Marcus Aurelius, Emperor of Rome and one of the only five “good emperors” praised by historians, used to keep a journal. In it, he reminds himself of what kind of leader and man he wants to be, what sorts of failures he wants to avoid or cease committing, what virtues and qualities he wants to develop or continue living out. (The Hays translation, linked above, is a punchy and poetic read, worth the purchase.)
We have a collection of his writings that comes from twelve notebooks. (The Annotated Edition by Waterfield is phenomenal at illuminating Marcus’s philosophy and perspective.)
He’s not writing to an audience; he probably never would have assumed anyone would read it. He’s writing to himself, for himself, to become a better version of himself.
And yet he spends a whole notebook thanking various people in his life for the qualities and lessons he learned from their example.
This was on my mind as I had some time for solitude and contemplation on Saturday, hours after hearing the news that my mother Leatha had passed away suddenly due to an unexpected illness.
Mom and Dad and Peter and me at their 40th Anniversary in 2014
“I owe my Mom and Dad such thanks,” I wrote in my own journal, “for the foundation of faith they laid in Peter and I –”
Broken as they each were in their own ways, weathered by the rough waves and winds of life, the trials and troubles they each suffered, and yet they tried to love us well, to raise us right, to set us on a solid path, to loose our ‘arrows’ into the world to make a positive impact.
I had hours with Mom giving attention, support, and prayer to the gift of music in me — she would sit in the living room while I practiced at the piano, enjoying the music or putting up with my learning process, praying and asking God that I would be a David, a man after God’s own heart, a worshiper and psalmist, a kingly man… and yet I can see how many of David’s flaws and failures I’ve duplicated.
Still, I had support, encouragement, and praise.
I had wisdom spoken into my life, and the worth of relationships reinforced. I learned from my mother the value of being a listener, the value of valuing others. So many friends of hers, names I cannot connect to a face or memory, have come alive for me with only the sound of her voice on the phone to relay anything about these people. I know how much they meant to her, how much they impacted her life in profound and positive ways, because they mattered to her.
From my mother I learned that even a bowl of Maruchan packet ramen can be a magical delight, when shared with a brother and a mother who takes time to read bedtime stories to her children, filling their stomachs with a little snack, their heads with fanciful tales, and their hearts with a fresh reminder of love.
I learned from my Mom the value of keeping peace and finding common ground even if she didn’t always do that with everyone. Family and strong connections between all of us mattered to her.
From my mother I learned the value of careful, clear, patient communication, and the power of language, and the thoughtful intentionality behind honoring people even if you didn’t really know them.
I learned from my Mom the value of a good laugh at all times, and perhaps most of all in the hardest times. She loved to hear the jokes, even the groaners and eye-rollers (which were my Dad’s forte), knowing laughter is good medicine for the soul. She delighted at the times she guessed the answer or punchline correctly, and she delighted us with some of her answers when she’d given up guessing.
Grandchild: Grandma, what do you call a cow with two legs? (The correct answer is ‘lean beef.’)
Grandma: I don’t know… Dead.
More than anything, I learned a strong, unyielding faith — which doesn’t mean that one never doubts,
never questions, never wonders why,
never looks up at the storm clouds with a sigh,
or at the silence of the stars with a shaking fist raised high…
…But it always, always comes back to trusting in the sometimes mysterious and incomprehensible but ever merciful and faithful ultimate goodness and provision of God in our lives. The Giver of all good things indeed, and the One whose hands hold onto us when we are flailing and scrambling in the chaos and darkness that sometimes fill the moments between our mountaintops.
Thank you, Mom, for always having a loving but firm, proud but praying hand and heart at my back. I will keep playing those songs and praising God, chasing after His heart like you taught me.
Years ago, when I was looking for ways to develop in my faith, a friend introduced me to the Topical Memory System or TMS, published by the Navigators.
It’s a thematic collection of Bible verses – five overall themes, each with six sub-topics, which each have two verses assigned to them. One block is about living the new life of a believer; another is about growing in Christlikeness; another is about sharing the gospel message with others.
The app isn’t super polished, but it still works great.
The TMS is a really useful system for getting some key scriptures into your head, so that you can call on them later, in conversation or for your own reflection and recollection. NavPress has some apps you can use on your phone or device, if the hard-copy paper cards aren’t what you want. They have eight common versions built into the apps and the printed card set – NIV, NASB, ESV, NKJV, KJV, NLT, MSG, and NRSV.
In other unpaid advertisement, a couple years ago, I picked up an Aura Frame for my office (and also one for my wife, and one for my mother back in the States, and then one for our daughter and her husband, and my brother got one too, and… yeah).
Aura makes digital picture frames where you can load a LOT of pictures into the service, and it will run through them at intervals you set so that you’re always getting fresh pictures. The app also lets you load pictures onto anyone else’s frame that you’re connected with, so when we’re calling home and talking about some exciting trip or funny picture, we can actually display it on my Mom’s frame instantly.
I’m sure there are plenty of frames and services that do similar things, but Aura’s the one I happened to get, and it’s been great for what I wanted it to do.
I love having an eclectic mix of pictures changing every 30 seconds.
The other day, I thought, “hey, why not put the TMS verses onto the Aura frame?” And I assumed someone somewhere must have already made images for the verses.
