I have a new favorite worship song. You know it; it's called "The Heart of Worship" by Matt Redman. I'm going to tell you about my experience with this song thus far and why I have rather suddenly decided that it is basically pure gold.
This song is nearly as old as I am, and I can remember singing it growing up in church for as long as I can remember. So, naturally, for very much of my life it has been a song that I've known very well, yet I never pay any attention to the words. This trend is tragic, but it happens all the time, even to people like me who really play a ton of worship music. Something psychologically within us allows us to sing songs without listening to the words. I often say that I hope one symptom of my worship ministry will be to encourage people to really listen and really sing the words. Unfortunately this is a rather difficult task, one that there's no clear-cut way of achieving. One possibility, I hope, is to write a blog post on the subject.
It was just tonight that the song took on new life for me. As I was singing whatever songs came to me, this one came to my mind. I realized, after singing the chorus once or twice, that I had actually misunderstood what exactly the chorus was saying the whole time. I'll briefly talk about that here: basically, the "it" in "it's all about You" does not refer to the "heart" of worship, but "worship." So, despite its place of honor in the title of the song, the song isn't so much about this ethereal "heart" of worship as it is about worship itself.
I guess I had always been annoyed by that first phrase, I'm coming back to the heart of worship. It sounds like Christian-ese with little actual meaning. And that would be the case, except that (given the distinction I made above) the next line defines this odd term: It's all about You all about You Jesus. What is coming back to the heart of worship? Coming back to having worship be all about Jesus. Tragically, this is not always the case. It may not even be the case a majority of the time. I'm sorry Lord for the thing I've made it is something I have confessed to God on many occasions. Turning "worship" into a performance or popularity grab is so easy and so common. This pitfall is difficult to avoid, but I'll suggest one solution: sing this song and mean it! I found myself this evening unable to stop confessing and realigning, getting more and more excited I get to say that It's all about You all about You Jesus.
Of courses, the verses and prechorus to the song are great too, but I'm not going to go through them line by line. To reexamine the song cuts deep as I realize how often I've only brought "a song in itself," and not myself in worship.
I would love to urge you, in any way I can, to develop a practice of really listening to the songs you sing in worship. It is so easy to just sing words! I do it all the time, I'm trying to develop this discipline right along with you. I want every word I sing in worship songs to be something I am actually personally praying and meaning. I have no problem confessing that this is not the case at all times, but I foresee a future where it happens more frequently.
I don't see it or act like it all the time, but it's all about Jesus.
Monday, November 10, 2014
Sunday, November 2, 2014
The Armor of God (God's Armor)
The following are the most interesting nuggets of information I gleaned from an inductive study of Ephesians 6:10-18. Getting into the meaning of many of the Greek words (via bible dictionaries and Logos software) really illuminates a lot of the meaning of the passage, much of which may have been lost or muddied in translation. Enjoy! I think there's some pretty great stuff here. I suggest reading the passage in question at least once before continuing.
Verse 10, "be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power," serves as a heading under which the rest of the passage falls. The verses that follow are an explanation, more specifically, of how believers are to fulfill this exhortation.
The phrase "full armor" is the technical term (panoplia) for the complete armor set of a heavily armed infantryman. Paul (the author here), through his frequent imprisonment, had frequent run-ins with Roman soldiers. Some scholars suggest that he was chained to one or otherwise in rather close quarters while writing this passage (I don't think this is the case, but my faith would not be in shambles if it is). This means he is not necessarily referring to an ambiguous set of objects, but a specific set of things that his audience would have been familiar with.
The difference of a seemingly unimportant connective really illuminates the purpose of the armor. The phrase translated "stand against the devil's schemes" is most literally translated "stand toward the devil's schemes." This word is the same one used in 4:12, "equip... for works of service." This phrase does not denote a passive defense to the devil's schemes, but willful and overt opposition.
"Day of evil" does not refer the end times, any specific act of the devil's, or even any specific event at all. Notice in 5:16 that Paul says all "the days are evil;" the same word for "evil" is used in both cases. It more specifically has to do with work or toil, as the sort of "evil that causes toil." Paul is not talking about preparation for a future event but action to be taken right now in the evil days that the world has continually experienced since the first evil day, when man fell away from Him.
