My friend and colleague Ricky sent me this post that wrestles with whether God cares for all those prayer requests we make about our work. Every Wednesday we have a mandatory prayer meeting (10 mins of prayer and 1 hour of meetings) to "pray" for issues in our lives. Most of our requests revolve around work and how stressed we are. Ricky and I always look at each other and wonder whether something is amiss in our lives when we seem so run down over the stuff we have to do.
http://www.thehighcalling.org/work/does-god-really-care-about-important-meeting
The post makes me think about our theology of work. We know that work is good and edifying. It is God-ordained and specific to who we are and who we were created to be. Yet we have come to idolize it and prize it so beyond what it ought to be, often sacrificing our family, our health, and our sanity to please our boss. And sometimes, our boss isn't the man who sits in the big office downstairs, it's an invisible one inside of us who insists that we toil for futile things like fame, prestige, and success. We give ourselves over to task-masters and willingly enslave ourselves to our work because it gives to us our sense of meaning and identity. In a way, as the article mentions, it has become our idol.
Today is Wednesday and we will have our prayer meeting again. I wonder how to balance this idea of work (in the holy and godly sense) and this god it has become.
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Monday, April 23, 2012
A Different Tradition of Worship
On Sunday I had the opportunity to attend an Anglican service. It's been the 4th time in the last few months I've been to an Anglican service which is 4 more times than I ever thought I'd be at an Anglican church. But I came to realize that there are some things which I've really come to enjoy about their tradition of worship.
Acknowledging that I don't know enough about Anglican roots and history, here is what I appreciate about the service I attended:
1. Communion:
I am probably not using the word in the sense that most Anglicans use it in but rather the "community" I felt drawn to as I worshiped at St. Andrew's. It was really neat to see a myriad of people from different social classes and cultural backgrounds singing together. It's definitely one of the most multicultural churches I've attended. I recall John Piper once explaining in his book, "Let the Nations be Glad" that God is ultimately more glorified when a diverse group of people all congregate and unite in worshiping Him than if only one group of people did. It was a really neat feeling to see a brother from a totally different walk of life and know that somehow God had drawn him, as well as yourself, to the same place and to the same community.
2. Revererance:
Maybe it has to do with the architecture of the church, but I love how the high ceilings and the stain-glass windows just draw you to another time and imagination. It makes me think of all the people who may have passed through Hong Kong and worshiped at this place. The grandness of the building reflects the posture and attitude I ought to bring in my worship as well. It reminds me that there is nothing flippant when I approach God and that the place I meet him is sacred. A funny thing is that even in the poor architectural conditions of modern day overflow and poor visuals and acoustics it reminds me that the worship service is not about what I can see or hear but rather that this place was built for God and not me. The service is for God's pleasure and not mine.
3. Liturgy:
I used to hate liturgy and think it was boring. I thought that we should be about spontaneity and breaking tradition. How wrong I was. I've recently learned the value of tradition. You join with history and the cloud of witnesses before you in remembering the creeds and prayers that your predecessors have recited. You are joining with a tried and meaningful legacy that's been passed on. I appreciate that the liturgy always focuses me on the character of God and pushes me to look outward beyond myself.
4. God-centered preaching:
I think I've come to also appreciate boring preaching because there is nothing wrong with boring preaching when it's based in the Word. It doesn't need to be flashy or thrilling. It just needs to be faithful. Often in our self-centered society, we hear messages that encourage our personal growth or assuage our emotional well-being. We prize our egos and fulfillment. It's refreshing to hear a sermon that focuses on what God is saying and how we need to obey rather than how God can meet our needs.
I'm excited and looking forward to seeing and learning more in a different season of worship in my life. Hopefully this leads to a deeper understanding of who God is and brings me to a deeper love of Him.
Acknowledging that I don't know enough about Anglican roots and history, here is what I appreciate about the service I attended:
1. Communion:
I am probably not using the word in the sense that most Anglicans use it in but rather the "community" I felt drawn to as I worshiped at St. Andrew's. It was really neat to see a myriad of people from different social classes and cultural backgrounds singing together. It's definitely one of the most multicultural churches I've attended. I recall John Piper once explaining in his book, "Let the Nations be Glad" that God is ultimately more glorified when a diverse group of people all congregate and unite in worshiping Him than if only one group of people did. It was a really neat feeling to see a brother from a totally different walk of life and know that somehow God had drawn him, as well as yourself, to the same place and to the same community.
2. Revererance:
Maybe it has to do with the architecture of the church, but I love how the high ceilings and the stain-glass windows just draw you to another time and imagination. It makes me think of all the people who may have passed through Hong Kong and worshiped at this place. The grandness of the building reflects the posture and attitude I ought to bring in my worship as well. It reminds me that there is nothing flippant when I approach God and that the place I meet him is sacred. A funny thing is that even in the poor architectural conditions of modern day overflow and poor visuals and acoustics it reminds me that the worship service is not about what I can see or hear but rather that this place was built for God and not me. The service is for God's pleasure and not mine.
3. Liturgy:
I used to hate liturgy and think it was boring. I thought that we should be about spontaneity and breaking tradition. How wrong I was. I've recently learned the value of tradition. You join with history and the cloud of witnesses before you in remembering the creeds and prayers that your predecessors have recited. You are joining with a tried and meaningful legacy that's been passed on. I appreciate that the liturgy always focuses me on the character of God and pushes me to look outward beyond myself.
4. God-centered preaching:
I think I've come to also appreciate boring preaching because there is nothing wrong with boring preaching when it's based in the Word. It doesn't need to be flashy or thrilling. It just needs to be faithful. Often in our self-centered society, we hear messages that encourage our personal growth or assuage our emotional well-being. We prize our egos and fulfillment. It's refreshing to hear a sermon that focuses on what God is saying and how we need to obey rather than how God can meet our needs.
I'm excited and looking forward to seeing and learning more in a different season of worship in my life. Hopefully this leads to a deeper understanding of who God is and brings me to a deeper love of Him.
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