After a little Google searching, I ended up looking at a Facebook page for Navigators Ghana, where they had a few of the verses in their photos. But they were using NIV (I prefer NASB), and they had other info I didn’t want or need.
So I made my own, and thought I’d share on the off chance someone else is out there Google-searching “Navigators TMS NASB” images.
This actually took more work than I expected, but I’m happy with the result.
If you happen to live near me and know me, feel free to pop-quiz me on these when you see me. I’m going to try to keep all five blocks fresh in my memory, and I can use the impromptu challenge!
Here are the links to each of the Powerpoint presentations and image files:
Welcome to a blog post for Pentecost Sunday – the “birthday” of the Christian church, and the day in this tradition where we celebrate the outpouring of the Spirit on all believers, recounted in Acts 2.
We sang a song I wrote at our chapel today, which I thought went along with the theme of God’s power at work in us, and I wanted to share it here.
One of the joys and challenges of serving in a military chapel is that every couple years, the lead chaplain for any service is almost guaranteed to change.
Unlike a traditional church where a senior pastor stays around and sets the vision for as long as they choose (or as long as the board will have them), this frequent turnover means that military chapels can sometimes experience big shifts from one chaplain to the next.
It would be like changing CEOs or office leadership every two years, hoping that what was important last week under the old boss is still going to be important next week once the new boss communicates a game plan for the future.
While a lot of aspects of the service and ministry will likely remain the same, each individual is going to have their own areas for greater focus, their own aspects of spirituality which they feel have the most importance for effective ministry.
I’ve been fortunate to be a part of the Kadena Contemporary Worship Service for a few years as a contracted musician and now as the worship director, working under three chaplains so far to fulfill their vision for the praise music during the service.
What energizes or refreshes you?
Our previous chaplain was focused on John 15:5 as a key verse for the congregation. Jesus tells His disciples:
I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. John 15:5 NASB
Chaplain shared how he hates raisins. When you bite into a juicy grape, there’s a gush of liquid that’s satisfying and refreshing. There’s some flesh to that fruit. It’s energizing and fresh.
But when you get raisins, they’ve been left out to dry; all the life has been sucked out of them. You get this shriveled, nasty thing that makes you more thirsty when you eat it.
He equated that to the Christian life. If Jesus is the vine, we need to stay connected so that we keep receiving that life from Him. We want to be fruitful; we want to offer a love and a grace to the world that quenches spiritual thirst and satisfies hunger for God.
Elsewhere Jesus challenges religious leaders who are so focused on and proud of knowing the scriptures. Christ declares that those verses testify of Him. If they wanted real life based on what they learned from the holy scriptures they cherish, then they would come to Him to find it.
You search the Scriptures because you think that in them, you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life. John 5:39-40 NASB
From that chaplain’s perspective, we needed as a church to be focused on God’s Word – on the Bible and understanding it, for sure, but even more importantly on understanding the message that God gave us in sending us His Son, Jesus Christ, the Word become flesh.
It wouldn’t be enough to become “Bible-thumpers” searching the Scriptures for ways to believe we are better than everyone around us, thinking we’ve got the secret or the best treasure and clutching it close to our chests.
We would need to put our beliefs to work, turn our professions of love into expressions of love, with actions and not just words. That’s what we see in Jesus, and if we were really going to abide in Him, that’s what should start happening in us.
Those verses meant a lot to me before he shared them with the church, but under his leadership, they bounced around my head for almost two years as he kept coming back to that vision, that focus:
“Abide in Christ. Let Christ abide in you. Minister to others and bring life. Be fruitful. Don’t be a raisin.”
I guess this used to be a meme? Thanks, imgflip!
How many people are really called to ministry?
Our new chaplain arrived almost the same time that our worship director was moving back to the States. I stepped into the worship director role and met with the new chaplain to find out what he wanted.
From the start, he has emphasized a desire to see the Spirit move freely in and through the congregation. Getting more people involved means less of a burdensome workload for each individual, but it also means that it’s not a one-man show up front.
His words and his passion reminded me of a term I learned about years ago in a church with a similar mindset: the priesthood of all believers.
In the Old Testament of the Bible, you’d often see the Spirit fall on one man or woman, who was called during their lifetime to do great and mighty deeds as God’s representative in a way. There was often a small number of prophets, if not one primary prophet for any given time in the life of the nation. Occasionally there were more – there is a school of prophets during the time of Elisha – but this seems like a rarity.
In our modern churches, it can often look the same. There is The Pastor, who everyone looks to for just about everything. If someone has to pray, ask The Pastor. If someone has a question about the Bible or Christian doctrine, ask The Pastor. If someone is struggling with anything, talk to The Pastor. If an elderly member of the congregation needs their lawn mowed, call The Pastor.
Maybe there are some other Special People in the church… like The Worship Leader, or the Elder, or the Senior Deacon, or the Sunday School Superintendent. Hopefully, a lot of the hard work of a large ministry is divided among a number of willing servants so that no one is bearing the load alone.
The downside is that this can lead the members in the congregation to act like spectators, showing up to a performance expecting to be entertained in a strictly one-way communication or ministry (from the people at the front to everyone in the pews).
“The priesthood of all believers” is meant to flip that ratio.
