Worship On Earth As It Is In Heaven

What exactly is worship?  That’s a question I’ve been asking myself a lot lately.  Nearly every passage in the Bible that uses the word worship uses it in context of the bowing down before God, a king, or a ruler; Paul says that working as unto God can be worship, but in our modern worship services we attribute worship as music. 

Honestly, I’ve felt a disconnect with modern praise and worship but haven’t been able to put my finger on what it is, until reading this book.

In Worship On Earth As It Is In Heaven Rory Noland makes the assertion that worship is the physical part of praise.  I’m generalizing a major study and explanation when putting it that simply, but that pretty much sums up where the disconnect has been for me.  

I’m not always physically engaged in my worship.  Sometimes I get so moved in adoration and love of God that I lift my hands, and there have even been times where I’ve been so awed and afraid that I’ve fallen prostrate in His presence, but I never got that these were moments of worship.  

To some extent these feel like moments of natural worship, I mean everyone will eventually bow their knees and worship Christ as Lord, we cannot help ourselves when we’re overwhelmed by His presence, but now that I know what worship is, I want to choose to do it.

Rory Noland makes a lot of other awesome observations about praise and worship in relation to music, but this is the one that stuck with me the most.   Here are some of the others I thought were really potent:

• Next time the decibel level of a worship bothers you, take a moment and look at what worship in heaven is going to be like: flashes of lightning, peals of thunder, people shouting at the top of their lungs, and the lead worshipers (seraphim) around the throne shake the ground with their cries of “Holy, Holy, Holy”.  If loud worship makes you uncomfortable, heaven certainly will.

• We should include young people in their twenties in our worship teams.  They are the future of the church and need to be discipled in worship not just pushed away because they have different tastes in music.  The Levites who led worship were required to retire at age 50, so they could mentor the next generation to lead the congregation. Numbers 8:23-26

• Worship in heaven will be multi-ethnic and multi-generational.  We’ll be worshipping alongside people from every tribe and language and every generation that’s ever existed.  If style and taste in music were really an issue in God’s eyes, that would never work.  Real worshippers worship in Spirit and truth, not according to tastes in music.  If you can’t worship God in a range of music styles from Country to Rap to hymns to tribal chant, you’re missing the point.  We worship Him because He’s God, not because the music moves us or even because we can sing better in one style over another.  You give god your best no matter what.

• Worship is participatory.  There will be no pews to sit in in eternity.  The only one who sits in heaven is God on His throne.  He’s the only spectator.  Everyone else participates. 

I highly recommend Worship On Earth As It Is In Heaven if you can find it.  In fact I highly recommend worshipping on Earth as we will in heaven.  God is worthy!

The Most Wonderful Thing About Heaven

If you do a Google search on heaven, you’ll get thousands, maybe millions, of different depictions of what heaven looks like, what we’ll do there, and who will go there. 

Mark Twain once wrote a story called “Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven” in which Captain Stormfield steers off course on his way to heaven chasing comets and ends up at the wrong gate, where an alien race with seven heads and one foot were entering their heaven. 

When Stormfield finally gets to human heaven, they issue him a harp and wings, and he goes and sits on a cloud and sings for a couple of days then gets tired of it all and dumps his wings and harp in a big pile where others had left theirs.  They all got tired of standing around singing all day and went to find something to do.

While Mark Twain’s writing is probably the last place I’d steer anyone looking to have a deeper relationship with Christ, especially since he pokes fun at believers in the story calling this depiction of heaven the “biblical picture”, he does make a good point.  Sitting on a cloud with wings strumming a harp all day is not a good way to spend a day much less eternity.

Luckily no one ever accused Mr. Twain of a being a biblical scholar.  The revelation of heaven in the Bible sounds much, much different.  Here’s one example: “There will no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His bond-servants will serve Him; they will see His face, and His name will be on their foreheads.” (Revelations 22:4)

The curse is gone—no death, work will be easy and enjoyable for men; there will be no pain in childbirth or discord in marriage for women (if these things even exist in the resurrection).  We’ll get to serve God and the Lamb forever.   But the most wonderful, most spectacular, most longed for thing about eternity . . .

We’ll get to see His face and not die!

That’s what I’m excited about.  The other stuff is good, but to see God face-to-face, to know Him and be known by Him face-to-face, no more long-distance chats, no more dark glass between us, but to be like Him because I can see Him clearly for the first time, that’s what I’m looking forward to most of all.

What else is there that is worthy of looking forward to?

