We can learn a great deal about worship by looking at the earliest Christians, for the culture that surrounded them was in many ways similar to ours in twenty-first century North America. Then and now the population is highly pluralistic, with the people’s...
I have become convinced that Christianity is fundamentally an experience in losing the lives of our dreams in order to receive the lives that Jesus died to give us. from When God Interrupts: Finding New Life through Unwanted Change
Worship celebrates God’s saving deed in Jesus Christ. This kind of worship is not a goal-driven worship, but a Christ-driven worship. And when Christ is the center of worship, all the goals of worship are achieved: Christ-centered worship educates, evangelizes, heals,...
I wonder if in the rush of creative planning and the desire to see people enjoy our worship gatherings in the modern church, we have pushed to the sidelines what we are supposed to be doing… In the emerging church, we need to make sure we view our worship services as...
We all need to apologize, and we all need to forgive, for humanity to have a sustainable future. Otherwise, we are controlled by the past, individually and corporately. History easily devolves into taking sides, bitterness, holding grudges, and the violence that...
We must not worship without study, for ignorant worship is of limited value and can be very dangerous. We may develop “a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge” (Rom.10:2) and do great harm to ourselves and others. But worship must be added to study to complete...
True Worship is not a peculiar practice in a particular place. True worship is the whole person saying, “Yes, Lord” in response to the self-revelation of God in Jesus Christ. from Hearts on Pilgrimage
The effectiveness of a liturgy lies in its humility, in the absence of self-proclamation—”I am the liturgy, notice me.” The Word of God is the gathering point for all the content and all the action. If there is a high point or seasonal emphasis in a liturgy, this is...
Have your heart right with Christ, and He will visit you often, and so turn weekdays into Sundays, meals into sacraments, homes into temples and earth into heaven.
Corporate worship can become empty—it can turn into an abstraction—outside of each individual worship taking on full responsibility, for each person is the church, and it is the church that is to be at worship, individual by individual. In corporate worship, it is not...