Friday, March 23, 2007
True Worship
In Renovation of the Heart in Daily Practice, Dallas Willard writes:
I love the idea that Willard presents that worship arises from transformation - it is an outpouring of change, and it is life-consuming.
Language matters, and by having redefined worship as we have we enable people to attend and be done with it. Sunday morning services are vital, but they are but part of a greater picture. When we do not bear that in mind, when we do not present them as part of a greater whole, we do not call people to the more.
Emotion is so important here. It is easy to create emotion that can result from change through other means, thus we get the thrill without the reality. Like a movie that really touches you, you think you have been on a journey that you never have. You experience the emotion of the journey, wihtout the risk, and WITHOUT THE CHANGE.
We can ill-afford ministry that is like a movie, creating the impression of a faith journey without the reality of same. Someties I wonder if that is a sin?
Related Tags: worship, journey, Dallas Willard, change, emotion
To bring the mind to dwell intelligently upon God as presented in his Word will casue us to love God passionately, and this love will bring us to think of God steadily. Thus God will alwasy be before our minds.I am weary of the narrowing of the word "worship." It was centuries ago that it came to mean, essentially, "Sunday morning services." But in the last decades it has narrowed further to mean "lots of music with a smattering of corporate prayer." How easy it becomes to discard the object of worship from the rest of our lives with such narrow definitions.
In the way we enter a life of worship. To think of God as he is, one cannot but lapse into worship, and wirship is the single most powerful force in completing and sustaingin restoration int he whole person. It puts into abeyance every evil tendency in every dimension of the self. It naturally arises from thinking rightly of God on the basis of revealed truth confirmed in experience. Worship is at once the overall characteristic of the renovated thought life and the only safe place for a human being to stand.
I love the idea that Willard presents that worship arises from transformation - it is an outpouring of change, and it is life-consuming.
Language matters, and by having redefined worship as we have we enable people to attend and be done with it. Sunday morning services are vital, but they are but part of a greater picture. When we do not bear that in mind, when we do not present them as part of a greater whole, we do not call people to the more.
Emotion is so important here. It is easy to create emotion that can result from change through other means, thus we get the thrill without the reality. Like a movie that really touches you, you think you have been on a journey that you never have. You experience the emotion of the journey, wihtout the risk, and WITHOUT THE CHANGE.
We can ill-afford ministry that is like a movie, creating the impression of a faith journey without the reality of same. Someties I wonder if that is a sin?
Related Tags: worship, journey, Dallas Willard, change, emotion
