THIS IS THE FIRST OF A SERIES OF BLOG POSTINGS ON THE TOPIC OF GENUINE WORSHIP. YOU’RE ENCOURAGED TO READ AND INTERACT WITH THESE POSTINGS OVER THE NEXT FEW MONTHS.
I used to work with a senior pastor who liked to give staff members a call after Sunday worship services to debrief the morning. After talking about some of the specifics (sound system miscues, bulletin layout, music selection, ushers, attendance, etc.), he would often end up with this question: “But, was God there?” Quite often, morning services that seemed to be technical disasters were, in fact, the ones in which we both sensed the presence of God. Likewise, some of the best crafted productions seemed to lack that which is, alone, important. Ultimately, this was his criteria for whether or not it was a morning full of smoothly processed events, or an actual engagement with the Almighty.
I agree with him wholeheartedly to this day. As a pastor, I would regularly proclaim the obvious truth that, if God is not with us, this is a waste of time, and technically not even “worship.” If God is with us, only then can other things matter.
I’ve been to countless services (many of which I have led) that have provided no tangible or intangible evidence of God’s actually being present. I’ve sung “Surely the Presence of the Lord is In This Place,” and felt the internal conviction to ask forgiveness for lying … because, surely, I was not sure. Despite many of these services having begun with an invocation, calling upon God to be present with His people, more often than not the reality of the presence of God was assumed by faith – faith in the propositional truth that God is everywhere (so therefore here), or faith in the verse that says “where two or more are gathered in my name, I am surely with you,” or faith in the efficacy of prayer (We prayed in Jesus’ name + God answers prayer = He must be present… though we have no sensual data of any kind to support our belief). In this way, we Evangelicals quickly become Thomistic, believing that the Aristotelian “substance” we experience is a service that is rich, divine, and full of life, though the “accident” is a Godless gathering in no way engaged in anything spiritual.
This isn’t good enough for me any more. If there is one guarantee I would like to make to the church gathered for worship, it is that they will encounter God there. But how do we gauge this? Can it be quantified? Can my pastor friend ever, with confidence, say “I think God was there”?
Jesus says in John 4:23-24 that “The hour is…now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” To worship “in spirit” is to have a point of connection with God that is initiated, provided and empowered by God Himself. In short, when worship is true and genuine, God must be there. If not, it isn’t a brand of worship that is of interest to God, and therefore it shouldn’t be of interest to us, either.
Worship must be in-spired, Spirit-infused, God-breathed. God must be there. His presence is everything.
