Dan - this is so rich. Thank you! Isaiah 29:13 has always been a key verse to me in my understanding of my calling as a worship leader; “You people worship me with your lips but not your hearts because your hearts are from me and your worship of Me consists of tradition learned by rote.” Jesus quotes this to the Pharisees and adds the heart-felt comment, “In vain do you worship me.” In essence, Jesus is saying, if this is just about ‘rehearsing words without putting any meaning behind them…if you’re going to ‘pretend to worship and not have an encounter with God,’ (Larue quote from your article) then don’t bother! Our calling as worship leaders is to invite people into genuine encounters with the living God! That is what He longs for and what we desperately need! Worship is about relationship in all of its joys and sorrows. It is walking with one another through the truth of life. God wants us to encounter Him there, in our victories and disappointments. That is relationship!
I had never put these concepts together, however, that sometimes the reason our praise is ‘forced’ or ‘empty ritual contrived in ceremony’ (Larue, and Isaiah 29:13) is that we have so limited what we help people express. We haven’t acknowledged the suffering that people carry in a fallen world, which is often where we need to encounter God the most. We so easily force people to proclaim something that isn’t congruent with their experience rather than encouraging the depth and honesty that real relationship requires. As worship leaders, we want to encourage people to ‘engage their hearts’ - both corporately and individually - with the living God, not just sing songs. Your work is helping us learn how to encourage genuine engagement with God in all of its aspects so that we come to Him with all that we are. That depth of relationship, that encounter, that engagement in worship is what transforms us.
Dan - this is so rich. Thank you! Isaiah 29:13 has always been a key verse to me in my understanding of my calling as a worship leader; “You people worship me with your lips but not your hearts because your hearts are from me and your worship of Me consists of tradition learned by rote.” Jesus quotes this to the Pharisees and adds the heart-felt comment, “In vain do you worship me.” In essence, Jesus is saying, if this is just about ‘rehearsing words without putting any meaning behind them…if you’re going to ‘pretend to worship and not have an encounter with God,’ (Larue quote from your article) then don’t bother! Our calling as worship leaders is to invite people into genuine encounters with the living God! That is what He longs for and what we desperately need! Worship is about relationship in all of its joys and sorrows. It is walking with one another through the truth of life. God wants us to encounter Him there, in our victories and disappointments. That is relationship!
I had never put these concepts together, however, that sometimes the reason our praise is ‘forced’ or ‘empty ritual contrived in ceremony’ (Larue, and Isaiah 29:13) is that we have so limited what we help people express. We haven’t acknowledged the suffering that people carry in a fallen world, which is often where we need to encounter God the most. We so easily force people to proclaim something that isn’t congruent with their experience rather than encouraging the depth and honesty that real relationship requires. As worship leaders, we want to encourage people to ‘engage their hearts’ - both corporately and individually - with the living God, not just sing songs. Your work is helping us learn how to encourage genuine engagement with God in all of its aspects so that we come to Him with all that we are. That depth of relationship, that encounter, that engagement in worship is what transforms us.