Psalm 95:6 “Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker!”

The definition of worship I generally hear is that worship is ascribing worth to something. Worship is honoring, paying homage to or revering God, someone that is considered sacred, or an object considered sacred. So many discussions and conversations surrounding "worship," which typically refers to a portion of a church service devoted to music, is that as we participate we are ascribing worth to our God. Do I think this is wrong? No, but something tugs in my heart as I consider what it means and looks like to ascribe worth to my God and if maybe I don't understand the reality of what that means.

How can I possibly ascribe worth to a God that is self-existing, the Creator of all things, beyond all comprehension, huge, magnificent, glorious, terrifying, and perfectly loving? As I begin to even consider what words to even use to ascribe worth to our Maker, I am left baffled. I am baffled by the fact that I cannot even begin to. I am amazed at His greatness. I am overwhelmed by the mere thought of Him. But, I am also greatly saddened that I rarely sit in this place.

When I think of worship I almost immediately think of how as I enter in, I am entering into the presence of this God. The God who is beyond the best, deepest, most sincere attempt to ascribe worth to, is present. I am before Him. What? Yeah, this is a big deal. Then I wonder, "Have I missed it? Have we missed it? Has the Church missed it or forgotten?"
Now, I'm sitting in a place of disconnect. If this is who I say my God is and I'm in His presence and in attempts to tell Him how worthy He is I am left speechless by His sheer existence, why the heck can I just sit here, listen to what seem like mostly meaningless, emotionless words/songs and remain unaffected? Why am I not breathing in the dust of the carpet as my face is to the ground, wholly unaware of how gross that really is, wholly undone by my God, with my spirit crying out, "You are holy, good, matchless, faithful, freedom, truth, love, worthy, holy, holy, holy..."?

Ascribing worth? If that's what I think worship is then either my worship is far too contained and often times grossly misplaced or my God is not who I, or maybe He, says He is.

Now, these thoughts bring loads of other questions and thoughts to mind. Well, what about my sin? What about songs that seemingly say nothing? What about the fact that "worship is a lifestyle" and not just the music time at church? Why is there musical worship? Am I just a weirdo because I think this is huge? What about pretty much the whole book of Exodus and reading about God's presence and response to His people and their response (Moses was freaking glowing after being with God!)? What about the Temple and alters and sacrifices? What about eternity and what does that mean now? How about Jericho and the musicians involved in that? Or spiritual warfare (David would play for Saul...)? What about physically responding in worship - raising hands, singing, kneeling? Why do it? What if worship always feels like it should be rejoicing and I am so far away from that place? What if I feel like God doesn't show up in any of this? ???? and more...

I love this. I love thinking about it, studying it, talking about it, the times I truly give myself to it, to God... However, not with out the coming and going of frustration.

So, I have decided it is time to study, to write, to talk and seek to know God and what it means to worship Him. Who knows if it will be like a paper I wrote in college or if I'll somehow end up talking about my first childhood pet that was a little rat my mom thought would be really funny to name Kitty - Thanks, Mom. It's hard to say what effect your humor had on little 2nd grade me. I joke...

And! Just to finish by being a bit nerdy - The Hebrew in this Psalm... my minds going...

Psalm 95:6 “Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker!”

Worship – Hebrew = Shachah – to depress or prostrate in homage or loyalty to God, bow down flat.
Kneel – Hebrew = barak – to kneel or bow, to give reverence to God as an act of adoration, implies a continual conscious giving place to God, to be attuned to him and his presence.

Come, let us...

To know and to be known.

There’s uncertainty that unnerves me,

The choice to shed every layer.

The soul moves and longs for more,

To know and to be known…

To Know.

What does it really mean to know someone? A friend can share one story, one experience, one opinion and sure, that may give you a small glimpse of who that person is, but there are so many questions to follow… You can sit and listen as someone shares their story, but no matter the depth of what they are inviting you to enter into with them, you barely scratch the surface. A friend shared this Steinbeck quote with me: “What a frightening thing the human is, a mass of gauges, dials and registers, and we can only read a few and those perhaps not accurately.” This is exciting to me.

I love hearing people’s testimonies, stories from childhood, stories of relationships, thoughts, opinions, perceptions, interests, etc. It is incredible to see the hand of God in people’s lives and I am often challenged by how another views and experiences everything in life. Sometimes I find myself wishing I could just sit and ask question after question and slowly get to know a person. There is desire in me to know. Is it so that I feel connected to something or someone? Is it that I like being trusted? Is it purely for my own benefit?

Sometimes I worry that it is all for myself (though, I do know I truly care about others. If I didn’t, I don’t think my life would look the way it does, but…). I do like being trusted and I do like feeling like something is being shared between another person and me. Maybe that’s not all bad. We are created for relationship. However, there is always struggle and growth in learning how to truly put another before myself. Am I really listening? Am I assuming I know them in this specific thing? Am I just waiting until it is my turn to spill? Do I want them to share more deeply from their heart than I am willing to share and in doing so manufacture an idea of knowing and being known?

To be known.

To be known is far more difficult thing for me to allow. I am entirely too concerned with what the person across from me is thinking of me (which is really what takes away from my knowing people – I am more important to me than them, really). What if my opinion is ignorant or shallow or stupid or…? What if they start assuming things about me? What if I am a complete idiot (which I don’t know why I fear, because I seem plenty fine with it in other circumstances…)? What if they decide they don’t like what they have come to see and know and they don’t see the value or worth in continuing? What would their response be to me if they really knew me?

