The Pillars of Christian Character: Worship

00:00:00:25 – 00:00:31:08
Clint Loveall
good to be back with you. Thanks to Michael for covering last week. Playing a little bit of catch up, but, it’s good to be back. I was sorry to miss one of these, because I do think they’re enjoyable, and I do appreciate the conversation. We are continuing tonight with the idea of Christian character. What do we mean when we talk about the the internal life, the internal reality of Christian people?

00:00:31:10 – 00:01:18:29
Clint Loveall
Who are we internally? As we pursue our faith, who do we become? And the idea of this series is to explore some of the practices, some of the processes that shape who we become as we encounter and engage our faith. These are the things that we repeat that we do over and over again. And the idea is that in doing so, eventually we integrate them and we embody them, and they become not something simply external that we do, but something internal that we are.

00:01:19:00 – 00:01:59:09
Clint Loveall
They become a part of us. And Christian character, as Michael made the case last week, is beyond the idea of being a good guy, a nice lady, a good person. It’s the idea of being Christ like, of pursuing Christ likeness. And, I think that sometimes we get that. I think sometimes the church is willing to settle for an essentially secular view of, well, you should tell the truth and you should be nice to people.

00:01:59:12 – 00:02:31:01
Clint Loveall
Well, yes, you should. What? You should do that because that’s what Christ asks of you, not because that’s some generic good way to live. It probably is a generic good way to live. But that’s not enough for Christian people. For Christian people, our character is to be pursued because it reflects who Christ is. And that is enough that that’s the highest reason that we seek to embody those things.

00:02:31:04 – 00:02:58:27
Clint Loveall
So this is the conscious practice. And we we sometimes call that sometimes we call that sanctification, literally to be made holy. Sometimes we call it discipleship, from which we get discipline. The idea that we commit ourselves to certain things so that our character is created and that that reflects the genuine traits that mark a Christ like life.

00:02:59:00 – 00:03:33:12
Clint Loveall
So tonight we’re going to talk about one of those things, worship the the idea of what it means that we praise God and worship may not seem off the top of your head like character, because we tend to think of worship as something we do something outside. A task, sort of, that we set ourselves to rather than a practice or a way of life.

00:03:33:14 – 00:03:41:18
Clint Loveall
Well, Michael and I will try to make the case throughout this presentation that.

00:03:41:21 – 00:03:54:16
Clint Loveall
Worship is much bigger and much deeper than the things we do in worship and worship. Maybe.

00:03:54:18 – 00:04:03:20
Clint Loveall
As much as anything. Possibly even above all else, is character for me.

00:04:03:22 – 00:04:31:03
Michael Gewecke
So if we are talking about worship more than just the sanctuary, then what we have to be looking at is the ways in which worship is working in, something larger than ourselves. And that is one of the core functions of worship in the Christian life, is to call us out of ourselves. It’s the word that self means to magnify, to exalt, to lift up.

00:04:31:06 – 00:04:56:09
Michael Gewecke
And when you come to worship, worships, purpose is to work on us, to draw us out of ourselves, to turn us and point us towards God. And fundamentally, the task of worship is to help detach us from the ways in which we are fixated on our own stories and our small circles, and to lift us up into God’s larger story.

00:04:56:09 – 00:05:30:27
Michael Gewecke
And I think today is a really good example of that, the worship that we had here. When we have communion, the Presbyterian way of considering what’s happening in that moment is that we are spiritually lifted up to be part and in fellowship with Jesus Christ, that the real presence of Christ is with us at the table. And so as we want to conceive of even the physical things that we do in worship, they exist for the purpose of calling us out of ourselves, because this is our reorientation to the way that the world actually is.

00:05:30:29 – 00:05:55:15
Michael Gewecke
One pastor said, the my church, they go out into the world during the week and for six days the world screws them up. And then they come to the sanctuary. And, you know, in a couple hours we have to get them set straight. And what he meant by that was that worship is a time to reorient from the values of the world to the values of the kingdom to remember that Jesus Christ came, died and was resurrected.

00:05:55:15 – 00:06:15:03
Michael Gewecke
And if that’s true, then everything that we do should be reflective of that. That turn and that now our lives are always lived up and out, because whether we’re in the sanctuary or not, we’ve been claimed by God. And what we do in the world is a reflection of that claim.

00:06:15:05 – 00:06:44:22
Clint Loveall
And and to dig in there a minute, one of the things worship does for us is to put us regularly in contact with an alternative narrative. When when you and I encounter the news day in and day out, it tells us we should be afraid. It tells us that our security is our 401 K and our retirement fund, our bank account.

00:06:44:24 – 00:07:36:00
Clint Loveall
It tells us that what we own is a measure of who we are. It tells us who are our friends and who are our enemies. And when we come to the gospel, it tells us something completely different. It upends all of those messages. And so as we participate in worship, not only corporately, but privately, personally, it gives us that opportunity to reorient ourselves to, in some ways, shake off those false messages and puts us again and again and again at the foot of the cross that wants us to be something different, that wants us to have a different outcome through different input than the world around us.