My previous understanding of "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God" was, I confess, incorrect. "Spirit" here does definitely refer to the Holy Spirit, the Person, and the connective "of" denotes origin; so we are not talking about just any spiritual sword here, but a specific sword that has come from the Holy Spirit Himself. The second half of the phrase makes it clear what exactly the sword is- "word of God" here refers to that which God has literally spoken. It is, importantly, not the same word used in John 1 to refer to Jesus. Paul names the sword "the word of God," referring to the Scriptures, which were God-Breathed, indeed given to us by the Spirit Himself.
What follows is the most interesting thing that I personally learned. Paul didn't even make up the armor of God! He took them from Isaiah (11:5, 52:7, 59:17), which he would have known very thoroughly. In Isaiah, it is God Himself who is wearing this armor, which illuminates the phrase that titles this blog post. "The armor of God" refers to the armor that god wears, "God's armor." This makes more sense when you consider that many of the pieces of armor, like truth and righteousness, are God's attributes, with which he is eternally clothed. It seems that the whole armor passage is an extension of Paul's call in 5:1 to "follow God's example." When we "put on" the qualities and attributes of God that He has revealed, we become truly strong.
As I mentioned in my previous post, this study has as its ultimate aim an application to be applied to daily life. This is a very specific action to be taken by the perpetrator of the study- I suppose what I should be doing is using "big ideas" and "pedagogical ideas" to "teach" this passage to you, but I haven't gotten that far in the class :). Therefore, I'll just share what I got out of it for myself. Perhaps in your own study the Spirit will illuminate something that you can do in your own life in response to what He has taught you with this passage.
What stuck out to me was the passage's clear focus upon preparation, and prayer's essential role in such preparation. Even "putting on" any given piece of armor is not automatic, but something that happens only through prayer. This passage has illuminated the fact that I am often unprepared for the constant assaults of the devil and his forces as I live my earthly life. More specifically, I do not pray regularly, and when I do, I don't often pray for the kind of preparation this passage discusses as so essential.
If I were to live out the preparedness through prayer that Paul is urging upon the Ephesians, I would daily seek strength from the Lord to resist lethargy, temptation, and any other "flaming arrows." Over this month, I will pray every day, setting aside a specific time to do so. Each time I pray, I will read this passage and be sure to pray in the manner Paul urges. After each time I will write a small (one sentence) journal entry signifying that I have done so, providing a way to keep a record of preparedness.
Like I said above, this is specific to me. Perhaps you don't even need this, and you walk in prayer and preparation. If you are like me and want to choose to have the same response to the passage, tell me if you want to be kept additionally accountable. Consider making the decision I discussed in my previous post to actually, tangibly respond.
In any case, thank you very much for reading, and I pray the Spirit will use the word of God to bless you.
Pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this n mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord's people.
Ephesians 6:18
Verse 10, "be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power," serves as a heading under which the rest of the passage falls. The verses that follow are an explanation, more specifically, of how believers are to fulfill this exhortation.
The phrase "full armor" is the technical term (panoplia) for the complete armor set of a heavily armed infantryman. Paul (the author here), through his frequent imprisonment, had frequent run-ins with Roman soldiers. Some scholars suggest that he was chained to one or otherwise in rather close quarters while writing this passage (I don't think this is the case, but my faith would not be in shambles if it is). This means he is not necessarily referring to an ambiguous set of objects, but a specific set of things that his audience would have been familiar with.
The difference of a seemingly unimportant connective really illuminates the purpose of the armor. The phrase translated "stand against the devil's schemes" is most literally translated "stand toward the devil's schemes." This word is the same one used in 4:12, "equip... for works of service." This phrase does not denote a passive defense to the devil's schemes, but willful and overt opposition.