Were Jesus' Prayers Answered: Unity

Part 1 of a 5 part series

In John 17, Jesus prays over the disciples, and in verse 17:20 He makes it clear that the things He is praying not for them alone, but for all those that come after them who believe in Jesus, in other words us.

As I read this passage, I began to notice that the things Jesus prayed don’t seem to be so.  Is it possible that Jesus’ prayers weren’t answered? He is the Son of God.  If His prayers weren’t answered, then how can we have any hope?  They must have been answered, but how? 

Here’s an example:

That they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me. The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.” (John 17:21-23)

I don’t know about you, but in the past 2,000 years, I haven’t seen much unity in the so-called followers of Christ.  There have been denominational splits after denominational splits after denominational splits, and they started almost immediately.  Paul talks about these issues in the first chapter of first Corinthians:

Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and [that] there be no divisions among you; but [that] ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. For it hath been declared unto me of you, my brethren, by them [which are of the house] of Chloe, that there are contentions among you. Now this I say, that every one of you saith, I am of Paul; and I of Apollos; and I of Cephas; and I of Christ. Is Christ divided? was Paul crucified for you? or were ye baptized in the name of Paul? (1 Corinthians 1:10-14)

Why all the divisions? 

The answer is pretty easy actually.  They’ve taken their eyes of Jesus.  A.W. Tozer puts it this way:

Has it ever occurred to you that one hundred pianos all tuned to the same [tuning] fork are automatically tuned to each other? They are of one accord by being tuned, not to each other, but to another standard to which each one must individually bow. So one hundred worshippers met together, each one looking away to Christ, are in heart nearer to each other than they could possibly be were they to become "unity" conscious and turn their eyes away from God to strive for closer fellowship.”

~ A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God (1948), p. 97

And if they’ve taken their eyes off Jesus, I don’t believe they aren’t part of the group Jesus is praying for here. He is not praying for Catholics, Orthodox, or Protestants.  He is not praying for Baptists, Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Pentecostals, Non-Denominationalists, or any of the other hundreds of denominations out there.  

He is praying for those who believe in and follow Jesus.  They may have come to that belief through a denomination, but their denomination doesn’t define them.  They don’t say, “I’m a Baptist”, “I’m a Catholic”, “I’m a Lutheran,” etc.  They say, “I love Jesus!” 

In my experience if you take a bunch of Jesus lovers from all the different denominations and gather them together what you get isn’t discordant arguments about doctrine and dogma, what you get is unified worship of the only One worthy of worship, God Almighty! I’ve seen it many, many times. 

Yes, Jesus’ prayers for unity were answered, but those prayers only apply to those who have believed on Jesus and not an organization of men.  You won’t see a Baptist in heaven, and you won’t see a Catholic in heaven, nor a Presbyterian, nor a Methodist, nor an Orthodox believer. 

There is only one way to the Father and His name is Jesus. And the only people you will see in heaven are those who chose to follow Him, and they will be unified in their worship of God in the next age just as they were in this one.

Next in the series: Protection

I Don’t Want to Be Offended (Re: Love Wins)

There’s a lot of controversy in evangelical circles right now over Rob Bell's new book Love Wins.  I’m going to admit right up front that I’ve never read the book.  I read his book Velvet Elvis and watched some of his Nooma videos back in the day, but nothing of his since then.

That said, I can’t really discuss Love Wins in any detail.  I don’t think Bell is saying what people think he is saying.  He comes right out and says what he believes in.  Watch the video and see for yourself:

All that said, the controversy that the book spawned is a little more concerning than the book itself.

I’m going to layout what I believe before getting too deep into this.  I believe what the Bible says, “it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment” (Hebrews 9:27).  That judgment leads to eternal life or eternal hell.  Eternal life is knowing the Father and Jesus Christ whom He sent (John 17:3).  Jesus made it possible to know the Father by removing our sins at Calvary, and if you choose to accept this gift, it’s yours.  You’ll be transformed, and you’ll stop doing those things that separate you from God.  If you choose to reject it, you’re damned already.  Damnation means hell for eternity.

To sum up: Hell is real. Everyone does not get a trophy for participation.

Now, let me add some more controversy to the controversy about Rob Bell and whether this salvation can occur post-mortem:

We tend to get riled up at the thought of someone who did not accept Christ in this life getting into heaven anyway.  But let me ask you this: if He chose to extend mercy to someone after death during judgment, would you really be that person who says to God, “It’s not fair.  I spent years on earth serving You, and this person is getting the same thing I am” like the bitter workers in Matthew 20:12? Would it not be better to rejoice in such a case that your brother or sister who was lost is found?