Paul frequently tells all the saints about what has changed since they came to faith in Christ, and one of those significant changes is that God’s Spirit dwells in each of us. To one church, he asks the question pointedly:
Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? 1 Cor 3:16 NASB
Every believer has the Spirit of God in them, with gifts and abilities that are meant to be shared in the church for the benefit of all present (see Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12-14, Ephesians 4:11-16). There’s no reason to have a one-man or few-person show up front. There are, or should be, a whole bunch of Spirit-empowered potential ministers of God’s goodness and grace filling the pews.
Have you ever seen a church full of temples?
The church is full of temples of God–you and me.
This is what Paul described as the mystery of the good news he was called to preach to the world. God wasn’t staying far off, some angry judge in the sky hammering a gavel calling us all guilty and pronouncing the sentence of death. Nor was He aloof and disinterested with our struggles and circumstances as if we were a forgotten cosmic ant colony.
Christ is in you, and working through you. God drew near in the person of Jesus, and nearer still in the indwelling presence of the Spirit.
… the word of God, that is, the mystery which has been hidden from the past ages and generations, but has now been manifested to His saints … which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Col 1:25-27 NASB
When we get our minds and hearts fixed on God… when we remind ourselves of His constant presence… when we consider all that He has called us to and the wonderful power at work in us because of His grace and mercy… when we get into that place–not just physically in a church building but spiritually in our passionate devotion toward Him…
That’s where we find our source of life–true, fruitful life that lasts. Remember: don’t be a raisin!
Here’s a video from our service a few months ago. (Today’s video had technical difficulties.) Jump to 11:45 to hear “This is Where (Source of Life)” played by the Kadena CWS band.
This is Where (Source of Life)
This is where my need meets Your sufficiency
This is where my past gives way to Your mercy
This is where I kneel in humility
You whisper, “Follow Me. Come follow Me.”
This is where my sin, You take and wash me clean
The mess that I’m in, You say You will redeem
I’ve been so blinded, but now I start to see
You come alive in me, the life inside of me
And it’s a mystery and a wonder
It’s my only hope
You’re living in me as I wander
All along life’s winding road
Yeah, You blessed me beyond measure
More than I could try to hold inside
You became my Source of life
This is where we see a little more of You
This is where belief turns into work to do
This is where meaning and purpose start anew
We’re called to follow You, to come and follow You
This is where vision becomes reality
This is where grace flows to the very least
Your Holy Spirit supplies the power we need
We come alive and see Your glory bursting free
And it’s a mystery and a wonder
It’s our only hope
You’re changing history as You sunder
Every chain upon our souls
Yeah You bless us beyond measure
More than we could try to hold inside
Jesus, You’re our Source of life
You are life
You’re the One in Whom I will abide
You’re the One of Whom the Scriptures testify
We will come and find that You satisfy our souls
On New Year’s Eve, on my way to work, my morning was fitting the 2020 mold perfectly.
Traffic was horrible even though many people had the day off.
I hadn’t had breakfast yet, despite being up for a few hours.
I was running later than I wanted to be, which would likely mean staying later at work to get those hours knocked out.
Finally, as I came through the base gate and showed my ID card, I fumbled trying to put it back in its cellphone case sleeve, and it fell somewhere in my car.
I pulled over and searched for a few minutes, but the card was nowhere to be found. I even wondered if maybe there was a hole in the floor I didn’t know about, under some fabric or a mat.
Then I took a long look at the plastic panel between the front seats of my car, where the parking break is located. There’s a small, mostly covered, slot for the adjustable parking break handle, and although it looked like a you’d need a one-in-a-million shot, you could probably slide an ID card into that tiny groove.
I shone light into the groove and–of course–saw the white plastic of my ID card lurking in the inaccessible depths.
The ID card I would need to even sign in on my computer at work.
The ID card that couldn’t be replaced easily, let alone on a holiday.
The panel is held in place by ratchet bolts on both sides, and it seemed like I would have to remove the front seats if I wanted to gain access.
I drove to the store on base, complaining to my wife on the phone, trying to think of options or tools that might help me get the thing free. Purchase (and breakfast) in hand, I drove to work, thinking that at least I could be at work, on the clock, while I sorted this dilemma out.
There’s a panoramic ocean view on the way to my office, as you drive between the base golf course and the flight line. I remember as a young Airman a few years ago (–ok, several years–OK two decades) looking out at the waves and coming to a crucial realization:
The problems occupying and overwhelming my mind on that particular day wouldn’t even matter or be remembered in a week or two.
New Year’s Eve was no different. I would probably be able to get my ID out of its prison. If not, it would suck, but I would be able to get a replacement in a few days… and my Retired ID would let me get on base and do all my usual activities without hassle.
Actually, that day was different in a way…
A bright rainbow filled the sky to the northwest. I saw it when I left for work, and I saw it again as I enjoyed this vantage point with the beach filling the horizon.
(This is actually the north beach of Okuma back in November, but the rainbow was similarly clear in the sky on New Year’s Eve.)
Biblically, of course, the rainbow calls to mind God’s promise of mercy and His faithfulness—a reminder I no doubt needed given the frustrations about my ID.
