worship

Known by Name

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The old saying goes something like this: Satan knows your name but calls you by your sin. God knows your sin but calls you by name.

We live in a world that preaches a watered-down god that tolerates anything and everything but has no real power to do anything about real evil. In such a culture, it’s easy to take for granted that God loves me.

But when you look at the real God from the Bible who knows every single thing about you including all those hidden sins and secret pasts, and He still loves you? And not only that, but this love isn’t a benign and vague feeling but a love demonstrated in Christ laying down His life for us.

That is an infinite love. It means He loves each and every one of us as if we were the only ones to love. He loves us with a purifying love that doesn’t merely tolerate us and cover over what’s wrong with us. His love transforms us and removes anything that is unworthy of God’s holiness or keeps us from being who God made us to be.

If we really understood and believed in that kind of love, we’d live different. We’d be different. The ones who get the love of God are the ones who love God and others well. They seek to know and do what Jesus says, not out of obligation but out of adoration. Their lives are a testimony to others and a kind of thank you back to God.

“My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:14-19, The Message).

Worship Music

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Back in the day, the debate was whether to use hymns or praise choruses in church. Lately, a lot of churches have decided that it doesn’t have to be an either/or proposition. You can do both.

As a child of the 80s and 90s, I have a nostalgic love for all the old praise choruses, but lately, I seem to be drawn back to hymns. I really love when you can take a hymn and give it a little more modern arrangement. That really makes the powerful words stand out even more.

I will say that if you pay attention to the rhyme scheme of the old hymns, they were always dead on. Every line rhymed exactly. Praise choruses? Not so much, but at least it was close most of the time. With the later modern worship music, not so much.

I really like some of the new songs, but I have to confess that some of the rhymes are really forced and don’t really rhyme at all. But that’s probably me being a little OCD. Besides, that’s not really the point of a worship song.

C. S. Lewis said that a good worship service is one where you were so focused on God that you don’t remember the sermon or the songs as much as you know that God was there. I’d add that a true worshipper knows that worship is more than just singing songs. He or she can truly sing from a heart of gratitude and praise, regardless of whether the song is an ancient hymn or a recent worship song because what matters isn’t the style or the arrangements but the God we’re singing about.

Maybe next Sunday will be another 90s throwback worship set. Maybe it will be all hymns. Or maybe it will be a blend of new and old. Regardless, I want my eyes to be on Jesus, not the setlist. That’s what truly matters, after all.

Heading South

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I finally got around to it. After months of thinking about it and finally deciding to make it happen, I visited the latest regional campus of Brentwood Baptist Church, The Church at West End in Columbia.

It was a bit of a drive from Brentwood to Columbia. Even on a Sunday, it took 45 minutes. But it was so worth it. I loved seeing this congregation worshipping and celebrating the Lord’s Day together.

I love how each of the campuses has a unique flavor and how each fits the community very well. Each one is a different expression of what a biblical Church should look like.

Several years ago, my goal was to visit each of the current campuses of Brentwood Baptist. At the time, there were 8, but I managed to get to each one. Now, I’m thankful that I’ve been to all 9. Maybe at some point, there will be another for me to visit.

I’m praying for the Church. It seems like more and more these days, the true Church that holds to the true faith will have to be more united than ever to survive. We will have to cross denominational lines and work together. We have to see other churches not as rivals or competition but allies and fellow saints.

God is at work. Whether it’s a massive structure that hosts thousands or a small room with a handful of people, God is present in the midst of them. People are getting saved and baptized. God is calling out faithful men and women to the ministry and the mission field.

Lord, keep us faithful to your true gospel. Bring back Your wayward churches and denominations that have strayed from Your truth. Bring back the prodigals that have wandered away and deconstructed. May we be true to all that You ask of us, and may we be one just as You, the Holy Trinity, are one.

Refreshing Reminder

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I was cutting the grass earlier than normal today in hopes of escaping the heat. Thankfully, it wasn’t super hot yet but the air was already heavy with humidity. Thankfully, there was a refreshing breeze that cooled me down periodically to keep me going.

That reminded me of something I learned about a particular Hebrew word used for the Holy Spirit. Ruach is translated as spirit, but it can also mean wind or breath. When Jesus was talking to Nicodemus about being born again, He probably used that word ruach to convey how the Spirit moves in mysterious ways.

Usually in western thinking, we typically assign one meaning to a word. Even words that can have different meanings usually have one based on context. But in Hebrew thinking, a word can have multiple meanings all at once.

As I have learned, it’s possible when Jesus used the word He was thinking spirit, breath, and wind all at once. The Holy Spirit is of course the third person in the trinity, the three-in-one consisting of three distinct persons yet also one God.

When Jesus later promised the Holy Spirit to the Church, He said that the Spirit’s job would be to remind them of all He had taught them. The Spirit would also give us the words to say at the right moment of a gospel conversation or where we’re defending what we believe.