"Day of evil" does not refer the end times, any specific act of the devil's, or even any specific event at all. Notice in 5:16 that Paul says all "the days are evil;" the same word for "evil" is used in both cases. It more specifically has to do with work or toil, as the sort of "evil that causes toil." Paul is not talking about preparation for a future event but action to be taken right now in the evil days that the world has continually experienced since the first evil day, when man fell away from Him.
My previous understanding of "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God" was, I confess, incorrect. "Spirit" here does definitely refer to the Holy Spirit, the Person, and the connective "of" denotes origin; so we are not talking about just any spiritual sword here, but a specific sword that has come from the Holy Spirit Himself. The second half of the phrase makes it clear what exactly the sword is- "word of God" here refers to that which God has literally spoken. It is, importantly, not the same word used in John 1 to refer to Jesus. Paul names the sword "the word of God," referring to the Scriptures, which were God-Breathed, indeed given to us by the Spirit Himself.
What follows is the most interesting thing that I personally learned. Paul didn't even make up the armor of God! He took them from Isaiah (11:5, 52:7, 59:17), which he would have known very thoroughly. In Isaiah, it is God Himself who is wearing this armor, which illuminates the phrase that titles this blog post. "The armor of God" refers to the armor that god wears, "God's armor." This makes more sense when you consider that many of the pieces of armor, like truth and righteousness, are God's attributes, with which he is eternally clothed. It seems that the whole armor passage is an extension of Paul's call in 5:1 to "follow God's example." When we "put on" the qualities and attributes of God that He has revealed, we become truly strong.
As I mentioned in my previous post, this study has as its ultimate aim an application to be applied to daily life. This is a very specific action to be taken by the perpetrator of the study- I suppose what I should be doing is using "big ideas" and "pedagogical ideas" to "teach" this passage to you, but I haven't gotten that far in the class :). Therefore, I'll just share what I got out of it for myself. Perhaps in your own study the Spirit will illuminate something that you can do in your own life in response to what He has taught you with this passage.
What stuck out to me was the passage's clear focus upon preparation, and prayer's essential role in such preparation. Even "putting on" any given piece of armor is not automatic, but something that happens only through prayer. This passage has illuminated the fact that I am often unprepared for the constant assaults of the devil and his forces as I live my earthly life. More specifically, I do not pray regularly, and when I do, I don't often pray for the kind of preparation this passage discusses as so essential.
If I were to live out the preparedness through prayer that Paul is urging upon the Ephesians, I would daily seek strength from the Lord to resist lethargy, temptation, and any other "flaming arrows." Over this month, I will pray every day, setting aside a specific time to do so. Each time I pray, I will read this passage and be sure to pray in the manner Paul urges. After each time I will write a small (one sentence) journal entry signifying that I have done so, providing a way to keep a record of preparedness.
Like I said above, this is specific to me. Perhaps you don't even need this, and you walk in prayer and preparation. If you are like me and want to choose to have the same response to the passage, tell me if you want to be kept additionally accountable. Consider making the decision I discussed in my previous post to actually, tangibly respond.
In any case, thank you very much for reading, and I pray the Spirit will use the word of God to bless you.
Pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this n mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord's people.
Ephesians 6:18
The Blog Returns!
So, I have material for another blog post. I may have material for some more after that. Before jumping right into it, I thought I'd post about the fact that I'm beginning to post again.
It is amusingly ironic that this blog, created originally to chronicle my college experience, basically disappeared as soon as I actually experienced college. There's a lot to say about college; it's incredibly fun, and incredibly busy. Perhaps my experience will be further explored in further posts. The reasons for its disappearance are many and are rather subtle; in the end it just became something that wasn't very important to me.
God has really been speaking to me recently, over the past two days specifically, and it's because of this that I'm posting again. I had spent a long time without reading the bible or praying very regularly, with a definite feeling of something lost but not quite enough motivation to seek that lost closeness. This began changing because of numerous small motions on the part of God, but it most specifically began yesterday in Zondervan Library.
