Dear Friends
Praise the Lord! Praise God in his sanctuary; praise him in his
mighty heavens! Praise him for his mighty deeds; praise him according to his
excellent greatness! Praise him with trumpet sound; praise him with lute and
harp! Praise him with tambourine and dance; praise him with strings and pipe!
Praise him with sounding cymbals; praise him with loud clashing cymbals. Psalm
150:1-6
Our worship looks a little different than how the Psalmist
describes his worship.
Last Sunday we had a couple of members of a Vineyard Fellowship
from Phoenix join us for worship. The Vineyard churches place a strong emphasis
on freedom in the midst of their worship. If you attend a Vineyard church, you
may see a number of different forms and expressions of worship, and one of
those forms of expression you might note would be people dancing during the
time of praise and worship.
Now you might be thinking raising your hands in worship is
acceptable, even if it may be a bit uncomfortable for me, but dancing-that’s
where I draw the line.
This past Sunday I watched this
couple during our praise and worship time as they sang and danced in front of
their chairs. With hands lifted high, they were spontaneously expressing the
joy that was in their hearts. It was a different way of worshipping then I was
accustomed to, but for them, their spontaneous worship was a real and natural
way of expressing their love for Jesus.
As I watched them, my mind drifted back to my first worship
experience while on a mission trip to Haiti where I beheld the freedom and
exuberance of the Haitian people as they worshipped God.
There is no formula for true worship, any more than there is one formula
for true prayer. Praying and worshipping are a matter of the individual heart
and as such they will be expressed in different ways by different people.
The word worship comes from a Greek word which means to turn and
kiss. When you turn to kiss your wife, you don’t follow a ten-step formula for
kissing, you just kiss her as your heart moves you to do. There is no set way,
or right procedure, you just let your feelings dictate your expression and you
don’t worry about how or where you do it.
There is no set way we should worship God. Some worshipers are
more staid, some are more expressive, some raise hands and some keep them in
their pockets. Some sit quietly and some get up waving worship flags as they
dance throughout the sanctuary. Now, I don’t know if New Monmouth is quite
ready for the flag waving dancing kind, but for some churches this is how
people express their worship.
When David brought the ark of the Lord from the house of Obed-edom
into the city of David, he did so with great joy, and we read, “David danced
before the Lord with all his might, and he was girded with a linen ephod”
(short for boxer trunks). David danced as trumpets played and people shouted forth
their praise. And we are told that when Michal, Saul’s daughter, looked out and
saw David dancing in his boxers as he leaped and danced before the Lord, “she
despised him in her heart (2 Samuel 6:16).
Now somewhere during that service, I too might have drawn the line
of impropriety, but David didn’t care. He was so excited, so filled with a
heart of worship he didn’t worry about what people might say or think.
However, we worship, may it be an enthusiastic, and uninhibited
expression of our love for Jesus, always remembering with A.W. Tozer who said,
“worship means to feel in the heart.”
Yours in faith and friendship,
Tom
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