Again I want to be clear that I think in order to be saved in the next life, you need to be saved in this one.  But it’s one of those things that I wouldn’t be upset about if I were wrong.  Jesus was very clear that many who think they’re saved will not be, and many who we might not think ought to be saved will be.  He’s the One who sorts the wheat and chaff, not us.  Let us rejoice with Him in the salvation of any sinner whenever it may happen, and grieve with Him in the destruction of any sinner whenever it may happen.  And rather than worrying about who's going where all the time, let's spend more time pointing everyone to Jesus, most importantly ourselves since He's the only one who can change our destination plans anyway.

Solo Deo Gloria

How Do You Forgive?

Forgiveness plays a big part in our Christian walk.  Jesus says, “For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions.” (Matthew 6:14-15)  In fact it’s such an integral part of His message for us, He says it in Matthew 6:12, 18:21, 18:35, Mark 11:25, Luke 11:4, 6:37, and John 17:3.  And these don’t even count the implied verses or when the apostles reiterate forgiveness in their epistles. 

So what does forgiveness mean in realistic everyday terms? 

I could go into a long study about the Greek word and how it means to leave behind, let go, give up a debt, which brings to mind the parable of the man who owed ten thousand talents in Matthew 18:24.  But I’m sure you’ve heard it all before.

In fact you’ve probably heard sermons about how you don’t forgive people because they deserve it, but because it will release you from bitterness.  Or maybe you’ve heard sermons about how God says, “vengeance is mine” (Romans 12:19), so just forgive them and God will get them in the end.  And these things are kind of true, but do they really reflect what forgiveness is?  Is forgiveness really all about you?  Is it really all about hoping that other person will get they’re just desserts in the end? Can you really say you've forgiven someone with these motivations behind your forgiveness?

What does real, Biblical forgiveness look like? 

When Jesus was dying on the cross, He said, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do?” (Luke 23:34)  This wasn’t a “release me from bitterness” prayer or a “you get them in the end, God” prayer.  Jesus asked that God would not take vengeance on those who crucified Him.  He asked that God would forgive them.

A short time later in Acts chapter two, Peter preaches to a crowd full of men who had crucified the Lord.  He specifically says to them: “this Jesus whom you crucified.” (Acts 2:36)  And three thousand of these men who Jesus prayed that God would forgive were forgiven. (Acts 2:41)

In Acts 7:60, we can see this same thing happen again when Stephen prays that God won’t hold his murder against his murderers.  In Acts 9, Paul who held the coats at Stephen’s stoning is saved.

When you forgive somebody, pray that God will forgive too. This is Godly forgiveness.  Truly, in the same way you forgive, you will be forgiven.

One Step Closer to Death

Take a moment.  Breath deeply.  Do you feel that?  That’s one less breath you’ll take in this life.  When you lay your head on your pillow tonight, you’ll have one less day to live.  Every step you take is one step closer to death.  There’s an old saying that goes something like “only two things are sure in life: death and taxes. “  But that’s not true.  People cheat on their taxes all the time.  No one cheats death. 

Time is marching ever onward and just as surely as you are reading these words; you will die.

The Bible says, “You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.” (James 4:14)  

There are a few more sayings out there about the certainty of death: “Carpe Diem (Seize the Day)”, “Live everyday like it’s your last”, and "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we may die."  You may recognize that last one from Isaiah 22:13.

Jesus brings up the idea again in Matthew: “For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be.” (Matthew 24:37-39)

None of these Biblical contexts hold the idea of “Carpe Diem” in very high esteem.  Yes, death can come at any moment, but that is no reason to live like it’s at your doorstep, trying to get in all the physical experiences you can before you’re gone. 

As an alternative I would humbly suggest that you spend your time on Earth preparing for eternity.  Spend everyday God gives you on this Earth getting to know Jesus better.  Learn to recognize His voice and follow His commands.  Love God with all your heart, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. 

These are the things that will bring joy on this journey into the grave, and these are the things that will bring us into our Master’s arms on the other side of it.

What if the Landing Gear Doesn't Drop?

God has done some amazing things in my life, and I've learned alot of lessons about relying on Him for everything, not putting value on Earthly possesions, giving everything to Him, being a steward of His stuff, the list goes on and on. The lesson He taught me this weekend extends far beyond anything I could have imagined having to learn, yet it was by far the easiest.