I prayed and thanked God for the many good things I have in my favor. I have a great job working for an excellent company that allows me to live on this beautiful island. I am healthy and life is pretty stable. My grumpy attitude is unfounded when I take stock of the blessings in my life.
“God,” I said, forcing my heart to admit what my head knew was true, “I know You’ve blessed me all along the way.”
A flash of inspiration hit–the thought of “there’s a song in that phrase.” I started playing with the words and melody as I made my way to work, and jotted down the details for later tweaking.
And the ID card?
A strip of duct tape on the end of a flattened straw fished my ID card out of the deep crevasse with almost anticlimactic lack of effort.
Your hand holds me, I know You’ve told me You will never leave, never forsake me Your hand of blessing, it’s overflowing Still I’m struggling when things don’t go my way
Your hand is comfort on my shoulder I know You’re with me in my darkest days When I’ve got no one, Your hand still holds on God, help me stop looking around and seek Your face God, help me stop running around And run straight into Your embrace How can I say that I trust You, then challenge what You do? How can I doubt You will rescue after all You’ve brought me through?
When I can’t see it, can’t understand it Still I know I can say by faith All I needed, Your hand provided Lord, You bless me all along the way
When I’ve wandered, when I’ve squandered Every precious gift of mercy that You gave You still sustained me on this journey Yeah, You bless me all along the way
We played it the first Sunday of the new year at our worship service. Forgive us in advance for the sound “quality” of the livestream, then jump to the 15 minute mark to hear “All Along the Way.”
I’m listening to music as I get ready for church this morning, and there’s a song that speaks right to me. I’m going to be a little vulnerable, and even throw in a [content warning: thoughts of self-harm].
When I think about my past—the mistakes I’ve made, the hurt I’ve caused, the wreckage I’ve left behind in my life and the lives of others—sometimes it can get overwhelming.
Not many people know all of my junk and my mess. Most people know “the nice guy,” the dude that sings and plays piano at church, the co-worker that’s willing to listen to what’s weighing you down.
Some people even look up to me in various ways. I don’t know if that helps or hurts more.
Because I know the rest of the story. There’s a darker part of me that still whispers and claws at the back of my mind, bringing up the past and stirring up doubts about the future.
Some days, that voice says I should just sink under the water in the bathtub and not come back up. Some days, when I look out at the ocean waves, that voice wonders if I shouldn’t just start swimming toward the sunset until I can’t go any further.
I never really feel suicidal, and I don’t think I would have the guts to act on any such impression if I truly felt like doing something.
But the voice whispers nonetheless, and the memories and regrets float like ghosts through the recesses of my mind.
Enter the power of forgiveness.
I grew up in church—heard all the stories about salvation and Jesus dying on the cross for our sins, prayed a prayer to ask Him into my heart before I fully learned to read, and so on.
Grace and forgiveness are familiar concepts—too familiar sometimes.
When you’re four, “Jesus saves” sounds nice, but you probably don’t understand what it means. Saves from what? What danger was I in? Was I not going to get a snack in Sunday School, or worse yet, was I about to be put in time-out?
When you’re over forty, on the other hand, you might have some things you look back on with regret and shame.
The Gospel message is that Jesus took all of our sin—all the hurt we cause others, all the hurt we cause ourselves, all the failures and moral weakness and rebellion—and put it on His shoulders to carry. He bore the brunt of the justice of a holy God for our wrongdoing, and to us, He extends a hand of mercy and forgiveness, of freedom and the chance to be like new.
When Christians enter into this relationship with God through Christ, we go through a ritual of baptism—usually involving being submerged under and rising up out of water, a symbol of joining in Christ’s death and resurrection.
We go under the waves, and the thought is that the old “me” stays there, dead and gone, while the new “me,” Christ in me, rises out of the water.
Consequences still remain. The cross doesn’t magically fix every relationship or heal every hurt. Baptism doesn’t wash away the scars of years of wounds inflicted on someone else. Healing relationships means walking a long and tough road, and that opportunity may not be available in many cases.
But the Gospel does give us hope. Grace does give us a reason and the power to change. Forgiveness does hush the whisper of the past. “Your accusation may be accurate, but your condemnation isn’t.”
This weekend, I had plenty of time to consider my past, to get overwhelmed by the weight of what I’ve done. I also experienced a measure of grace—unmerited kindness—from the people around me as we work through all of this.
At one point in the Gospels, a woman deemed sinful by her community comes to Jesus, anoints His feet with perfumed oil, washes them with her tears, and dries them with her hair. The outwardly righteous religious leaders look on with scorn. “If he knew the kind of woman that was touching him right now,” they think, “he would have nothing to do with her!”
Jesus replies that one who is forgiven much loves much.
If I’m too familiar with grace and forgiveness, it’s like, “yeah, yeah, Jesus died for my sins, for God so loved the world and all that.” Sounds pretty good and all, but let’s not get carried away.
When I stop to really consider it—or when I can’t help but think of how desperately I needed it—then it draws a much different response from my heart: praise and gratitude.
I could have gone under and stayed there… but His hand reached out to draw me up from the depths, and that gives me a reason to sing.
Continuing the “10 albums that influenced your musical taste” thing I got from my wife and daughter.