As I was in the midst of an inductive study on Ephesians 6:10-18 (for Intro to Christian Educational Ministries class), it became clear to me that I had uncovered enough interesting information to form a blog post. That was the beginning of the train of thought that will culminate with my next blog post. The ultimate goal of these inductive studies is an Application to be directly applied to our own life, and (in theory) actually carried out. I am no foreigner to the idea of such applications, having heard a plethora of lessons and sermons that ended with one or more such things. My pattern in the past has been, usually, thinking about it, maybe even doing it a little bit, but not really implementing these sorts of things. As I wrote my application for this passage, I resolved to be sure that that would not be the case.
Part of my application involved praying every day, at specific times. As I finished writing the application at 8:45, I wrote "the weekly time for Saturdays would be 9," printed my assignment, and headed to the prayer chapel to practice what I preached. Once there I prayed, out loud, for the first time I had with such sincerity in a long while. I prayed through the passage I had studied and then began laying before the Lord all the thoughts and insecurities and hopes I had kept subconscious previously.
It is hard to describe that experience, or describe the change in general attitude that followed. I re-found the closeness with God that had only ever been one intentional step away. I resolved to, yes, actually pray through this passage every day. It has become clear to me that, as long as I approach life in this recently re-found fullness, I will indeed have experiences to blog about. So here we are.
Church today was fantastic, as the presence of God was experienced and a lot of relevant truth was spoken into my life. I have resolved to live with a different response to these sort of experiences, to actually live differently because of them. This blog is a way of chronicling those efforts. I think I'm back to posting about what this blog was originally about, finding how to worship everywhere and in every way. My experience worshiping through study and prayer has lead me to worship by, well, blogging.
Thank you for reading this, I hope the relating of my experiences will inform you regarding the posts to follow and, hopefully, be used by the Spirit to bless you in some way beyond that.
It is amusingly ironic that this blog, created originally to chronicle my college experience, basically disappeared as soon as I actually experienced college. There's a lot to say about college; it's incredibly fun, and incredibly busy. Perhaps my experience will be further explored in further posts. The reasons for its disappearance are many and are rather subtle; in the end it just became something that wasn't very important to me.
God has really been speaking to me recently, over the past two days specifically, and it's because of this that I'm posting again. I had spent a long time without reading the bible or praying very regularly, with a definite feeling of something lost but not quite enough motivation to seek that lost closeness. This began changing because of numerous small motions on the part of God, but it most specifically began yesterday in Zondervan Library.
As I was in the midst of an inductive study on Ephesians 6:10-18 (for Intro to Christian Educational Ministries class), it became clear to me that I had uncovered enough interesting information to form a blog post. That was the beginning of the train of thought that will culminate with my next blog post. The ultimate goal of these inductive studies is an Application to be directly applied to our own life, and (in theory) actually carried out. I am no foreigner to the idea of such applications, having heard a plethora of lessons and sermons that ended with one or more such things. My pattern in the past has been, usually, thinking about it, maybe even doing it a little bit, but not really implementing these sorts of things. As I wrote my application for this passage, I resolved to be sure that that would not be the case.
Part of my application involved praying every day, at specific times. As I finished writing the application at 8:45, I wrote "the weekly time for Saturdays would be 9," printed my assignment, and headed to the prayer chapel to practice what I preached. Once there I prayed, out loud, for the first time I had with such sincerity in a long while. I prayed through the passage I had studied and then began laying before the Lord all the thoughts and insecurities and hopes I had kept subconscious previously.
It is hard to describe that experience, or describe the change in general attitude that followed. I re-found the closeness with God that had only ever been one intentional step away. I resolved to, yes, actually pray through this passage every day. It has become clear to me that, as long as I approach life in this recently re-found fullness, I will indeed have experiences to blog about. So here we are.
Church today was fantastic, as the presence of God was experienced and a lot of relevant truth was spoken into my life. I have resolved to live with a different response to these sort of experiences, to actually live differently because of them. This blog is a way of chronicling those efforts. I think I'm back to posting about what this blog was originally about, finding how to worship everywhere and in every way. My experience worshiping through study and prayer has lead me to worship by, well, blogging.
Thank you for reading this, I hope the relating of my experiences will inform you regarding the posts to follow and, hopefully, be used by the Spirit to bless you in some way beyond that.
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