00:07:36:02 – 00:08:23:20
Clint Loveall
I know many of you, walk or run or bike or go to the gym, and that’s the idea of the gym, right? That every time I go to the gym, I make some tiny little benefit. And over time, it moves the needle. The same is true with worship. Worship. Over time, as I submit myself over and over and over again, begins to do a work in me, and I begin to be able to move those things that I encounter in worship from the external to the internal, so that they become a part of who I am.

00:08:23:22 – 00:08:48:10
Clint Loveall
One way that theologians have talked about this is that worship is not something we do. It is our vocation. Part of our job as Christian people is to worship. If you had a job description of what it means to be Christian worship would be on the list. You would need to be competent in worship. It is not simply a feeling.

00:08:48:10 – 00:09:16:01
Clint Loveall
It is not something done to us. It is something we do. It is something we participate in and something that happens to us. And you know, you know, the difference. We have those moments, each of us, where we sit in church and some of it misses us. We’re not always deeply engaged. But then sometimes a thing will happen.

00:09:16:03 – 00:09:57:06
Clint Loveall
A song or a sermon, whatever it may be. And we find ourselves sort of elevated, sort of transfixed and hopefully transformed. We we take something with us that begins to do its work on us and this is an important part of worship. You we’ve had these conversations before. In not to not to be heavy handed here, but, I find that often default thinking in terms of how people evaluate worship is how they experience it.

00:09:57:10 – 00:10:21:13
Clint Loveall
So if you ask people, how did worship go? They will generally tell you the music was good or not good. The sermon was whatever the I liked it, I didn’t like it. But when we allow worship to be evaluated by our preferences, we miss that deeper aspect of how did it form us? How did it change us? What did I bring to worship?

00:10:21:13 – 00:10:42:06
Clint Loveall
Not just what did I get out of it? Too often, that’s the primary question people had. Did I get anything out of church this morning? The real primary question should be what? What did I put into church this morning? How much did I offer the worship service? Not simply how much did I take from it? It is good to take something from worship.

00:10:42:07 – 00:10:56:19
Clint Loveall
Good worship should allow us an opportunity to take something with us. But sometimes we believe that maybe that’s the point. And, I don’t think that’s the best starting place.

00:10:56:21 – 00:11:20:13
Michael Gewecke
That’s why one of the metaphors of worship is sacrifice. The sacrifice of praise. Right. And you have this idea that we give up something when we come to worship. And so whether that’s you actively participating in prayers, whether that’s actively giving thanks to God for the offering of music, whether that is you seeking to hear God’s Word for you in Scripture or in sermon I.

00:11:20:15 – 00:11:48:01
Michael Gewecke
One of the things that Antone and I were talking about this before we started is that it’s interesting because on Saturday night, you can go to the performing arts center and sit in a performing arts venue, and you can hear music and you can clap and you can hear someone speak from the front, and then you come into the sanctuary and it might feel like the same thing is happening, but as a Christian vocation, we think of that completely differently.

00:11:48:08 – 00:12:10:21
Michael Gewecke
Those are not the same things. One is the offering of a community up to God. A way of giving the best of what we have and reorienting our souls over and over and over again to that value. The other is something that’s directed and pointed at us, and I do think vocations the right word. There’s a movie that I watched quite a while ago now it’s a documentary.

00:12:10:21 – 00:12:37:19
Michael Gewecke
It’s called A Euro Dreams of Sushi. I don’t know if you’ve heard of this, but basically it’s a movie about a man 85 years old who lived his entire life as a sushi chef, literally from a young man he spent his entire life trying to achieve perfection as a sushi chef. He has a ten person restaurant in the Tokyo subway, and the waiting list is is like years out.

00:12:37:22 – 00:12:58:06
Michael Gewecke
That’s Michelin three star. Anyway, the whole point. One of the points of the documentary is this man gave literally to the nth degree his entire life to think of what? What would be a perfect experience if you came to my place? And so he identifies when you sit down, which hand you use to grasp your glass, he moves the glass to your primary hand.

00:12:58:11 – 00:13:37:08
Michael Gewecke
It’s just that the amount of thought, time and attention put into it is extraordinary. And that’s what the vocation is, is what you do begins to start shaping your identity. You start thinking like the person who you continue to invest in. And that’s, that comes back the other way that’s invested in you. And I think that is what, as Christians, when we start thinking about worship as being our vocation, that we become the people who week over, week over week are trying again to get one step closer to the God who has called us by name, that to practice once again the truth of the gospel, to be reminded that that truth it applies

00:13:37:08 – 00:14:03:03
Michael Gewecke
to us today, and it calls us to take one step further. There’s always one more step of faith, and every worship service is an invitation to take that step. It is an alignment of our heart with the purpose that God has given us. And quite frankly, worship then becomes the starting gun of our lives instead of it being the arrival point where now you’ve made it right, and then we bend over and we take a few deep breaths.

00:14:03:05 – 00:14:33:16
Michael Gewecke
Worship is actually the moment in which we’re sent out again with renewed purpose in the world. Our vocation, is re animated. It it’s supported. It’s given substance again, and then we’re shot back out into the world for the purpose of bringing that worship with us. Because if it’s true, if worship changes us, if it’s not, if it’s not just an experience that we have, then what that means is worship gives us a unique moment where we turn to God.