As I jot down the backstories associated with this pair of albums, I realize they aren’t probably going to connect with anyone but church folk… but that’s a risk I’ll have to take.
I grew up in church and learned to play a number of 80s & early 90s “church songs” – hymns, praise choruses, and occasional hits in the Contemporary Christian Music genre. A lot of that was to entertain or bless my parents and friends of the family.
Some of it was because our Associate Pastor was a phenomenal pianist who I’m told played backup keys for some high-profile names in the 60s and 70s before coming to Jesus. (I’m trying to find proof of this, but you don’t often see “backup keyboardist” listed anywhere.) Regardless, it was always a treat to see Pastor Bob get rockin’ on the baby grand, and I wanted to learn to be at least half as good as him.
But imitating someone’s style isn’t the same as pouring out your heart in a song. While I prayed a prayer at a young age and professed faith in Christ all my life, I went through an all-too-typical teenage back-and-forth of commitment and complacency or even apathy about my faith.
After joining the Air Force in late ’94, I went through almost two years of training before I got to my first duty station in September ’96. By then I had gotten myself into trouble with a combination of more credit card debt than I knew how to handle, and less responsibility or attention to detail on the job than the Air Force expected of its members. Everything seemed to be falling apart, and at what felt like the bottom, I turned back to God.
Basically, I admitted that if I was going to do this “believe in Jesus” thing, it had to be real or else what was the point?
There was a little church off base that welcomed me in even though I was smoking in the parking lot. They seemed to care more about me than about telling me off for how messed up I was.
When I said I wanted to go there again, the acquaintance who gave me a ride said, “I don’t go there often, but I know someone who goes every week, and she lives in the dorm next to yours.”
I met a lovely young lady named Jami that day who offered to give me a ride to church each week… and later allowed me to talk through a lot of the stuff I had to deal with in my heart in order to grow up (at least a little). She also happened to be one of maybe two or three sincere Christians I knew at the time who felt like peers, so we talked a lot about scripture and spiritual growth. Soon after, as we spent more and more time together, we decided to officially call it “dating,” and a few months after that, I asked her to marry me.
Jami had some albums by this guy, Dennis Jernigan, who sang songs that felt more honest and deep than a simple “This is the day that the Lord has made, let us be glad and rejoice in it” that we might sing in the congregation at church.
Jernigan is also a pianist, and something of a psalmist. He is prolific in his songwriting, and the subjects aren’t all the happy Christian music you might expect Ned Flanders to listen to.
All the Jernigan albums are great if you care for this kind of music and message, but this album, Break My Heart O God, particularly changed my musical tastes.
A friend of mine from my new church asked me to accompany him on “You Are My All In All,” which he wanted to sing as a farewell to the congregation before he moved back to the States. I was happy to play, but as we practiced in private, I also sang along.
“Dave,” he said, “you should totally sing too. We could harmonize. It would be great.”
I was convinced my voice was best left unheard, so I resisted at first, but eventually I agreed. That invitation and encouragement led to me joining up with the worship team, not just to play keys but to sing–and eventually to leadership positions and paying positions in music.
If I had to pick one album that represented the shift in both my heart and my musical taste toward incorporating praise and worship, it is “Break My Heart O God.”
However, not long after joining up with the team, the worship director introduced us to some new songs and a couple of albums that came out from some obscure Christian group with a website called WorshipTogether. Seemed like a bunch of (relatively) edgy stuff from churches and musicians in the UK.
There were these folks I hadn’t heard of before, like Matt Redman, Martin Smith and Delirious?, Stuart Townend, Tim Hughes… eventually David Crowder and Chris Tomlin, among so many others.
This music felt different than the book full of short praise choruses from labels like Integrity’s Hosanna! or Maranatha. And while Hillsong was taking over so much of that market share with what I thought was also good music and meaningful worship, all of this stuff being imported from the UK seemed like where it was at.
(Maybe I should make a Cutting Edge joke here, since that album from Delirious? is almost a tie for deserving the ninth slot. Anyone still reading probably does get that reference.)
This makes me think of one of the best periods of music ministry that I’ve experienced. We would jam out a worship set for almost an hour, listen to the pastor preach for about an hour, and then close with a song… which often turned into another half hour or hour of people just wanting to worship and praise God through singing, dancing, clapping, or just bowing there before the altar.
Not everything about that time was perfect, but it set the bar for what I think of as solid, spontaneous, Spirit-filled worship with a sense of the presence of God… and that’s a place I’ve been returning to as often as possible since.
As I contemplate Good Friday, and the sacrifice of Christ for the sins of the world, I thought it would be a good day to post this hymn I wrote a few weeks back.
You saw my weak and helpless state My suffering under heavy chains For Your name’s sake You did not wait But took my place and bore my shame The King of Glory scorned of men Whose every breath belongs to Him Yet in my sin You loved me still And took my place upon that hill
The spotless Lamb who knew no sin Drew down the justice meant for me And all my guilt was laid on Him The burden of iniquity To You the cup of wrath did come And crying out, You drank its dregs And in my place Your body hung And there You died and bowed Your head
Blessing and honor and glory be To the One who alone is worthy The Lamb who was slain Name above all names Jesus Christ, the King of kings.
