I was naughty and I gave the audience a trick question. I read out two passages that described an encounter between people and God. First, I read out the Isaiah 6:1–8 passage. Then I read the Luke15:11–32 passage. I asked them which picture of God they preferred. Some said Isaiah 6, while others Luke 15. I then confessed that it was a trick question. We cannot embrace the picture of God we prefer. We have to take God as He is.
I was sharing at a worship symposium. I shared that so much of the discussion on corporate worship focused on the “how” of worship, e.g., the songs we sing, the atmosphere of our worship space, the work of the worship leader, etc. These are all important. We want to honour God with the best that we have and can be.
But the starting point of worship is not what we do. The starting point of worship is God. Worship is the proper response to God’s revelation. Our first concern is not how can we do the mechanics of worship better. It’s growing in understanding of who God is. The quality of our worship is tied to our clarity of who God is.
Therefore the first step in worship is to look at how God has revealed Himself. He has revealed Himself in creation, in His dealings with biblical Israel, in His coming as Jesus, and it’s implication for the early church. All this is recorded in Scripture. We cannot have exhaustive knowledge of God, but we can have accurate knowledge of Him as He reveals Himself in the Bible. And God Himself comes to us in the person of the Holy Spirit to help us understand the Bible.
I was not really joking when I said that a short course on theology should be mandatory for all who lead the church in corporate worship. Before we talk about the "how” of worship we must know the “who” and the “why” of worship.
Of course it is possible that we focus more on our response in worship than an encounter with the living God because it is more comfortable. Isaiah 6 shows us that an encounter with the Almighty would strip away any pretence of our own holiness. We need God to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves — cleanse us from our sins. And it is our overwhelming awareness of the grace we received that moves us to say yes to being part of God’s mission in the world.
It is our encounter with the awesome holiness of God that helps us to appreciate Luke 15. We have no standing before such a holy God. Yet when we admit our sin and turn towards home, we see the Father rushing out to hug us and to welcome us home. To what degree would we appreciate Luke 15 without the prior tutoring of Isaiah 6?
Maybe we shouldn’t start our corporate worship with singing. Maybe we should start with silence, meditating on a passage of Scripture that helps us to remember who God is, who we are, and what He has done for us. Then, with a primed heart, we stand and declare His praises.