00:14:33:18 – 00:14:47:15
Michael Gewecke
We are reformed, refashioned, transformed. To use the language of this morning. And that then becomes the very thing that send us out into the world with the mission that God has called us to have.

00:14:47:18 – 00:15:13:05
Clint Loveall
I I’m very much drawn to that language of being formed by worship. I don’t know that you’d remember this, nor do I expect you to, but a while ago, preached a sermon. I think it was maybe after our young people had come back from a mission trip and you may know this in youth ministry circles, there’s a lot of conversation about whether short term mission trips are worth it or not.

00:15:13:05 – 00:15:42:10
Clint Loveall
You spend a lot of money taking unskilled labor to do things that may or may not have a very lasting impact. And the the question is, should you just mail that 15 grand to the people, let them do with it something better than you’ll probably do. And I certainly understand that, I find myself in the middle in that debate.

00:15:42:12 – 00:16:16:26
Clint Loveall
There are those who say no short term mission trip is wasted money. There are others who say, no, it’s great. Kids love it. I’m not sure either of those is a great answer. I find myself in the middle saying, ultimately, I don’t think we’ll be able to answer that question until these kids aren’t kids anymore. We won’t know if that investment was worth it until they are or aren’t still in church, still serving people in a decade, in two decades, whether their kids are getting baptized in church someday when they’re 30.

00:16:16:28 – 00:16:43:11
Clint Loveall
Because at 15 they had an experience that mattered to them. And I bring that up because I think there’s something similar in a conversation about worship. We could have we could have some talk and we could come up with some checklists about what is good worship. But we could say the music would be of a certain caliber. We could say the preaching would be short, but good.

00:16:43:11 – 00:17:07:08
Clint Loveall
You know, we could we could do all that. But ultimately, the way that we will know the character of worship is the character of the people who did it. Are we able, week in and week out, to go back out into the world? Once we’ve been here and in some small way live the Christian life better than we could have without that.

00:17:07:10 – 00:17:40:19
Clint Loveall
Are we formed or are we directed toward the life of Christ? In part because we’ve gathered and connected and commune with God and one another. And I think that’s that ultimately is the goal. And how do we evaluate that? Well, there has to be over time, you all will ultimately be the evidence of whether First Presbyterian Church worships.

00:17:40:19 – 00:18:07:28
Clint Loveall
Well, that’s determined by the people who do it. Is our character being affected? Are we being changed? Are we being empowered? In the Book of Order, our Presbyterian kind of handbook, there’s a section called The Six Great Ends of the church. And one of those ends is the maintenance of divine worship. In other words, the six primary tasks of the church and one of them is to maintain divine worship.

00:18:07:28 – 00:18:35:27
Clint Loveall
Now, I don’t love the word maintain. It’s an old word. It makes it sound like we need to change the oil and church every once in a while, but the idea is that we need to give effort to keep worship running, that we need to make worship. Not only appealing and and helpful and words. I don’t love authentic, reliable.

00:18:36:00 – 00:19:03:01
Clint Loveall
But we need to make sure that ultimately we are attempting to make worship faithful. And that is true in our corporate worship. And that is also true in our personal worship, our praise, which we’ll talk about in a little bit when it comes to the vocabulary of worship. We have a lot of help from the scripture. Scripture has a ritual, Kabhi Larry and never talks about worship as one thing.

00:19:03:09 – 00:19:44:10
Clint Loveall
So I mean, not surprising in a in a Bible. There’s an entire book dedicated to music, to Psalms, music and singing has always been a part of worship. Interestingly, it is some people’s favorite part of worship. It is probably other people’s least favorite part of worship, but it is well documented. It has a long history, one of the few places in modern life where people get together and sing, especially those of us who aren’t singers.

00:19:44:10 – 00:20:19:21
Clint Loveall
We’re not. We’re not doing there anywhere else. Though last week one of our friends tried to drag us to karaoke, but even they’re like, that’s a that’s a hard pass. We’re not we’re not doing that. Interestingly enough, music is probably also one of the places where there’s been the most disagreement and, conflict in worship services.

00:20:19:24 – 00:20:32:07
Clint Loveall
Our, our preferences for music are very strong. And, the church has had a lot of battles over that. But music clearly is an important part of, of our worship life.

00:20:32:10 – 00:20:57:03
Michael Gewecke
Obviously, prayer is an important part of the worship. I think maybe we sometimes short change the depth of prayer. We have adoration praising God for God’s character, who God is. Don’t make the mistake of thinking when we think about what worship does for our character. Part of that is because we see God’s character in worship. We adore the, that’s what the historic church meant by adoration.

00:20:57:08 – 00:21:18:17
Michael Gewecke
We see God in that moment for who God is, and so therefore we give thanks to the door God for that character that God has. We confess the truth of who we are. Prayer is a moment of self-giving, of offering up those parts of ourselves, both good and maybe even more importantly, the bad, that we can allow ourselves to let go of in the grace of Jesus Christ.

