Here I Am To Worship

We've been talking this evening at worship: what worship is, what it means to worship, how we worship.

 

Taken from the Old English 'weorthscipe' meaning worthiness, worship means to acknowledge the worth of. 

 

When we worship God, we are acknowledging who He is and, therefore, are acknowledging His worthiness.

 

But worship isn't something we do for half an hour in church on Sundays.  Or during the week when we listen to a 'worship' CD.  It's not even really about singing.

 

Yes, singing is a large and significant part of worship, but true worship is about living a life which acknowledges God's worthiness in all areas.

 

Jesus said to the Samaritan woman at the well:

"It's who you are and the way you live that count before God.  Your worship must engage your spirit in the pursuit of truth.  That's the kind of people the Father is out looking for: those who are simply and honestly themselves before him in their worship.  God is sheer being itself - Spirit.  Those who worship him must do it out of their very being, their spirits, their true selves, in adoration."

 

[John 4:24 MSG]

 

 

I love that line - those who are simply and honestly themselves before him in their worship. 

I love it and I am deeply challenged by it.  I'm not sure that I've very comfortable simply and honestly being myself: I'm not sure I feel enough.  Sometimes I like to dress myself up in different layers of disguise.  I'm not even sure I know what it means to be simply and honestly myself.

But I want to start to find out.

I want to say, as Tim Hughes sang, "Here I am to worship."

No pretense, no disguise, no distraction.  Not just here I am for 20 minutes.  But every day, every moment - here I am to worship.


 

 

 

 

With and Within

I've just had one of those washing machine disasters you always dread.

 

I put a load on earlier this evening and have just taken it out.  It was mostly pale clothes, but I had a couple of scarves that needed freshening up, so I popped those in too.  One of them was pale blue.

 

Now everything is pale blue.

 

I know what you're thinking.  It was a silly mistake, I just wasn't thinking as I put it all in earlier.

 

I'm amazed by how much of my washing has been affected and by how everything has been permeated by a subtle hint of blue.  But what is most amazing is that the scarf itself is still a beautiful dusty blue.  It doesn't seem to have changed or faded at all.

 

It has changed everything else, but hasn't changed itself.

 

I have been thinking about the word 'Immanuel' over the last day or two - 'God with us'.  I always thought that this name referred to the idea of God coming to be with us through Jesus.

 

But that's something that happened in the past and doesn't always seem to relate directly to me.  And 'us' is very vague and very big.  It is an all-encompassing word.

 

Whilst the Bible makes it clear that Jesus came and died for the whole world, sometimes I want to know that He came just for me too.

 

I was reflecting on this earlier and I think that rather than seeing Immanuel as meaning God with us, it is more helpful to see it as meaning God with me.  Or even, God within me.

 

Paul writes,

 "Christ in you, the hope of glory."

[Colossians 1:27 NIV]

  

In the same way that my blue scarf has permeated and coloured all of my other clothes, a relationship with God through Jesus colours all of our lives as well.  Every aspect is influenced and affected as His love flows into our lives and changes them.  And as we receive His love, we become more like Him.

 

In his song 'Everything', Tim Hughes sings -

 

      "God in my living, there in my breathing

      God in my waking, God in my sleeping

      God in my resting, there in my working

      God in my thinking, God in my speaking

      Be my everything, be my everything

      Be my everything, be my everything
 

      God in my hoping, there in my dreaming

      God in my watching, God in my waiting

      God in my laughing, there in my weeping

      God in my hurting, God in my healing

      Be my everything, be my everything

      Be my everything, be my everything."

My clothes are now evidence of the presence of my blue scarf in the washing machine - they are evidence of scarf with us, or scarf in us.  In the same way, as we grow in our relationship with God, our lives will become evidence of that incomprehensible truth: God with us.  God with me.  God within me.