Worship

I spent the last week at Northern Pines, a family camp in Green Lake, WI. While there, I met this amazing girl named Molly and pretty quickly we became friends. One night after worship, Molly looked at me and asked, "Do you know what the most amazing line from 'How He Loves' is?" When I shook my head, she continued, "The very first line: 'He is jealous for me.'" I stood there for a moment, taking in that simple sentence that I had breezed over so many times in the song. He is jealous for me. The creator of the universe, who made thundering elephants, crashing waves and majestic mountains, is jealous of my attention. He wants it all for himself. Wow. We continued to discuss the song, the implications, and marveled at it together and individually the rest of the week.

Worship is an amazing thing. It isn't just singing to our Creator, but includes praying, dancing, serving, taking pictures, painting, breathing, talking, and being silent. Worship should be everything we do. It is God's way of letting us connect with Him. I particularly enjoy the singing and music part of worship, so that's what I'm going to focus on for now.

Listen, really listen, to a worship song. Not the tempo or melody, but the words. They will knock you off of your feet. Thinking about how God's love never fails, how He placed each star in the sky and knows them each by name, that He shines out of the darkness, brings us out of the ashes. That He sent Jesus to die for a wretch like me. That He could be jealous for that same wretch's attention. It's pretty mind blowing. When you really think about it, you can't stay the same. Worship is a transforming experience. If Molly had turned to me and said the same thing, we had marveled, and then I didn’t change anything about myself, I would be making a huge mistake. When she pointed that out to me, God asked me to spend more of my time with him, to turn my attention more often to my Creator who is jealous of me. He wants to spend time with me, and wants to spend time with you as well. He isn’t just jealous of my time and how I spend it, He is jealous of yours. He loves you and wants you to turn to him with your pain and fear, instead of earthly friends. Once you realize that, there is no return to the way things were.

Pain

I ran a 5k this weekend with some friends to "Celebrate the 4th of July". Not sure how that makes sense, but I have to make it 8 miles at the end of the summer, so I figured I should train some. Needless to say, it was a disaster. I made it across the finish line with lungs and legs burning and collapsed onto the grass. It was possibly the worst 35 minutes of my life. And that's when I realized something. If I can consider running and being tired like that anywhere close to the worst experience I've ever had, I have led a pretty great life.
Yes, I am still limping slightly as I walk down stairs and no, I don't think I'll be doing that again any time soon. Sure, thinking about it, there are plenty of experiences of mine that are far worse. But thinking about pain, real pain, made me wonder. What does real pain feel like? I felt plenty of pain for months after certain experiences: deaths of close relatives, bitter ends to friendships, moving to Sterling, etc. In many ways, though, I live in a safe, secure bubble. I've never dealt with divorce, death of a immediate family member or best friend. I've never been diagnosed with a life-threatening illness or been hospitalized at all really. My arthritis and athsma, the 2 diseases I do have, have been in remission for years. Look at Job from the Old Testament. I mean, he finds out that his livestock, servants and all 10 children of his are dead- all in the same day! Then, as if that isn't enough, he breaks out into a horrible skin disease with sores all over his body! All because he was faithful to God.
My point is that I really haven't experienced pain. And as weird as it sounds, that disapoints me a little bit. God uses pain to draw us closer to Him. One of Job's friends talks to him and says "For God does speak--now one way, now another-- though man may not percieve it" (Job 33:14). He goes on to describe the ways God speaks to us. His final one is "A man may be chastened on a bed of pain with constant distress in his bones" (Job 33: 19). God uses pain to talk to us, to turn us back to him. Its the whole point of the Beatitudes, that God blesses those who are hurting the most. Oh, and Job? After he proves himself faithful through it all, God returns his health, gives him twice the property as before, new children and an extremely long life.
No, I'm not masochistic. In fact, I recoil from pain. But the few times God has put me through the most intense pain, I have always come out stronger on the other side. So next time you are in pain and crying out, wondering why God is letting this happen to you, just remember that "Weeping may remain for a night, but Joy comes in the morning" (Psalm 30:5).