I like to think of what the Holy Spirit does (at least in part) as a refreshing reminder of all the promise God has ever made. When life gets hard and the world becomes overbearing, the Spirit is like that gentle breeze that reminds us that God is present with us in the trials. He will bring to mind a verse or something a friend said that reflected God’s heart or even a song lyric that speaks God’s truth.

All that is to point us to Jesus and keep our eyes fixed on Him who is the founder of our faith and the goal of our journey. As long as we’re on this side of heaven with all our struggles and trials, He’s with Him. One day, we’ll have our faith made sight and reach the end of those struggles and trials, and then we’ll be with Him.

Knowing God

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“We know God but as men born blind know the fire: they know that there is such as thing as fire, for they feel it warm them, but what it is they know not. So, that there is a God we know, but what He is we know little, and indeed we can never search Him out to perfection; a finite creature can never fully comprehend that which is infinite” (Thomas Manton).

As I grow older, I become increasingly thankful that God has made Himself known. I realize more and more that apart from that revelation, I could never hope to know about God, much less know Him.

Romans 1 says that there is enough evidence in nature to prove there is a God. Romans 1 also says that because of sin, our minds are corrupted to the point where we can’t seek after God unless He seeks after us first. Until God shines a light on our hearts, we remain in the dark.

I love the idea that in heaven, we will never fully exhaust all there is to know about God. That’s what will keep our worship from becoming dull (plus having the experience of being in the presence of the living God).

Every time we worship God in heaven, He reveals another aspect of His character. Because God is infinite, there is no end to the joy of learning new things about God. After each time, our worship grows deeper and fuller and richer.

Here on earth, we’re still learning as well. Often because of the old sin nature that’s still within us, we have to unlearn some bad thinking about God in order to be able to fully grasp who He is. But God never tires of us or grows impatient with us or decides that we aren’t worth the effort anymore.

That should make Sunday worship a little sweeter. That hopefully will help you to sing a little louder and live a little bolder as you and I draw closer and closer to our faith one day being made sight.

11 Years Later

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I figured out a little while ago that it was 11 years ago today that The Church at Avenue South had their first ever Easter service at 2510 Franklin Road, months before the official September launch of the campus. I distinctly remember we had rows of white plastic folding chairs set in front of a screen. There were maybe 100 of us with a handful of kids.

This Sunday, we had an overflow set up in the basement with just as many chairs. Upstairs in the sanctuary, we had three services to accommodate over 900 worshippers with plenty of kids in attendance. Not to mention we celebrated our first ever Easter Sunday in our new facility that probably seemed like a pipe-dream 11 years ago.

It’s so easy to get caught up in the tyranny of the urgent and forget that sometimes we are living in the answered prayers of the past. So many of those things we pleaded with God to have are now the same things we routinely take for granted in our quest to get more from God.

That’s why gratitude is vital to the life of a believer and to a community of faith. It stops entitlement dead in its tracks and keeps us reminded of God’s continual faithfulness because we like those Israelites of old are forgetful and prone to wander.

I love that we have so many new members who never set foot in the 2510 Franklin Road location. Probably a small handful are left who remember that first Easter service in 2014. But God was there. And He still shows up every Sunday at 901 Acklen Avenue.

I can’t wait to see what the next 11 years holds in store. Or even the next 11 months. Whatever it is, I’m sure it will be exceedingly abundantly beyond anything we could ever ask or dream or imagine or hope for. That’s just God’s way.

Praying for Muslims During Ramadan

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This year, I tried something new. I signed up through the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention to pray 15 minutes a day for Muslims during the season of Ramadan (February 28-March 30).

It was the first time I’d ever signed up to pray daily for any length of time. I quickly learned that 15 minutes of praying can seem like a loooong time when it’s just you trying to pray what’s in your head. Thankfully, the IMB posted daily reminders to pray with several prompts to guide my intercession. Plus, I found some other helpful websites to guide my prayer time.

Hopefully, this is not a humble brag. It should be something like if I can do this, so can you or anyone else. I believe that all of the greatest revivals in history began with people on their knees in prayer (or in my case laying in bed in prayer). I believe this time is no exception.

One particular website that caught my attention was from an organization called Missio Nexus. They have a radical prayer goal of seeing 10% of all the Muslims in the world come to saving faith in Jesus by 2028. By my reckoning, there are 1.8 billion Muslims in the world currently, so that would mean 180 million worshippers in heaven who formerly prayed to Allah. Or better yet, round that number up to 200 million. Can you imagine how amazing of an impact that would have on the entire world?

I hope every one of you will find a prayer passion, whether it be for an unreached people group or people from a different religion or even people whose paths you cross wherever you live, work, or play. It really does open your eyes to the great big world that exists outside of your and my needs and wants. Definitely keep praying for those needs and wants because God tells us to do that, but also be mindful of the Great Commission to take the gospel into all the world and the Revelation 5 scene with worshippers from every people group, language, continent, color, and nationality. That’s truly where God’s heart lies.

No Fear

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“The remarkable thing about God is that when you fear God, you fear nothing else, whereas if you do not fear God, you fear everything else” (Oswald Chambers).