You saw my full depravity Yet looked with mercy on my need The King came in humility And took my place upon the tree You bore my curse, You took God’s wrath Reserved for me, now I can stand In wondrous praise upon the path From Calvary to Promised Land
Now I will bow and sing the praise Of You who died and rose again God’s Only Son, High Priest who saves I’ll stand amazed and fully cleansed Worthy of more than words can say Be glorified eternally I come before the throne of grace And take my place knelt at Your feet
Blessing and honor and glory be To the One who alone is worthy The Lamb who was slain Name above all names Jesus Christ, the King of kings.
Though sun may set, and night consume The light of hope, replaced with gloom, The dawn will split the darkness soon. And though in death, they thought Him doomed, The Son arose, and from the tomb Eternal rest and life now bloom.
Sunday is coming.
Wishing you all a safe and meaningful Good Friday and Easter Sunday.
How does something hardly mentioned in the accounts of the New Testament church become a driving force that dominates roughly half of the average church gathering, and determines, for many, whether or not a church feels good or right for them?
Let’s talk about “worship.”
Our chapel praise & worship team had an after-practice discussion on worship and scripture – the first of many, hopefully. We minister in a military chapel, so there is a lot of overturn and change of leadership. The worship leader and I have only been serving for a year now, and while Bible studies were on our “to do” list, unfortunately, life and distractions got in the way.
Our worship leader asked me if I’d be willing to share to get a conversation started. I was happy to do so, and thought, “Since this is our very first one as a team, what’s the most fundamental thing to me about worship and what we do?”
Despite my opening question, there are lots of scriptures that we use to define the importance of music ministry and praise — great stories from the Old Testament such as the musicians leading the army and the enemies destroying one another in confusion; teachings on the Tabernacle of David and how that might apply to us today; all the excellent verses in Psalms; New Testament moments like when Paul and Silas are praising in prison and an earthquake throws the cell doors wide; even instructions suggesting everyone should come to church with a psalm, hymn, or spiritual song so that the body might be edified.
What to choose?
What came to mind wasn’t what I expected.
“What worship is not.”
I felt compelled to look at verses about worship… how the Bible defines it, and how we often use the term today. I’m convinced that the two are very different, or at least that we should be more careful about what we mean when we say “worship.”
There’s the oft-quoted reminder that worship comes from Old English weorthscipe, which is basically “worth-ship,” the quality of being valuable or precious. It’s an expression of how much someone or something is worth to us.
In other words, true worship costs something.
When I look at scripture and consider the life we’re called to lead, how much of what God instructs us is singing and playing music? In epistle after epistle, Paul writes a letter to churches or leaders where he lays out some theology – some truth about what God has done and what that means – followed by practical instructions for living a life of worship. So little of those instructions are about the “worship” we cherish and esteem so highly.
Paul tells us that offering ourselves as living sacrifices is our “spiritual service of worship” (Rom 12:1). Jesus tells us that “He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me” (John 14:21). John later reminds us that the expression of love for God is our obedience (1 John 5:3).
Singing is conspicuously absent.
Imagine if your spouse said, “Honey, I need your help. Can you please do the dishes so I can use them to cook?” Would you express love and the worth of your spouse by singing to them?
I would always do the dishes out of love for you… I would even take the trash out to the dumpster, too… I would pick up all the laundry ’round our home… This is my love for you, my love for you alone.
Or maybe just do the thing that’s been asked of you.
If there was a pie chart for what we’re called to do to live the Christian life, singing and playing music is going to be a pretty small slice among the many more practical responsibilities of ministering to the needs of others. If we took all of the commands of Christ and Paul and others in the Bible and tried to map out what’s covered, our current idea of worship as deeply emotional singing to God isn’t going to be big on that list.
If you cooked a worship pie using the Bible’s recipe, it wouldn’t taste like music.
When handling God’s Word, there are two important terms for how we approach and interpret the text:
Exegesis is the process of getting the intended meaning from the text – reading comprehension, informed by context, scholarship, other scripture, lexical aids, and the like. “What does this mean? What did it mean to its audience?”
Eisegesis is reading intended meaning into the text – reading with a bias or preconceived notion. “I want a verse that backs up what I’m saying, something that confirms what I already think is true. Oh, here’s one.”
I found the verse that says what I wanted a verse to say! … More or less.
Sometimes this leads to well-meaning people sharing as fact or Gospel truth what they’ve heard from well-intentioned teachers, who themselves passed on what they were told by other folks who saw something in a verse or heard something profound and adopted it as a certainty. Then no one fact-checks the familiar teaching, because why would you?
I’m not chucking spears at any of my fellow believers. We all get things wrong sometimes, and I’ve come up with some amazingly bad interpretations of Scripture. I am trying to chuck spears at some of the phrases and beliefs we accept in the church that aren’t readily apparent in the Bible which defines our faith.
If we’re not careful, every verse that says anything about someone singing or praising will become a new “teaching on worship,” a new “revelation about the power of praise.” Very quickly, we end up with books and videos full of exposition on verses taken out of context, all feeding our understanding of the importance of new, fresh, anointed, powerful, expressive praise and worship music, much of which pushes us toward purchasing that new song or this new album from an industry of which there seems to be no end in sight.
Cynical, I know. Sorry.