I cannot begin to express my frustration in these thoughts. For one thing, I know I have opinions and thoughts about things and I know I am a fairly intelligent person, intelligent enough to add to a conversation (I think? Yes.). I also value being teachable. If I do value that, should I not be seeking opportunities to be taught, to grow, to be challenged in my thinking? Mmmm, yes. Part of that is making known where I am at times. Annoyingly enough, it is with those who I want to know me the most that I find that all my thoughts or opinions suddenly vanish and my opinion is now that I have no idea… but that might be something else entirely…

The deeper frustration I have is with the “what if” of a person not liking me or “peacing out” because the person they are coming to know isn’t worth it. I hate this because that is completely wrapped around how that has been communicated through, I don’t know, maybe two people in my life and in seeing this fear I also have to admit that there is hurt there. I would much rather make myself believe I can walk on unaffected, but I cannot. I cannot continue without acknowledging it because in doing so I will continue to carry it into relationship with cynicism. On the other hand, this “what if” is immensely frustrating because of the countless ways this lie has been proven wrong through my dad, mom, brothers, friends, leaders… What an incredible blessing it is to have always had people around who truly love me and speak truth into my life. I’ve returned this with cynicism and fear. I am saddened by that…

I used to be more afraid of the last one than I am now – what would they think if they really knew me? I feel like there is my story and then there is my story. The freedom that I have experienced in my life through power of the blood of Christ is overwhelming but I am quick to forget. However, He has brought healing and redemption to things in my life and heart I never thought possible and to see His glory in the redemption of my crap is, hands down, the most amazing thing – ever. Slowly but, without a doubt, surely I am being changed and conformed into the image of Jesus. What?! Yeah. I can confidently stand in Him. So, as others begin to know me I can trust and hope that they will see God in me and I pray that is what is most evident.

Last thoughts… This desire to know and to be known is my soul’s longing for God – to know the Creator of the universe who is beyond all comprehension and to be known so deeply, truly, and fully by only Him who can know me that way. I fully believe that He uses community and relationship with others as instruments in this, but I also believe that sometimes this desire for God is misplaced and my god becomes people or myself. I find myself wanting to say with disdain to others: “You don’t know me,” because idols will fail or see myself as someone’s savior, which is delusional…

God, have mercy. Thank you for the grace you continue to pour out. Thank you for your patience as I continue to learn how fully known I am by you. Thank you for your Spirit that dwells in me and enables me to love others. Thank you for the opportunity to know others and be known in community and friendship. May you alone be glorified in and through these relationships.

(Apparently I love to write in parenthesis… and some of these thoughts may seem like they trail off, but that’s because they are thoughts that continue to be reshaped, stretched, or completely changed… such is life…)

How My Soul Moves

It's safe to say I have no idea what I am doing here. Here goes...

As I sit here and over think the rules and stipulations of writing thoughts and beginning a blog, I just laugh at myself because it is precisely this over thinking that has sat me down in this chair. Am I doing this correctly? Am I doing everything I can to ensure that I am portraying myself exactly how I want? Is this going to be understood? Is this logical? Is this good, smart, controlled? Control.

Lately, I have spent time with a group of people who have demonstrated to me what it means to be open and to share with one another. They all are gifted and talented in different ways that are shown through writing, art, music, and even just communication or conversation. Their willingness to allow others to enter into these things with them challenges me as I reflect on how hard I try to keep people from entering into things with me. I try not to reveal my emotion or what’s deep in my heart because in that vulnerability I am easily left defenseless. This is not only present through my own artistry, but just in how I open myself to people in general. It often seems easier if I pretend those things do not stir my heart. Emotionless.

In so many ways, I try really hard to control every emotion that comes up in me. If it’s not logical, why bother? If I am at point A and need to get to point B, why bother with the space in between the two? If I allow myself to feel the emotion of that space does that not reveal weakness? And in the honesty of feeling that emotion am I not, once again, left defenseless?

I have been thinking that I may have a problem. It mainly lies in the fact that I do have emotions, quite a few in fact. Shocking, I know. Deeper still and, in my opinion, the larger problem is how I have kept so many people at arm’s length (but the arm’s length of someone who has longer arms than me, because mine are too short to really give a good picture of this…) because I fear being know. Fear.

So, here I am. I’ve decided (because I’m still in control, of course) that I will let myself feel and I will begin to learn how to let people in. I cannot say I really know how to, but I figure I can take a first step. I will share through my art. The following lyrics or the following poem (I’m not quite sure it’s a poem because I can’t really say I know much about poetry, or the rules. Heck, maybe it’s poetry. Maybe poetry doesn’t have rules when it comes down to it. Maybe I need to let go of needing rules and guidelines…) reflect some emotions I’ve been having. It reflects a lot of the thoughts I have been having lately and I plan on delving into some of these thoughts as I continue on this little experiment of sharing who I am…

How My Soul Moves

There’s a fear that grips me,
The pouring out of one’s self.
A heart moves and longs, for what?
It does and does not know

There’s uncertainty that unnerves me,
The choice to shed every layer.
A soul moves and longs for more,
To know and to be known.

Oh, to feel how my soul moves
But how my heart remains contained
Oh, I know how my soul moves
To know the heart that’s in those eyes

Nothing makes it easy,
It will never be safe,
But I know my soul moves.
This heart is beginning to quake.

Oh, how my soul moves to love
By pouring out,
In uncertainty,
After every layer shed,
Uncontained.