00:21:18:17 – 00:21:45:03
Michael Gewecke
We give thanks for the ways in which God is at work in and through us. And then maybe the power of the prayer that you might first think of, you know, supplication. We ask God, to be at work in the lives of those who need him, those who are carrying heavy burdens. I think one of the aspects of prayer that we fail to see is that prayer is not just about asking God for deliverables like we get Covid to.

00:21:45:04 – 00:22:05:29
Michael Gewecke
This pattern of my prayer list is the the full extent of my prayer. God hears this concern and this concern and this concern and this concern. We forget that one of the core parts of prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray. How he start the prayer. Our father, who art in heaven. The beginning of the prayer is a relational lesson.

00:22:06:02 – 00:22:25:28
Michael Gewecke
Every time. Every time you are reminded. Who are you talking to? My father. Well, why isn’t he the one who created everything? Yes. Isn’t he the one who, brought judgment upon the people of Israel all these times? Yes. How do you address him, father? Right. It’s a way of reminding ourself that you are beloved daughter of God.

00:22:25:28 – 00:22:47:14
Michael Gewecke
You’re beloved Son of God. It it roots our identity as being children of God. And prayer has a way of teaching us and reminding us of that again. So prayer. Yes, we bring you out our concerns. We seek to offer up to God the best and worst of what we have in those who we know need him. But it also is a reminder to us when we address God as Father.

00:22:47:14 – 00:23:08:12
Michael Gewecke
It’s a reminder to us of our relationship with God, and it helps instill within us, again the trust and faith that that relationship should bring. Then also you have silence and stillness. I think I mentioned this before, so I’ll be brief. Some of you might remember it. I remember I was in seminary and I was doing a field education placement in a congregation with a very wise pastor.

00:23:08:12 – 00:23:31:29
Michael Gewecke
It was a great experience, but there was another student who was assigned with me, and it was his turn to preach, and he had worked this all out. But basically his sermon was about silence. So he got up. We talked for, I’d say, about two minutes, and then he sat down for eight minutes and just sat down, and it was the longest eight minutes of my life.

00:23:32:02 – 00:23:47:08
Michael Gewecke
And, you know, he tried to set that up and he tried to sort of give meaning to it before he did it. But by the time you got to about the 5 or 6 minute mark, people were doing the fake coffee, you know what I mean? It was like the hey, let’s get up and go kind of situation.

00:23:47:11 – 00:24:05:05
Michael Gewecke
I’ve always thought that that was a beautiful nightmare, going to be honest with you. Because because in a way, I don’t think it worked in the way that he was hoping for it to work. Right. On the other hand, it did work. On the other hand, it made people very uncomfortable, and it gave people an opportunity to think for a second.

00:24:05:12 – 00:24:27:18
Michael Gewecke
Oh, wait, when’s the last time I had eight minutes of silence in my life? And I do think worship, especially those moments where there is quiet and there should be quiet, church shouldn’t just be bright lights and fog and and loud music the whole time, right? There should be opportunities for solemn. In the midst of that, I think we are reminded Psalm 46, be still and know that I am God.

00:24:27:20 – 00:24:56:20
Michael Gewecke
But then also you have the idea of physical expression. Listen, there’s there’s so many traditions and there’s so many cultures. I think one of the beautiful things about church is it’s not rooted in what symbols on the sign. It’s not about what kind of instrumentation you have in your sanctuary that there are Presbyterians worshiping every Sunday in Africa, doing so with banners and dance and our kind of exuberant emotional affect in worship.

00:24:56:20 – 00:25:22:29
Michael Gewecke
That is wonderful. And it’s faithful. And then you will also have people in Iowa who, if they move their hands. It was quite a loose day, right. And all of that, all of that is fine. God knows God’s people, right? Once again, our father. And so there’s an accommodation for who we are, the culture. And I think there’s a way in which we discount how well God knows God’s children.

00:25:23:02 – 00:25:45:07
Michael Gewecke
Right. And there’s a way in which worship allows us to express God in whatever way is native to our people and to our culture. And then you have giving generosity. The fact that we have an offering in worship is, for some, I think, a chore, but at its core, it’s a moment to be reminded that worship is always about response, right?

00:25:45:07 – 00:26:11:19
Michael Gewecke
We hear God’s Word and we respond to it. It gives us an opportunity to give thanks as as we’ve been given to. And that then asks us the question, Will we obey if we’ve heard the Word of God? If God has spoken to us today, if we have once again been pointed to the creator, Redeemer, justifier, sustainer of all things, if that happens in worship, that will we do the will of the one who we came to be with.

00:26:11:21 – 00:26:37:02
Michael Gewecke
And that is a question that we answer with every choice that follows worship. It’s not just about reorienting ourselves, it’s about will that orientation stick as we go into the world that we’re called to live? Will we obey what we’ve been called to do? Oftentimes we get fixated on what should I do when really we know what to do.

00:26:37:07 – 00:26:49:15
Michael Gewecke
We would just prefer to spend the time hammering that out instead of doing the thing. And I think worship gives us an opportunity to set ourself back to that task over and over and over again.

