Music & Worship

I have been told throughout my whole church life how important music is. Many churches today revolve their entire church around their music department. I find this surprising considering that we don’t even know if Jesus could sing, let alone play an instrument. You would think that if music was so vital to our Christianity, Jesus would have mentioned it once or twice in his lifetime.

Music has definitely played its part throughout history in many extraordinarily miraculous events, such as the fall of Jericho, and even the fall of racism in more recent years, but I think that somewhere along the line we have mistaken music for worship.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the “praise and worship” we find in a lot of churches these days. In fact, I was a worship leader for many years. But I came to the point where I found that I had lost the meaning of worship in my life. I began to question whether the “worship” I was performing was for God’s benefit or for mine, and I realised that I had lost my ability to worship without the aid of music.

Although music is a valid expression of worship, I believe that so much more is required of us. Studying the bible, meditation, generosity, social justice, visiting sick people and providing for the needy is all part of true worship. Anything that gives expression to our devotion to God is worship. I have realised that for me music is often just the easy way out.

Darlene Zschech says “Music excludes, worship does not.” If anyone knew how to worship, Jesus did. His style of worship was simply wholehearted devotion, even to the point of death.

The Divine Weaver

Perspective is such a powerful thing, and when you realise that God is actually in control of all things, it can be just the life line you need to make it through the tough times. We often forget that God sees things that we know nothing about, and the older I get the more I believe that everything happens for a reason. It may be years before we see the reasons why we go through what we do, and we may never truly understand some things, but we just need to look for the gold dust that is buried in the mud, and remember that God's tapestry is so much bigger and brighter than ours.

The Divine Weaver

My life is but a weaving
Between my Lord and me;
I cannot choose the colours,
He works it steadily.

Sometimes he weaves sorrow
And I, in foolish pride,
Forget that he sees the upper,
And I, the underside.

Not till the loom is silent
And the shuttles cease to fly,
Shall God unroll the canvas
And explain the reason why.

The dark threads are as needful
In the weaver’s skilful hand
As the threads of gold and silver
In the pattern he has planned.

Author Unknown

Self Worth

After a falling out with a friend a couple of years ago, I realised that I had been basing my value as a person on my relationships. I subconsciously believed that my worth depended on what my friends thought of me. It came as a shock when it dawned on me that I was trying so hard to be liked, that my closest friends really didn’t know anything about the real me (my hopes, dreams and fears), in spite of the amount of time we had spent together over many years.

All of my life I had struggled with fear, but once I let go of the dependency I had on the people around me, the most amazing thing happened – the fear that had plagued me vanished. It was very painful giving up the particular friendship I mentioned before, but over the months that followed I realised that I had a freedom I had never experienced before. Looking back three or four months later, I realised that I had not been afraid of anything since that day.

I don’t believe that this break through in my life was the result of not seeing that particular person any more, but rather that I finally reached the point where I began to look to God for my worth. I began to base my value on what God, who knows me better than anyone, thinks of me, rather than what others think of me.

There’s a lot of pressure these days to be something you are not, but I encourage anyone who is struggling with issues of self-worth, to be true to who you really are. God made you the way you are for a reason, and real value and purpose can only come when we truly believe that.

Holiness

People do not look at us Christians and think “Wow, look at how holy they are!” If anything, they think we are self-righteous hypocrites. We have made so many rules about what it is to be holy – do not drink, do not smoke, do not go to parties – no wonder people don’t want to be like us! All we have achieved by this kind of thinking is to isolate ourselves from others.

I believe that holiness is not about what we do and do not do, but is about our character. I don’t believe Jesus meant for us to be separate from the world in a literal sense – he certainly didn’t separate himself from the “bad people” when he walked the earth. I believe he meant that we should stand out. People should look at us and be amazed at how passionately we live – how much we love those around us; how generous we are; how much we enjoy life.

People should look at us and want to be like us, not because we seem to have it all together, but because we live our lives so passionately in everything we do, each and every day, just like Jesus did.

Jesus said that people would know we are his disciples when we love one another, not when we live a life out of touch with those around us. Jesus didn’t set us free to be bound by a never-ending list of rules and regulations. Jesus set us free to be free! That’s what people in this world are looking for.

Fake It Till You Make It

One of my all-time most hated sayings is “Fake it till you make it”.

I think that one of the main reasons people don’t want to be a part of Christianity is because we constantly pretend we are something that we are not. People need to see that we are real people; that we struggle with the same issues that they do, but we have an undeniable hope and purpose no matter what. They will be attracted to us, not because we are perfect and have it all together, but because we live our lives so passionately, in spite of the bad things that happen to us.

I just can’t imagine Jesus sidling up to someone who is going through a rough time and telling them to fake it till they make it. Jesus was real – he shared his struggles and sorrows, as well as his victories and joys. Surely his example is the one we should follow, not the myth that tells us that Christians must be perfect.

Unanswered Questions

Have you ever questioned things that you are supposed to just assume are true? I have grown up a Christian and yet I have spent most of my life asking questions that there seemed to be no answers to - no satisfactory answers anyway. I used to wonder if it was just me? But I have embarked on a journey over the past few years which has not only begun to answer some of my many questions, but has made me realise that I am not the only one out there who asks these kind of questions. The purpose of this blog is to air some of my thoughts about my God, whom I love more than anything, and about my own "Christianity". I am far from having all the answers, but I think it is important to at least raise the questions. I hope others may benefit from the things I am beginning to learn about how to be a true follower of Jesus.