Worship in 2013…..The Work of Jesus The past couple of columns have looked at the work of persons in creating worship vehicles (Liturgy, or Work of the People) and God’s Story (Ancient-Future Worship). Let me share something which puts the two together in a wonderful way. It comes from Dr. Robert Webber’s excellent book: “Ancient-Future Worship: Proclaiming and Enacting God’s Narrative.” “Worship discloses the work of Jesus Christ. He Himself is the eternal liturgy of God. (The word liturgy is a common Greek word that refers to your work or occupation. Carpenters, doctors, lawyers each have their own work or liturgy.) The work of Christ now continues in the heavens where He is doing the work of eternal intercession. He is one man who has served God and through His service has won creatures and creation back to God. He fulfills and replaces all the rituals of the tabernacle and temple that pointed to Him. He is the new Adam, the new covenant, the new circumcision, the new Sabbath rest, the new Paschal Lamb. He is the One in whom ‘God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell’ so that ‘through Him’ He might ‘reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through His blood shed on the cross.’ (Colossians 1:19-20). And, we have ‘been buried with Him in baptism and raised with Him through your faith in the power of God, who raised Him from the dead.’ (Colossians 2:12). Jesus Christ does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. As God incarnate, He is our obedience, He is our faith, He is our new life, and He is our eternal intercession before the Father. What was lost in Adam (The Fall) has been restored in Jesus Christ. God became the created, became incarnate so that He might re-create and win back His creation and creatures from the power that rebelled against Him. And in the end of history, the second Adam will finally crush the powers of evil, defeating their presence and power in the world forever. So what then is the worship that the people of God do? We remember God’s saving deeds and anticipate His vision, His final rule over all creation.” What I hear Dr. Webber, who finished this book just weeks before his death from pancreatic cancer, saying is that worship is what God does first in enacting His great Story. I am fond of saying that if the Scripture teaches us anything, it is that God always makes the first move. God writes the Story from Genesis to Revelation with Christ’s death and resurrection at its center and heart. By hearing and proclaiming God’s Story/Narrative, we both receive and are invited to find our story in His. When we give to the Lord in our worship, it’s in response that God has first given to us in God’s Story. Another way to say this is that worship is not so much what we do, but our response to what God has already done, is doing and will do. So, a fair question about worship is: Does Worship Tell the Story? Whether in Scripture, Baptism, Holy Communion music, spoken word, visual, tactile, body, etc., are we celebrating God’s Narrative? I like this question, because it makes me think in larger terms that I generally do. Worship that honors God tells God’s Story. Let me finish about what is at stake by using another great insight from Dr. Webber: The Biblical teaching that Jesus is our worship dispels all notions of self-generated worship. We are fallen creatures whose union with God has been shattered, twisted, broken, even severed. We have rebelled against God, gone in a direction away from God, inverted to the self, proclaiming salvation through self-actualization. Our fingers do not reach toward God, but toward the self, whom we worship and adore as our self-designed God of the universe, the one around whom all things revolve. However, the whole God Story is about Jesus, God incarnate, Who became a man that we might be re-united to God.” Let’s you and I hear, learn, love, proclaim this Story! Christ Is Risen! Pastor Rand
Posted on: Sat, 03 Aug 2013 16:02:45 +0000