Commitments - and being Worshipful

Pundits say we live in a low commitment culture – but we constantly bump up against evidences of commitments.  There’s a ring on your finger.  There’s a contract to be signed.  The mortgage bill arrives.   It’s time to show up for work again.  I can’t meet you because I have a lunch date already.  We are our commitments.  Our true freedom is exercised, not in willy-nilly doing whatever the heck that suits me in the next 5 minutes, but in making and honoring commitments.

   Consider all the commitments made in worship.  Parents make promises when their children are baptized.  New members take vows.  Every discrete act of worship is a promise – to live as forgiven, thankful people once we’ve left the place.  People flit from church to church, forgetting we make commitments to a church family.  And of course, we have weddings.

   My anniversary is tomorrow.  Lisa and I made promises – not merely to each other, but to God, and to our families, and to the church.  Like all who make any kind of commitment, we didn’t fully understand what it would mean to live out those promises.  We might have predicted how it would all unfold, but our forecasts would have been wrong.  You make commitments, then grow into them, struggle through them – and inevitably too many of our commitments wind up fractured.  We need mercy.  We need a power beyond ourselves to stick with those we’re stuck with.

   Worship teaches us how to make and keep commitments – largely because worship is about God.  Lewis Smedes shrewdly wrote, “Yes, somewhere people still make and keep promises.  They choose not to quit when the going gets rough.  They stick to lost causes.  They hold on to a love grown cold.  They stay with people who have become pains in the neck.  They still dare to make promises and care enough to keep the promises they make.  I want to say to you that if you have a ship you will not desert, if you have people you will not forsake, if you have causes you will not abandon, then you are like God.”

   And thus, we worship God out there through living into and even surviving the commitments we have made – buoyed by our humble awareness of God’s total commitment to us.

Worshipful - the Offering

We collect money in worship - yes, to fund what the church needs to do, but more importantly for you to grow spiritually, and to counteract the stranglehold money has on our souls. What if we let the offering time in worship linger in our minds so we might become worshipful with all our money during the week?


What is money for? Seems obvious - but then again: does money burn a hole in your pocket so you buy stuff like right now? Is money for investing, a nest egg, to earn more money or provide a security blanket? Is money an index that declares my worth as a person? Where does my money go? and is God glorified by what I do with it?

Jesus talked a lot about money, although he didn't have much. He suggested that God feels about us the way a poor woman feels about one lost coin, and she sweeps and hunts on her knees until she finds it. Maybe the next time you hold some change in your hand, which in today's economy feels relatively useless, more of a bother than anything else, remember that woman who prized her coin, and that Jesus values you and me, and the other person who only seems worthless.

Yes, Jesus warned us about money, how it deceives, misleads, usurps God's place in our souls - and how it cannot deliver. Some Americans insist our money should say "In God we trust," but we should shiver over the realization that money has become the god in which we vest our trust.

John Wesley spoke up for Jesus when he said Make all the money you can, save all you can, then give all you can - and he didn't mean Give the extra money you don't really need. Give generously, sacrificially, joyfully. "If you have money, consider that perhaps the only reason God allowed it to fall into your hands was in order that you might find joy and perfection by giving it away" (Thomas Merton).

Gratitude - and being Worshipful

     I write a minimum of three thank-you notes every day.  That’s not many, only takes 4 or 5 minutes.  But in a year that’s more than a thousand, and as I’ve been doing this for 20 years, that’s a lot of thank you notes.

   What is striking as I think about it is how many people I have forgotten to thank, and for so many kindnesses and favors.  Superficially, a thank you note is about good manners – but I’m only mildly interested in etiquette.  I want people to know I appreciate them, that I’m honored by them.

   More importantly, I want to be a grateful person.  Like everybody else, I’m tempted toward a sense of entitlement.  I’m drawn toward what I think I deserve.  I easily lurch into a sense of self-sufficiency.  But these moods are not of God – and they are not even the truth about me or anybody else.  We are all great debtors.  On my own I’d be nobody, except one to be pitied.  The more I realize how all the good in my life is a gift, and the more I express thanks for the wonders in my life, the richer I am, the more spiritually settled I become.

   The Bible speaks constantly of gratitude:  “I do not cease to give thanks for you” (Ephesians 1:16).  “Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good” (Psalm 107:1).  You can’t thumb through many pages without reading expressions of thanks.

   Disciplined practice of gratitude makes us grateful people, and deepens our gratitude to God – and even teaches us how to ask God for things:  “With thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God” (Philippians 4:6).  Not “Ask, then give thanks if you get what you wanted,” but “With thanks, ask.” 

   Gratitude is contagious.  If someone thanks me, I’m inclined to thank somebody else – so more people are encouraged, and a whole church, a whole community might become a grateful, encouraging place.

   If you want to know God, and to be worshipful, and even a nobler, more contented person, try this praxis:  write a thank you note or two, or four or seven, each day.

The Remote - worship fully?

You pick up the remote. An image appears on the screen. What to do next? Surf! See what piques your curiosity, or search out that hip drama everybody is watching, or ... Maybe Springsteen needs to remake "57 Channels (and Nothin' On)" - maybe "1,057 Channels (and Nothin' On)"?