However, the plain reading of scripture to me doesn’t give singing and music the central role in the Body that we do in the church today.
I love doing it, I love being a part of it, I love leading it, I love being in the congregation during it, I love everything about it… but I have to be honest that I just don’t see it at the forefront of what God’s Word calls us to do and be in our churches and our daily lives.
There are more important matters.
For me, getting on stage and playing the piano or singing a song is either an emotional stimulant or an emotional release. I can pour out my frustrations in “worship” and I benefit greatly from it. It’s definitely not some grand sacrifice I’m making, some selfless act worthy of commendation.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful that God gives us a means of expressing our adoration and praise which is so fun and so powerfully moving. It’s just not the sacrificial, selfless lifestyle I see the Bible calling Christians to live out in the day-to-day.
I shared this with the team and my wife, and I got some very important feedback. For some people, getting on stage in front of people is really hard. Being in the spotlight when you want to shrink into the shadows is a challenge. Having to perform or speak through your fears is difficult. I respect that, and don’t want to make light of the effort those people make to serve God in music and song.
Similarly, some worship teams have far more obligation and responsibility. If you’re running the music ministry for a big church with multiple services and you’re wrangling all the moving parts and conflicting schedules, that’s work, no doubt about it. Giving that your best might be a selfless sacrifice, for sure. I don’t want to ignore that either.
My concern is more for this concept that worship – specifically singing and playing music – is the main thing, or one of the main things.
Who was a worship leader in the early church?
Ephesians 4:11 doesn’t read, “And He gave some to be apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and worship leaders…” yet that’s a prominent role in our churches, with a whole branch of biblical teaching developed around trying to glean every insight from scripture about the power of music and praise.
Are we receiving the intended meaning from the text, or are we reading meaning into passages, hoping to find what confirms our existing assumptions?
Why don’t we read about more worship leaders in the Bible? Should I have to go all the way back to Chenaniah of the Levites in 1 Chr 15 to find someone “in charge of the singing” in corporate worship?
Arguably, Satan is another “biblical worship leader” based on some interpretations of Ezekiel 28 and Isaiah 14, but I’m not so sure scripture is clear on that. (Links to some interesting articles looking at what Scripture says, what it doesn’t, and what we might infer.Remember, exegesis is good; eisegesis is bad.)
What is the list of qualifications for a worship leader, if the office is so important? We have lists for overseers, deacons, pastors, teachers, and the like – practical instructions and standards for servant leaders who meet the practical needs of the Body.
Why doesn’t Paul give us a glimpse of what the worship leader’s role looks like? Did 100% of churches have that 100% correct, and so it wasn’t necessary in any of his letters? That would be a pretty amazing coincidence.
Again, I am not opposed to what we call worship music, and I’m sure I will continue using that term to describe it, whether out of habit, laziness, or convenience. I just got done playing some songs and singing with my wife, followed by looking into rapid paintings as expressions of worship as part of planning for an upcoming special Night of Worship gathering where all we plan to do is express our hearts to God, mostly through music and song.
I also think there are fine “lead worshipers” in the Christian community who put some thoughtful and careful teaching out there for all the rest of us wanting to be the next Matt Redman or Kim Walker-Smith. (They’d probably respond with a teaching about “Don’t try to be us. God doesn’t need another Kim Walker-Smith. He wants you.”)
It’s just that I know my heart well enough to catch how easily I choose to “serve” in a way that I enjoy, to “minister” in a way that comes easy, to “worship” in a way that costs me nothing and actually only benefits me.
So what IS worship?
For me, a convicting display of worship was when I chatted with my friend, a talented singer and passionate lover of Jesus who can easily hold their own belting out a beautiful melody in front of any crowd, who can expertly follow the leading of the Spirit to know what’s the right thing to say or sing at the right time, who has every reason to be up front in the spotlight leading the congregation in praise…
And instead, they said, “There’s no one running the children’s ministry. This is a need in the Body. This is important. I don’t feel gifted in this, I don’t feel a desire to do this–but I do feel like I need to step up and serve to meet this need.”
That looks to me like biblical worship. That’s a sacrifice.
I get up to play and sing, and I feel like the rich people tossing wads of cash into the collection in front of Jesus, acting like their loose change is something special.
I’m not saying I won’t keep playing or singing songs. I just want to make sure that I’m being honest about what I’m doing, and what I’m not.
What do you think?
Are we too focused on music when we talk about worship? Have we let new songs and emotional moments overtake practical obedience in what it means to do church and live the Christian life?
Or am I missing something crucial in the way I’m looking at this? Is there some key aspect or benefit of the songs we sing and the way we express our hearts to God which I have neglected?
Let me know in a comment, or share your thoughts on the matter. I certainly don’t have a lock on spiritual wisdom, and I’d love to hear what God has shown you.
There’s a line from the song, “Here As In Heaven,” by Elevation Worship, which gets me excited about the Body of Christ coming together to praise Him.
The evidence is all around … that the Spirit of the Lord is here.
We’re in the midst of planning a night of worship for the Protestant chapels on Kadena, and part of what’s on my mind for that is the reminder of what Scripture teaches us about the presence of God.