00:26:49:17 – 00:27:21:12
Clint Loveall
And just as no. One service can contain everything, going to worship a single time can’t be the expression of the full worship life either. So this is why repetition becomes so important. If one were to look for. I remember a conversation with someone who was talking about their church and they said, I just, it makes me happy.

00:27:21:12 – 00:27:47:14
Clint Loveall
It makes me feel good every time I go and I thought, I suppose that’s a good thing to say about your church, but my concern is they may not be giving you the whole story of the gospel. The gospel should certainly make us feel good on regular occasion, but it is impossible to read the gospel and not feel convicted at some point.

00:27:47:16 – 00:28:06:15
Clint Loveall
And your church should also ask you to look at those parts of yourself that you don’t really want to. So I would say, don’t trust the church. That only shows you one thing. I don’t think church should beat you down and make you feel guilty every week, nor do I think it should lift back you on the back and tell you you’re doing great.

00:28:06:21 – 00:28:59:06
Clint Loveall
It should do both of those things over time, and that is the value of repetition. I was thinking, just about some of this. Jane and I were in South Texas last week, and, wasn’t quite as warm as we hoped, but there is a beach, and so we would walk on the beach and and when I, when I’m on a, a beach, I, I don’t know, some point I read how sand gets made and I think about that when you see these millions of metric tons of sand and it all started with rocks and shells and over time, water just slowly broke it down to its smallest pieces.

00:28:59:09 – 00:29:33:13
Clint Loveall
Or when you stand at the Grand Canyon and you think that started off as a stream bed, and over time that was cut. Those little things, when I think about sculptures, who, a tiny piece of stone at a time, unleash whatever it is they see, potentially in that piece of marble or rock or woodworkers, how they would start, perhaps with a rough grit sandpaper.

00:29:33:13 – 00:29:59:24
Clint Loveall
But then over and over and over, released the the beauty of wood. And I think that’s what worship does. No worship service is big enough to make me fully Christian all at once. Right? This is this is a little bit of the Presbyterian nervousness about altar calls. The idea that you you go to church, you go up front, and now everything’s great.

00:29:59:27 – 00:30:28:03
Clint Loveall
Well, we know that’s not right. We know it’s good. And it’s great to have you in the fold. But the idea that things are smooth sailing from there isn’t. For most of us, our experience. And so what do we do? Again and again and again? We put ourself at the foot of the cross, and we let God begin to do that shaping work in us.

00:30:28:06 – 00:30:56:23
Clint Loveall
And it is conscious. In other words, we have to make an effort to do that because one of the dangers of repetition is that you can do it easily, right? We we know the Apostle’s Creed, we know the Lord’s Prayer. We can do those things without thinking. We can sail our way through church without really engaging. And sometimes we do.

00:30:56:25 – 00:31:08:16
Clint Loveall
That’s the danger of the familiar. So it does take some conscious effort on our part. It does take, it does take some work.

00:31:08:19 – 00:31:28:26
Clint Loveall
This is, Well, let’s let’s stop when we stop here. Any thoughts? Questions about to maybe go in a little bit different direction. So this is a good point to see if there’s anything percolating.

00:31:28:28 – 00:32:03:08
Clint Loveall
Okay. This is, I think this is a thing that we have struggled with, maybe tangentially, here in the last 25 years or so. The church has, maybe a little older than that, but we haven’t done it. It’s a fairly recent struggle. The churches look for words to modify worship. So instead of just having a worship service, we’ve now added a descriptor.

00:32:03:10 – 00:32:15:05
Clint Loveall
We have contemporary worship, traditional worship, formal worship, casual worship, praise and, praise music, worship.

00:32:15:08 – 00:32:16:22
Clint Loveall
Lose your hair at worship.

00:32:16:22 – 00:32:17:20
Michael Gewecke
Bluegrass worship.

00:32:17:20 – 00:32:27:21
Clint Loveall
Bluegrass, cowboy worship in Texas and.

00:32:27:24 – 00:32:30:08
Clint Loveall
You way.

00:32:30:10 – 00:32:35:04
Clint Loveall
More cowboy. We’re sort of I can wear I’ve got boots with you.

00:32:35:04 – 00:32:39:28
Michael Gewecke
Okay. With more cowbell worship.

00:32:40:00 – 00:33:19:26
Clint Loveall
The. The danger. I’m overstating this, so bear with me. This is a little bit grumpy, old man, but the danger is that that if we’re not careful, worship becomes the modifier, becomes the object. So contemporary worship, the thing that gets worshiped is contemporary. The thing that gets worshiped is cowboy is style. And and the danger I think in that is that when we focus, when we over focus on style, we under focus on character and content.

00:33:19:28 – 00:33:48:13
Clint Loveall
And so it’s been an interesting move in the last several decades that we have begun to use other words to talk about worship. And, and really, those become a kind of marketing speak, because now I’m, I’m not simply calling people to worship. I’m calling them or inviting them to a preference of worship. And.

00:33:48:16 – 00:34:12:20
Clint Loveall
It has some upsides. I won’t argue that, but it has some dangerous parts too, because now we begin to think, oh, I just need to go find the worship that fits me. I need to go find the worship that, in other words, it it minimizes that idea that no worship is going to ask something of me. Worship is going to.

