It’s been pretty cold lately – particularly early in the morning – and it’s got me thinking. Church musicians, why do you do what you do? Why practice an ever-changing bunch of songs to play and sing with people in your Life Group, your Youth Group, your church meeting or wherever you do it? Why do you rehearse on a Saturday when friends and family are relaxing? Why do you get up at 6:00am on a Sunday morning in the middle of winter and try to warm up your fingers and voices to a point where they work to some semblance of fluidity before standing in front of a crowd of people to sing and play music. It’s fun? Yeah, I guess it is, but if it’s for some sort of gratification, whether the recognition of people or your own entertainment, it’ll be short-lived – especially when your delicate musician hands are so cold.
We have to be worshippers of God first before we are musicians. The Westminster Shorter Catechism says, “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever”. Now, I’m not entirely convinced that that’s our purpose in it’s entirety during this life but I do believe that it is, at the very least, a very big part of it. God has created us for relationship with Him and our most natural way of relating to Him is in worship.
Ok.. So, if we are to be worshippers and if we try as far as possible to take our lead from the bible then I’d like to look at a biblical character that models a worshipper and attempt to learn a few things from this person. No prizes for guessing who I’m about to look at. Ok, so maybe a small prize: a chocolate to the first person who names the character. I’ll even double the stakes if the answer comes with a good explanation. Ok, go!
Click here for part 2 of this article.
David?
Because it says he was a man after God’s heart?
Top deck please.
I’m curious to see how you elaborate on the title of this blog especially in the context of the new covenant we have with God and that fact that no “worship leaders” are mentioned in the New Testament ‘churches’… and no title of “Worship leader” exists in the new covenant as an office, service or calling…
I think un arguably, David… And although he was the man that God Himself named as one “after His own heart” I don’t know that that’s the only reason… If we spend time on Psalms we see a genuine heart of worship. A heart that, having made endless mistakes, knew what it mean to repent, and turn his heart back to the Father… Its amazing because David really was a sinner of note, but its equally, if not more amazing how that meant nothing to God as David knew how to worship with a heart of repentance, a heart that acknowledged its sinful desires and actions but didn’t candy-coat it or “sweep it under the rug” but he understood how to sincerely return to the Father! A challenge for us, to say the least
sorry dude, i was first! hahaaa hand over the choc!
Jabez?
Nebuchadnezzar? Well, you might get something out of that story.
I like the way John Piper has rephrased the Westminster Shorter Catechism by saying, “the chief end of man is to glorify God BY enjoying Him forever.” It really shows how worship is something God demands from His people because He knows that that is what would make His people the most happy, content, and bring them the truest joy.
David’s honesty I think makes him one of the best models, and it would be interesting here to discuss just how honest corporate worship songs should be, as honesty I feel helps to push the creativity of lyrics forward – but are honest songs always helpful and how do they teach us theology?
As to Matt’s questions around NT churches… interesting questions. I have some stuff to say about that but this comment is too long already
Jonno I really like where you are going with this. I am guessing you will use the life of King David to illustrate what a life (heart, attitude etc. ) of a worshipper should look like.
The reason I like this so much is because in doing this you will set straight some misconceptions regarding worship. One of the major misconceptions I have in mind is to think of worship as “just” singing songs of praise in a corporate gathering. The other would be that worship is constrained to a certain place and time. Again I am referring to a church meeting.
Let me maybe also say this: I do believe that intentional corporate acts like singing songs, preaching God’s word, celebrating the sacraments (Baptism & Communion), and the giving of our money etc. are in fact also aspects of worship. We will do well to rediscover why we do what we do when we gather corporately.
Anyways, there is lots to say regarding these matters but for now I am looking forward to some of the helpful insights we will get from the life of David.
Thank you Ryan. And some good points by Waldo.
There’s some great discussion on here, thanks for all the comments guys!
First up: Matt wins the chocolate and a Top Deck it shall be. Let me know when and where we shall conduct the handover ceremony
Also, some very good questions there. There is actually a whole lot of the language that we use in church circles that is actually quite inaccurate and can be misleading. I can’t say I’m a big fan on the term “worship leader” myself. Especially because, biblically speaking, the Holy Spirit is “the worship leader”. One of the things He does is to “bring glory to me [Jesus] by taking from what is mine and making it known to you.” (Jn 16:14). So part of our worship of God is a revelation-and-response kind of thing that the Spirit initiates.
Mpho – Good points. I’ve been looking at the life of David a bit and there is definitely a lot to learn from.
Ryan – That is quite a cool spin on the Catechism.
Waldo – Those are definitely good comments. Worship can’t just be confined to singing songs on a Sunday. If that’s all that it ever was in my life I’d go as far as to question if those songs even amounted to worship at all.
As ever in Bloggingtonfieldville there are a whole bunch of great points that have been raised in the comments and I don’t think I could do them justice in a brief comment. Each could easily be given a whole article and discussion of their own. In fact, they probably should – so watch this space.
So… to get back on topic; it probably wasn’t a particularly difficult one but yes, it is David I have in mind. I’ll be elaborating on that a bit more in my next post. It’s been a pretty crazy two weeks but I hope I’ll be back with part two sooner rather than later.
“Also, some very good questions there.”
Thank you Jon. And thank you for your response. I agree with the revelation-response point of view. Please keep writing.