That was a hip slogan back a few years, I think. No fear. I think it needs to make a comeback.

These days, fear is used as the supreme motivator when it comes to politics and marketing and just about everything else under the sun. It seems like so many are still living under the fear of 2020 and the pandemic.

Another saying that I like better from back in the day went like this: “No Jesus, know fear. Know Jesus, no fear.”

It might be a tad simplistic, but the general idea is good. To know Jesus as the Prince of Peace is to be free from a life dominated by fear and anxiety. I don’t think any believer ever is completely free of fear this side of heaven, but he or she is not a slave to it any longer.

I also recall an acronym used by a black preacher that I have always loved. He said that F-E-A-R stands for False Evidence Appearing Real. Nearly all of fear is based on a lie. Nearly all the lies based on fear tell you that either God is not there or He doesn’t care. Fear says that you have to figure it out and solve it all yourself because there is no one else. Fear isolates.

But Jesus calls us to the Father and to one another. Peace comes when we are right with God and right with each other. Peace doesn’t come when you feel super relaxed and calm. Peace comes when even in the midst of feeling afraid you also have certainty of hope at the center of your core.

There’s an old chorus that came to mind when I was typing out these words. I can’t for the life of me find it anywhere, but I think the words are along these lines:

“There is no fear in Jesus Christ
And by his grace we’re made new
And it’s the cross that reminds us
That in him no fear.”

Anyone who remembers this, if you can reply with the correct lyrics (or better yet, the worship artist), I would so greatly appreciate it.

Reason to Sing

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As you may or may not be aware, I have music perpetually playing in my head all the time. I mean All. The. Time. Like from the moment I wake up until the moment I finally fall asleep. Every now and then, I have a random song that I haven’t heard in a while that sneaks into my mental playlist. Or sometimes I think God puts a song in my mind that speaks above the volume of everything else.

One song, Reason to Sing, is from the group All Sons and Daughters. The confessional lyrics are raw and honest in a way that most current worship music is not. I believe it’s from 2013, so it’s not ancient or really all that old, but the lyrics speak a timeless truth to all those feel like lives shattered on the floor. I hope it will speak to you as it has spoken to me over the years:

“When the pieces seem too shattered
To gather off the floor
And all that seems to matter
Is that I don’t feel You anymore
No I don’t feel You anymore

I need a reason to sing
I need a reason to sing
I need to know that You’re still holding
The whole world in Your hands
I need a reason to sing

When I’m overcome by fear
And I hate everything I know
If this waiting lasts forever
I’m afraid I might let go
I’m afraid I might let go oh

Will there be a victory?
Will You sing it over me now?
Your peace is the melody
With You sing it over me now?

I need a reason to sing
I need a reason to sing
I need to know that You’re still holding
The whole world in Your hands
That is a reason to sing

I will sing, sing, sing to my God my King, ‘fore all else fades away;                                       
I will love, love, love with this heart in me, for You’ve been good always” (Leslie Jordan, David Leonard, Alli Rogers © 2011 Integrity’s Praise! Music/BMI and Integrity’s Alleluia! Music/SESAC (both adm at EMICMGPublishing.com), and Simple Tense Songs/ASCAP CCLI # 6092351).

Worship

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“He demands our worship, our obedience, our prostration. Do we suppose that they can do Him any good, or fear, like the chorus in Milton, that human irreverence can bring about “His glory’s diminution”? A man can no more diminish God’s glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word “darkness” on the walls of his cell. But God wills our good, and our good is to love Him (with that responsive love proper to creatures) and to love Him we must know Him: and if we know Him, we shall in fact fall on our faces. If we do not, that only shows that what we are trying to love is not yet God—though it may be the nearest approximation to God which our thought and fantasy can attain” (C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain).

As my pastor points out periodically, we worship for an hour or so every week. That leaves 167 other hours during the week. I submit that worship that exists only in the one hour on Sunday but not during the rest of the week is not truly worship.

My Sunday experience flows out of how I worship the rest of the week. I can’t live for myself Monday through Saturday and show up Sunday expecting God’s blessing. I can’t ignore God for six days and then expect Him to speak to me on Sunday.

I read somewhere how Orthodox Jews build their week around the Sabbath. They will spend the first three days reflecting on the past Sabbath and the next three days preparing for the next Sabbath. That makes the Sabbath the focal point of their week rather than just one day out of seven. I like that.

If we made worship the focus of our week, then we could sing those songs of praise on Sunday with meaning. If we really sought to be worshippers not just through music but in how we lived and worked and played, then our worship would truly be a witness to the world and not just a penciled-in part of a church service.

Maybe the best way to worship is to live every moment for an audience of One. If we truly want to worship, we live in a way that magnifies the worth of God. We seek His pleasure and approval in everything we say and do and think and live.

And for me, I confess that I have often looked at worship as something I have to do versus something I get to do. I should never forget that worship flows out of a heart set free, and only someone who has been delivered from death to live, from despair to hope, from slave to son can truly worship because he has something worth celebrating.