“Don’t you know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” – 1 Corinthians 3:16
Over the years, I’ve heard many lead worshippers and passionate seekers talk about how we approach God through music and corporate praise in terms of a process of “entering into His presence,” or a hopeful desire that “maybe God will show up in our time of worship.”
“Will You come and fill this place? Can we feel Your presence today?”
They’ll quote verses from Psalms and the Old Testament talking about entering His courts and they’ll refer to the three sections of the Tabernacle as if it’s a picture of gradual stages of worship.
“First we’re in the outer courts, kind of like the congregation meeting up in the sanctuary … then some of us will press in to seek God, and we’ll go deeper, further, into the holy place or the inner courts … but then a few might really pursue God and go into the Most Holy place, where His presence is.”
There’s even a song about it that I recall from the ’80s or ’90s. Take me past the outer courts, into the holy place… take me in to the Holy of Holies.
But we’re not living in the old covenant, where only the select ones can enter the presence of God. Those songs and ideas at least recognized that all of us are welcomed into God’s presence because of Christ, but I feel like they’re still lacking a key understanding of what has changed since we are now in Christ.
You are the Temple of God.
About two decades ago, I decided that this faith in Christ had to be the real thing in my life – not “I grew up in church,” not “I’ve always been a Christian,” not “I’m an American so of course Jesus loves me,” and so on. I rededicated my life to Christ about two decades ago and have stumbled and faltered my way toward Him ever since. One of the sermons I remember from early on in that time was framed around 1 Cor 3:16 and 1 Cor 6:19 which say very similar things.
The Spirit of God is in you.
Why would we be seeking to enter the presence of God, when He became Emmanuel – God With Us – to dwell among us forever? Why would we be striving to work up an emotional moment that we can call “entering the presence of God” when He is already here with us, wherever we go, whatever we’re doing, any time, all the time?
The pastor focused on Paul’s question, “Don’t you know?” It almost seems like a challenge: Hey, don’t you understand? Don’t you get it? Are you not aware of this?
Not a hateful or condescending put-down, but a caring re-emphasis on what matters. Don’t you know about this? This is important. This is crucial. You have to know this.
The Spirit of God dwells in you.
If that’s true, that changes things in worship. (It changes a lot of other things too.)
I don’t have to work up a passionate moment or a goosebumps feeling to know that God is already “here” in the room and in the moment with me. I don’t have to strive to make it through some stages or jump through some religious hoops to where now I somehow earned or deserve to access His presence – He already did all the work in redeeming me and putting His Spirit in me.
We know this is true of the Gospel – we don’t do good to earn Jesus points or secure some kind of hopeful “maybe” for salvation. God saved us through Christ, all our sin forgiven, all our debt paid, all the work done by Him so that “by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.” (Eph 2:8-9)
My pastor years ago reminded us of the truth of what Scripture says (what’s true even when we don’t feel like it or don’t remember it). You are the temple of God. When you wake up in the morning, remember that you’re not asking God to show up sometimes during your day or hoping that maybe He’ll look your way now and then. He is right there, right then, with you always, wherever you go.
The problem isn’t that we need God to show up or that we need to enter His presence. The problem is that we often need to be reminded of what God has said and what He has already done.
He isn’t withholding Himself or limiting Himself, playing keep away or hide and seek with us. Sometimes, we get distracted or caught up in everything else going on, and we’re not staying aware of God’s presence.
We can choose to remind ourselves of this truth, though… just as we must often be reminded of the promises and the goodness of God.
A pastor I heard once preached a basic sermon, but pointed out, “The problem isn’t that we need to hear some new thing, some magic trick that will energize us spiritually or make us always successful. The problem is how easily we forget the basics, and how often we need to remind ourselves of what God says is true… which is nothing new, but something very necessary.”
When we look around our church sanctuary – or the living room of someone’s house where believers are gathered in His Name – then the evidence is right there all around you, hinted at in the myriad faces of the faithful, testifying:
Have you noticed that God has a way of bringing the unexpected message or song you need right at the time you need it? I recall that when our oldest daughter got married and moved back to the States, that week at the chapel service was the first time I heard and played the Bethel version of “It Is Well.” Even though it felt like the seas of our family life were turbulent and shifting, I had to sing – and recognize – that those waves and wind still know His Name, and that through it all, with my eyes on Him, it would be well with me.
This week, my family sent our son Jon off to Thailand for LifeCompass, a four month missionary internship with Cadence International. It is both awesome and hard to see him go. As parents we worry for his safety; as Christians we praise God for working in and through him; as loved ones we will miss the joy and passion he brings to our home.
Last week at worship team practice, one of our magnificent singers, Rachel, introduced me to a song called “Another in the Fire” by Hillsong United. Jon is taking the words and the scriptures that inspired them with him, and I’m keeping them close to my heart. We all have fires and seas in our path. Maybe it’s the difference between who we know we should be and who we are. Maybe it’s a deep grief or frustrating struggle where we never seem to make headway. Maybe the doubts and uncertainties about what’s to come. Maybe it’s all those and more. Whatever our struggle or challenge, there is Another who was with us, who is with us now, and who will be through it all. We can know that we will never be alone.
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Welcome to a blog post for Pentecost Sunday – the “birthday” of the Christian church, and the day in this tradition where we celebrate the outpouring of the Spirit on all believers, recounted in Acts 2.