But something is on. Some of it is tawdry, or just sophomoric. The remote has an off button. But TV isn't bad: good dramas can help us understand ourselves, the dreams, aches, kookiness and wonder that we are - and our need for hope. If Sheldon (in Big Bang Theory) makes me laugh, I thank God, who decided life would be richer if God devised something like a sense of humor. Jesus was no sourpuss.

Watch the news - and don't let the devil make you believe the networks are so biased you can't get the facts. Pay attention: there's tension in the Middle East, hunger in Africa, turmoil in Europe. God's heart is broken every day in farflung places. If you think like Jesus you'll care and hurt too.

Finally there's great preaching on TV - but not from the clergy. Tune in those nature shows that show you the secret haunts of jackals or the nests of eagles, or a nebula in deep space, or the echolocation of bats. Let your jaw drop, and be awestruck by God.

Pick up the remote (or put it down). Worship fully.

Doing the wash - worshipfully

Doing the wash: now there’s an activity ripe with theological possibilities!  The act of sudsing and spinning your clothes clean might remind us that we need God to cleanse us – and it might be uncomfortable and hard on us, just as it is on our clothes in that machine!  In worship we confess our sin and seek forgiveness; it’s embarrassing, and requires change.  Being washed, like my laundry.

   But then the load is ready to come out of the dryer.  As I fold an undershirt, and then a handtowel, and then my biking shorts, I say a prayer for someone, anyone, or give thanks for something, or someone.  As I smooth out and put my laundry in order, I ask God to put my life in better order.  Iron out my crooked places, O Lord.

   And then there are socks – notoriously independent creatures, although they were made to live in pairs.  I’m always one sock short.  Where could it be?  As I pair my socks, I pray for a relationship, mine with my child or spouse, a couple I know that is struggling.  When I notice the lonely sock without its friend, I think of someone who’s been left alone – and pray, and maybe even email or phone the person.  Or I think of the one who has gone out on his own – the friend who’s moved to the West coast for work, or the son away at college – and I pray, and maybe even shoot that person a note of love.

   The laundry: another chance to worship fully.

Worshipful - at a stoplight

I'm driving. Maybe I'm running a bit behind. I approach an intersection and - darn! - the light turns yellow. Quick decision: mash the gas and sail on through? Or ease onto the brakes, and stop?

Now it's red - and it's one of those long ones. Waiting. I hate waiting. Maybe I try to respond quickly to an email. Still red; the digital clock is rushing forward and I am not.

Finally - finally! - back to green. But... the knucklehead in front of me isn't going. Head's down - he's texting! Do I lay on the horn as my blood pressure surges?

Jesus understands. He was the Savior of the world, which had to be a pretty demanding job, his work never done, places to get to. And yet when the light turns red, I suspect Jesus wishes we might exhale, thank God, and just let a little Sabbath moment happen in the craziness of the traffic thicket. "Be still, and know that I am God" (Psalm 46:10). Instead of reaching for the phone (or continuing to peck the thing if you've stupidly been doing so prior to the red light!), remember that not everything hinges on me and my frenetic busy-ness. God has the world well in hand. Being worshipful begins when we simply stop.

Jesus' Bible repeatedly reminded us about this, like a clock chiming the hours. "For God alone my soul waits; I shall not be moved" - or "rattled" (Psalm 62:1). "Those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength" (Isaiah 40:31). "I wait for the Lord like a watchman for the morning" (Psalm 130:6). But maybe I'm hustling to go do something for God! "They also serve who only stand and wait" (John Milton).

The gracious blessing of the red light can be the saving mercy, when we think like Jesus, and relish an unchosen but worshipful moment. My car - becomes a sanctuary?

Spectating? Worshipful

You notice: I'm a spectator right now. Maybe I'm at a game, or the symphony, or watching TV, or looking out the window at a couple walking by. We know how to be in an audience: you watch, soak it in, maybe grade whether you approve or not. Did the movie make me laugh? Did my team win?

You might begin to feel like a spectator of your own life - like it's happening out there, the frames whizzing by, scenes you see and maybe wish you were a part of. Political life in America is largely about watching the TV and fuming about the knuckleheads - in the privacy of your own den, with no constructive action to make a difference yourself.

You come to church, and once more you slide into your accustomed role: I'm watching the show. Does the music suit me? Do I agree with the preacher? Did it hold my attention?

Søren Kierkegaard helped us understand worship: while a service looks like performers (minister, choir) on stage before an audience (the congregation), the truth is we are the performers (minister, choir, and congregation), and God is the audience of One. We are not consumers to be entertained; if we are in a spectating mindset, we have not worshipped at all.

Worship isn't about what I like or don't like. Worship isn't like pulling up at the gas pump and getting a refill. Worship is about God; in worship we glorify God. Worship is maybe only time during the week that it's not all about you, the one time you shelve being a consumer.

I once knew a woman who kept coming to church after she'd grown totally deaf. In a note I asked her why, if she couldn't hear the music, my sermon, or the other people? She wrote back and said It's not about you, or them, or even me. It's about God. I might even be able to worship better because I can't hear.

Next time you notice yourself spectating - in church, or out there at a movie or in a crowded restaurant, stop and think of Kierkegaard. You are the performer, and God is your audience. You begin to participate, and to really live - and it's not for the other people who might look your way. It's all for God, on Sunday morning but all through the week.