Reflections on the Season, Feb 5, 2012

Reflections on the Season                                       Epiphany 5    February 5, 2012

Today’s readings are

Isaiah 40:21-31, Psalm 147:1-11, 20c, 1 Corinthians 9:16-23,  Mark 1:29-39

Isaiah says

²⁶Lift up your eyes on high and see: Who created these?  The One who brings out their host and numbers them, calling them all by name; because God is great in strength, mighty in power, not one is missing.

And the Psalm  says

¹Praise you God! How good it is to sing praises to our God; for God is gracious, and a song of praise is fitting.

²God builds up Jerusalem; and gathers the outcasts of Israel.

³God heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds.

⁴God determines the number of the stars; and gives to all of them their names.

My son, Lucas, got us into astronomy.  We gave him a telescope a few years ago, and have  identified the various “seas” on the surface of the moon and viewed the row of tiny lights lined up either side of a brighter dot …the moons of Jupiter!    Every time I slow down to really see, it is truly awe-inspiring.  It makes me yearn to praise God, and not just myself, together as a community, to worship in awe and wonder -- “There’s a song that’s inside of my soul; it’s the one that I’ve tried to write over and over again”.¹

But I have trouble praising God freely, wildly, openly, publicly, deeply, and truly.  And from the tenor of many worship services and gatherings I’ve been part of over the last ten years or so, I wonder if many of us are somehow impeded from praising God.  There are a number of issues here 1) First off, we’re busy with important must-do tasks, and praising and worshiping God just does not get much done. Part of a psalm or a couple of songs are ok, but more would really be a “royal waste of time”².   2) I think enthusiastic praise and deep worship are somehow (in the U.S. at least) associated with right-wing political, moral majority evangelical fundamentalism, and we in no way want to look like or be otherwise associated with that kind of thing.  3) Losing ourselves in praise takes and certain kind of humility and letting go of self-sufficiency, and that’s never easy 4) Wait, is there really a God who names stars, anyway? Seems like a quaint anachronism to many (more on that in a later blog).  5) Then there is also the problem of how to do communal worship when we have so many various styles of worship.  It is risky to lead worship where one person’s great experience is another’s fingernails on the chalkboard.

My point is that it is no wonder our worship may be lacking in depth and length, zest and vigor.  It takes courage to be in praise and worship these days.  But as Matthew Fox points out “Courage is the first sign of the Spirit. It is the root of all the other virtues.”

Well, I am not often very courageous. But I do have this question:  if a few of us were to en-courage each other, could we water the seeds of the Spirit to expand and deepen our worship together? God invites us to respond to God’s love with extravagant praise.  I would value a conversation about what you make of my reflections today.  How  can we overcome the impediments and find a way?  What are you finding as positive group worship practices? 

John+

Notes:

¹ Song “Only Hope”  by Switchfoot

²A Royal “Waste” of Time: The Splendor of Worshiping God and Being Church for the World.   Marva J. Dawn.   Eerdmans Press, 1999.