00:34:12:27 – 00:34:41:10
Clint Loveall
It’s not about me being comfortable and it’s not primarily about what I get out of it. And I think that that that piece of it has been. A when we approach worship based on our preferences, I think there is a danger in minimizing its impact, and I hope we can find a way through that. And I do think in general, it’s good to be comfortable.

00:34:41:12 – 00:35:01:11
Clint Loveall
I have gone into services that turned out to be something that I didn’t expect and that, you know, but you just roll with it. But it’s good to have some idea of what you’re getting into, but I just I think we have to be careful there. That’s enough.

00:35:01:13 – 00:35:25:20
Michael Gewecke
I only want to add one point to that before we need to plow on. I think not only do we risk that, we compartmentalize for ourselves our preferences into worship, that that is a risk. I think another risk is you steal something from worship writ large and the example here, I don’t want to pick on this. So I want to be clear that this is not pejorative.

00:35:25:20 – 00:35:49:00
Michael Gewecke
I’m not trying to judge this. I’m just using it as an example. But I, I know I’ve been in some Presbyterian churches that celebrate a thing that they call holy Humor Sunday. I don’t know if you’ve heard of this, and I think the idea is that that one Sunday or maybe two Sundays out of the year, they’ll they’ll build some jokes and some some humor into the worship service.

00:35:49:03 – 00:36:08:24
Michael Gewecke
And once again, this is not me making judgment on that, but it is to say, I have seen that in a few churches where my reflection was. It’s fascinating because no one laughs in your church any other time of the year. And it’s like, hey, we’re going to give you a a few moments where you can laugh, right?

00:36:08:27 – 00:36:39:22
Michael Gewecke
And when you think of worship as work by the people, every family, but you want to be a part of laughs at some point, right? And they generally don’t plan it and put it in the bulletin. There’s a there’s a reverence, there’s an honor and worship. But my point is, sometimes when we set aside cowboy worship, what we make the mistake of doing is inviting the cowboys to join the bankers, to join the nurses to join the teachers, because that’s what the body of Christ is.

00:36:39:22 – 00:37:09:03
Michael Gewecke
We make it smaller than it should be, and we need to be careful that we don’t compartmentalize worship because of it. Moving on note, friends, that we often think of worship as being a thing that we do together, but worship isn’t a thing that can be contained by a worship bulletin. If our vision of worship is a thing that can fit on a piece of paper or on slides on the screen, we have an impoverished view of what worship calls us to do.

00:37:09:05 – 00:37:32:20
Michael Gewecke
Worship is not. And, this is going to be just a novel. No, if I can’t be a cranky old man, cranky middle aged man, I guess whatever, people will say, we’re going to go praise now, or what they mean is we’re going to stand up and sing praise music as a style, right? You do realize everything we say in response to God’s gift to us is words of praise.

00:37:32:22 – 00:37:53:28
Michael Gewecke
Whether or not there’s a guitar, whether or not there’s a trap set, that there are some people for whom that is the frame. The point being here, it worship as as we think of it, is not just what happens in public. And it’s not just a thing that whether there’s a band on, a chancel or a stage or however the tradition does it.

00:37:54:00 – 00:38:15:14
Michael Gewecke
Worship is also private. And we, I think, know that worship is when we open our Bibles and we read Scripture that has a way of reshaping our understanding of the story that God is working in the world and invites us into that story. Whenever we are engaging with the people, whether in the church or out of the church, we hear them tell their own story.

00:38:15:20 – 00:38:37:01
Michael Gewecke
Christians are listening in that for God’s story. What what is your struggle? What what is the way that I can serve you? How can I use the best of my gifts to be a blessing for you Christians who are living our lives looking for those people who we can follow? Good examples of the faith, people who demonstrate for us what faithfulness and prayer and thoughtfulness looks like.

00:38:37:01 – 00:39:01:26
Michael Gewecke
These people become important parts of our own private seeking to live out the gospel. Of course there are those contexts. There are those places where we are practicing the faith. And make no mistake about it, some of the most difficult Christian work that you will do in a given week is when you go to work, or you go volunteer someplace, so you go look after somebody else’s kids or whatever the thing that you’re doing.

00:39:01:28 – 00:39:23:23
Michael Gewecke
Wherever our individual character and virtues are tested, that’s an opportunity for worship to be working on you because it all just hinges. Can you see in that moment, am I doing what I’m doing for God or for me? And if you can rightly in that moment say to the glory of God, then it’s an act of your worship.

00:39:23:25 – 00:39:53:11
Michael Gewecke
And I think that we sometimes forget that it’s the small things that we do, whether that’s taking communion, taking time to pray, taking a moment a day to offer generosity to somebody else. These are also private moments of worship offerings to God as we seek to offer ourselves to others. All of this counts as worship, and it doesn’t fit on the worship bulletin, and it’s good to be reminded of that.