Brandon and I went to Detroit for a Computers and Writing conference this weekend, which went fairly well. We got to sit in a giant conference room in over-stuffed chairs and talk about all the nonsensical rhetorical theory that supports the technical writing we're building our careers and education around. It was a pretty laid back experience, and the down-time we had in our dorm rooms gave me a lot of opportunity to spend in prayer and devotion. I actually received some direct answers to some questions in my life I had been asking and was feeling pretty peaceful about everything in general.

We had ended up booking a roundtrip flight from Chicago to Detroit in order to save some driving time. After the conference, which ended two hours earlier than we expected, we got a ride back to the airport. We gathered our meager belongings and headed toward the terminal expecting to wait four hours for our flight. We were walking into the airport, and Brandon turns to me and says, "you should ask if we can get on an earlier flight." I responded, "I can ask, but it may cost extra." We arrived at the counter and the ticket guy takes one look at our agenda and says, "do you guys want an earlier flight?" We looked at each other, then back at him, and nodded.

Now, usually when strange coincidences like this start to occur, I get really excited because I've come to recognize the handiwork of God when I see it, but this time, I let my guard down and just thought, "Well, that was convenient." We got on the plane immediately and found that the nice ticket agent had given us the emergency exit seats, which for two 6 foot + guys is amazing because of all the extra leg room, and really the only price you have to pay is helping people exit the plane if you crash. Very convenient, yet again.

We took off, and everything went fine, until we reached Chicago. The captain announced that we were beginning our descent, the stewardesses all rushed to their foldout chairs, and a loud crunching noise issued from the floor below us. Brandon and I looked at each other and both said, "that didn't sound good", and the plane that had been dropping rapidly toward the runway, sped up and rose back into the sky.

The pilot made the following announcement: "Sorry, ladies and gentleman, our panel indicates that one of the landing gear doors didn't lock back into place correctly, so we decided to review the emergency regulations for that situation, and it doesn't look like it should be a problem, so we're just going to circle Chicago, and we'll go ahead and land in about ten minutes."

We heard some more grinding below us and wondered why the pilot was retracting a malfunctioning landing gear back into the plane. We circled Chicago and came back around for another landing attempt. This time the crunching was proceeded by a high pitch whine, and Brandon said, "The landing gear didn't go down at all this time." Sure enough, we rose back into the sky, and the pilot announced an affirmation.

I thought the thing that probably crossed everyone's mind at this point, "we're going to crash". I've watched the news enough to know that landing a plane without the landing gears usually results in great big rolling balls of fire.

The woman sitting behind us leaned forward and asked if we understood how to operate the emergency exits.

We assured her we did.

She laughed nervously and pointed to her two-year old grandson who was sitting peacefully next to her daughter-in-law, a miracle in-and-of-itself. "That's my grandson; he'll need you two to be his heroes."

We smiled and nodded encouragingly.

To make a long story short, the pilots managed to lower the gear automatically, and we landed amidst an armada of emergency vehicles and federal agents. We were towed into the gates, and our fellow passengers broke out into audible rejoicing.

The point of the story isn't God's hand in delivering us safely to the ground--I have no doubt he intended that the whole time--the point of the story is that for the first time in my Christian walk I understood what Fanny Crosby was singing about in 1873 when she wrote, "Blessèd assurance, Jesus is mine! / O what a foretaste of glory divine! / Heir of salvation, purchase of God, / Born of His Spirit, washed in His blood" or what John was writing about in 1 John 5:11-14: "And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may KNOW that you have eternal life" (emphasis mine). In my BC days, I had a few brushes with death, and there was always a knawing fear, but this time as my life hung precariously in the balance of a malfunctioning airplane's questionable landing, I had no fear whatsoever. I knew that no matter what, the situation was in God's hands. If this was the moment He choose to call me home, Hallelujah! If He intended me to live and carry on with the work He's called me to, Hallelujah! If He intended me to crash and burn and live a life maimed, broken, and scarred, Hallelujah! I was so content with whatever outcome He had in mind, that I very nearly dozed off during the crisis.

As I look back on the experience, I can't help but thank God that He gave me the opportunity to build my faith in this way and share it. It really isn't about living in His protection, though that's amazing and important; it's about living in assurance that I'm never out of His will as long as I don't choose to be. If my focus is Him, then everything that happens to me will glorify Him, and that's the only position to be in that will make every event, even death or physical harm, peaceful and joyous.

To God be the praise and the glory forever,
Amen