This text should bring a permanent ceasefire to the worship wars
that often consume the church. Contemporary vs traditional vs blended vs
emergent vs whatever will come next. Projection screens or hymnals? Long teaching
sermons or liturgical based sermons? Narrative lectionary or Revised Common? Communion
every Sunday or less often? Arguments over hymns or styles of worship are intensely personal
because, well, they are personal. But in all the arguments I've never heard
anyone ask about God’s preference. That’s not to say personal preference doesn't have a place in the pew or the pulpit only that God doesn't care about what
we think about worship when we argue about it. But more to the point when what
we like or dislike about worship takes center stage in our spiritual life we act
in opposition to what pleases God and therefore our worship is no longer
worshipful. That is because it is all about us and God desires us to think about others
in the same way God does. We cannot do the work God intended the church to do
if all our work is centered on the way the church works. I could quote endless scriptures on
that topic but this one will do. The song that God loves is the hungry belly
filled and the parched throat quenched. The melody that makes God smile is the laughter
of the oppressed set free and the sigh of the outcast welcomed as friend. So by
all means seek out worship that pleases you but only if it inspires you to
worship in the way that pleases God which, I’m sorry to say, has almost nothing
to do with what pleases you. Ouch or Amen? Or both?
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