00:39:53:13 – 00:40:20:25
Clint Loveall
We could speak in broad terms, and we won’t do a lot with this, in the interest of time. But there are some elements. If you visit churches, if you end up in a different congregation, certainly there are some things that good worship should include. It should include Scripture that that’s a non-negotiable. Now, just because you read the Bible doesn’t mean you understand.

00:40:20:25 – 00:40:46:00
Clint Loveall
It doesn’t mean you can teach it well. But, beware the church that doesn’t use the Bible. Don’t go there. That I don’t think that’s shocking to anyone. I had a friend in seminary who told me she went to a field ad placement where the pastor that day decided that his sermon would be based out of a Doctor Seuss book.

00:40:46:03 – 00:41:12:20
Clint Loveall
And so for the reading, he read Doctor Seuss. And then proceeded to preach a, writing you see preached. He talked about Doctor Seuss and then the poem, and she said, what do I do? And I said, leave you go. Don’t go back, I get fired, I whatever I that that’s not that doesn’t work. Scripture singing prayer.

00:41:12:22 – 00:41:17:07
Clint Loveall
Those practices

00:41:17:10 – 00:41:47:24
Clint Loveall
You know, and, and each place will put their own spin on the, those things. But there are some non-negotiables when it comes to worship. Beware the worship service that works too hard to make you comfortable. Again, we we want to have a point of contact with people, but that’s not the point. The point is, does worship put us in proximity to the living God?

00:41:47:27 – 00:42:12:16
Clint Loveall
And does it make room for that? I think, as Michael mentioned, look for a church that’s human, a church that things happen and people say we messed up and laugh and go for it because we are it’s it’s real people. And then ultimately, I think a church in worship has to allow us the space to learn the rhythms of worship.

00:42:12:18 – 00:42:36:23
Clint Loveall
How do we learn gratitude? How do we teach our children? How do we have moments like we were blessed with this morning when a congregation stands with a young family and says, we want to help you raise this child. We want to pray with you. We want to. We care what happens. Those are those are markers that are important.

00:42:37:00 – 00:42:56:07
Clint Loveall
There’s a pastor, a theologian named Craig Barnes, one of my favorite authors, and he had a, a woman, and he he didn’t know her, but he had the sense she had a rough life. She visited his church, which was large, and he asked her, was visiting with her afterwards and said, you know, what did what did you think?

00:42:56:07 – 00:43:31:07
Clint Loveall
How did it go? And she said, well, it just seemed so, which just all seem so serious. And he thought he knew what she was saying. And he said, yeah, you know, we can be a little stiff. And she said, no, no, no, I mean, it felt holy and then he realized he didn’t understand what she was saying and that she what she had caught on to was that sense of God trying to make an appearance in the congregation.

00:43:31:09 – 00:44:04:08
Clint Loveall
And and that that’s a beautiful picture of worship and, and ultimately, that’s why corporate worship still matters. You know, we live in an age of individual stuff where most people believe they can go their own way and where that’s often encouraged. I know I’ve told you this before, but I occasionally get people who tell me, you know, I do my worship on the golf course or out fishing or walking or whatever.

00:44:04:08 – 00:44:37:00
Clint Loveall
And my standard response is, yeah, what text did you use this morning? You know, because that that’s not what they mean. There is something in being gathered that matters. And we’ve, you know, we’re in an era of exploring some of that as we lean into online worship. There’s some very theological questions about, is it okay for a person to connect with the church through computer, if that’s a primary way?

00:44:37:02 – 00:45:05:15
Clint Loveall
It’s not a bad thing, but is it enough? And what is lost in substituting that? Being an observer for being a participant, for coming and shaking someone’s hand and sitting with them over a cup of coffee and praying out loud with them and singing together, even off key, and all of those aspects of worship. What’s at stake in our being together.

00:45:05:15 – 00:45:26:17
Clint Loveall
And I think that that’s, online worship blurs that a little bit. It’s it’s new, it’s a wonderful tool. But the church writ large is is going to have to struggle with how do we incorporate it in such a way that it doesn’t work against what we’re trying to do?

00:45:26:20 – 00:45:52:09
Michael Gewecke
I think that we could spend a long time talking about the possible risks and the the tributary paths that. But online and private worship can take us. I think one important thing to note is that it is subject. I think it may be a greater degree to some hindrances that also exist in in person worship, and I will.

00:45:52:11 – 00:46:20:09
Michael Gewecke
We’ve got three to name here really quickly. The first is spectator ism. That’s when you come to worship and you think of it as a performance to evaluate rather than an offering to give. So that is, I think, amplified online, because what else do you watch on your TV? Your favorite movie or favorite TV show? You watch your favorite, commentator, whatever that is, right?

00:46:20:09 – 00:46:48:29
Michael Gewecke
You watch things that have value to you. Then you put your worship service on your TV. What do you naturally do? Well, what do I think about that one? Right. Spectator ism happens, I think easily in that format. But if you’ve been in church for any amount of time, you know someone who has left the church and said, well, I do not like how they do fill in the blank and then it becomes more about self, becomes about the offering offered.

00:46:49:01 – 00:47:09:01
Michael Gewecke
That leads to the second self-centeredness, where we make worship about what we want to extract from it, rather than what worship calls us to give to God. Which is a hard thing. I think sometimes for us to think when we show up to worship and we feel like the beggar, we feel like the person who has nothing left.

