help lead a small, sometimes off-key- congregation. “Beauty”? Call the New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center!
Wait. On second thought, don’t. Instead, read a few lines David wrote in Psalm 27:4 . . .
One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after:
that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life,
to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD
and to inquire in his temple.
See what David implies? If we come and sing and play with a single-minded desire to enter the Lord’s presence to gaze upon his beauty, we can. It doesn’t take the New York Philharmonic. It takes the redeemed of the Lord singing with heart-felt longing to come into his presence and “see” the wonder of his beauty.
MYSTERY.
. . . we should consider opening ourselves to mystery and spontaneity . . . Christian worship is not a science class. These days we’re being fed nothing but information; but emotionally, I think we get less and less experience in our gatherings because our liturgy is so cleaned up and we’re losing the edge, the mystery of things.
. . . gathering together as the church [is] . . . where we actually carry out the science experiment and put behaviors and responses and postures to action and open ourselves to the unplanned and surprising work of God’s Spirit in Christ among us. Christian worship free from emotion and mystery produces unexceptional and tame views of God . . . .
I think by “mystery” Tenney means worship in which God’s Spirit in Christ occasionally does “unplanned and surprising work” among us. He’s not a tame lion you know, as C.S. Lewis wrote of Aslan, the Christ-figure in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. How tragic if our worship moves us to see him as “tame”! But, as Tenney points out, that’s what “worship free from emotion produces—unexceptional and tame views of God.
While Paul stood in awe of how God revealed much of his mystery in Christ (Ephesians 1:9; 3:4; Colossians 1:27; 2:2), he implied God hasn’t revealed all of himself. His judgments are yet unsearchable. His ways remain mysterious. The depths of his mind are still beyond our understanding.
Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable his judgments and how inscrutable (mysterious) his ways!
For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor? (Romans 11:33,34).
Thank God for his self-revelation in Scripture! Thank God that he has made himself knowable and established firm doctrine on which we can stand! But there is more to God than he has revealed. What remains hidden doesn’t counter what he’s revealed, but enhances it. If we come and sing and play longing to sense a wonder of God we’ve not yet experienced, perhaps he might surprisingly captivate us with more of his “mysterious” presence.
Worship of God always must be more, because God is always more. There remain wonderful mysteries of his presence we haven’t yet found. There is a beauty of his “face” we haven’t yet seen.
You have said, “Seek my face.”
My heart says to you,
“Your face, LORD, do I seek” (Psalm 27:8).
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