00:47:09:03 – 00:47:34:25
Michael Gewecke
Remember the the person who Jesus lauded was the widow who brought the least amount of coins? It’s not the gravity of what you have to offer worship, it’s that you show up to do it. Don’t discount that. And then also compartmentalization. But realistically, Christians are always tempted, and I think that maybe the online makes this even easier as well.

00:47:34:27 – 00:47:58:01
Michael Gewecke
But we limit worship to Sunday and the rest of the week goes on autopilot. And you’ve heard me say it before, so it’s just a reminder, right? Remember when you leave church and you go to the restaurant, they know where you came from, right? Or like treat the people there like you would have treated them if they were in the pew next to you.

00:47:58:04 – 00:48:20:29
Michael Gewecke
And that also applies on Monday and Tuesday. Wednesday, because our witness is not restricted to the walls that surround us. I know that you know that. But we need remind you of it. But we are not compartmentalized. Worship doesn’t just happen inside a place that calls itself a church. It happens in the hearts of the people who are sent from that place to do their work in the world, their vocation.

00:48:20:29 – 00:48:24:18
Michael Gewecke
Which mission form and which worship forms in us.

00:48:24:20 – 00:48:49:03
Clint Loveall
Fundamentally, the only reason we worship is because God is worthy of it. If you want the the ultimate takeaway, it’s not because we see our friends. It’s not because we like the building. It’s not because we like the music or the preaching. We worship the people of God, worship because God is worthy of worship. Now the benefit of that is that God is gracious and God is kind.

00:48:49:03 – 00:49:18:12
Clint Loveall
And as we worship, we are given the opportunity to grow in our character, to grow in faith. And I say opportunity because that’s not automatic. You can go to church every week and develop the wrong character. If I show up at church every week, selfishly thinking critically and most interested in whether my preferences are met, I’m not going to grow much.

00:49:18:14 – 00:49:47:20
Clint Loveall
Sitting in the sanctuary, unfortunately, doesn’t guarantee the result of Christian character. We have to make an effort. It is a discipline. It is a practice. It is something that we pursue by being open. As we praise God together to what God will do in us and through us. Worship is one of the greatest tools that the church has to form.

00:49:47:20 – 00:50:21:19
Clint Loveall
Christians. And yet sometimes we’re arguing about. Parts of it. And that’s natural. We’re we’re people were fallen. We let ourselves get in the way sometimes. But but if nothing else happens tonight, then you go home thinking, why do I come to church? And what is my expectation for being there? That I think that’s a worthy conversation. Worship offers us the chance.

00:50:21:21 – 00:50:44:20
Clint Loveall
You know, you don’t think about it probably until you reflect on it later. But as we grow up in our families, from the time that we’re crawling around on the floor of our family home, we’re being formed by those people. Now, some day we may need to reflect on that and try to make adjustments, because we didn’t know I was also learning this or that, right?

00:50:44:23 – 00:51:32:05
Clint Loveall
But that’s the true of a church family. We are always being raised up in the church, and worship is the primary way that our path of faithfulness is shaped. And that is true both corporately and personally, as I do devotions and as I pray and as I sing, and as I watch videos and those other things that are personal expressions of worship, they are the things that are shaping me, informing me, and they are the things that ultimately, I hope will live in my unconscious, so that when no one is watching and when I am tested, they will be the things that guide me through those moments.

00:51:32:07 – 00:52:10:23
Michael Gewecke
I think maybe one way to summarize that is you come into a conversation, you hear that we’re talking about Christian character. Then you learn, we’re going to talk about worship. I think most of us have tried to that thinking that’s that’s a little that discordant. How does that sit together? Was worship have to do with character? And I think it comes all the way back to that point that says that our characters over a lifetime are formed by the God that we worship, and you will worship a God with question is, will you put your direction on the God, or will you let whatever the whims of the day are provide that direction?

00:52:10:25 – 00:52:31:24
Michael Gewecke
And worship sets a North Star that provides us a direction in which our identity is formed. And like the Grand Canyon or like the sculptor, worship has a way of working on us, and it instills character in us. You might not see it in one week. You won’t. You may not see it in months, but you will over a life span.

00:52:31:24 – 00:52:42:18
Michael Gewecke
See the ways that worship shapes us as people filled with gratitude, courage, love all the things that are going to follow in this series. Worship has a way of working that in us.

00:52:42:20 – 00:53:13:28
Clint Loveall
Yeah, we’ll close here. But there there’s a beautiful thing. It’s a part of our it’s part of our baptism liturgy, which is fresh because we used it this morning that there’s that line where we say that we hope what this child sees in us, we will one day see in them that that’s the idea that that’s the hope that what we are practicing, what is becoming our Christian character, will be observable to those who follow us.

00:53:14:01 – 00:53:31:13
Clint Loveall
And one day it will also belong to them. That’s that’s a beautiful goal for a Christian community. That’s enough. Let me stop there. Let us stop there. Anything else? All right. Thanks, everybody.