Wonder

I have recently been obsessed with the idea of "wonder."  I attended a worship arts conference at Willow Creek church this last summer, and the theme of the week was none other than wonder.  I remember being blown away by the idea that in our lives and in our faith, we must keep a sense of awe toward God and His works always.

A book I am reading for my Theology and Worship Arts class called Worship Come to Its Senses by Don Saliers talks a little bit about the idea of awe and how it has been somewhat lost in our culture.  He suggests that because we use such words as "awesome" in daily life all the time, we lose the sense of what the word really means.  I mean, saying "Dude, that episode of Lost was awesome" is a far cry from "How awesome is the Lord Most High, the Great King over all the Earth!" (Psalm 47:2)

I think this means that when we read the scripture, we somewhat gloss over the passages that read this way.  We think, yeah, God is a pretty awesome guy, but that isn't what the Biblical writers are intending.  Instead, they mean awe as in drop-your-jaw, stand-in-amazement, at-a-loss-for-words kind of awe!  We are to stand in awe of God and what He has done, is doing, and will do!  That's pretty powerful stuff.

I also think that churches have somewhat lost a sense of awe in their worship.  I mean, come on, we're gathering together in the presence of the God of the universe, and there are people scrambling through their purses to get a piece of gum or stepping outside to refill on the free coffee.  As a side note, I am in no way saying that this is necessarily bad, and I have certainly been guilty of it, but you get my point.  We need to find a way to recapture this sense of divine presence among us, this sense of God communing with His people in their worship.

On the other side of that, I think one thing our churches do really well, at least the ones I attend, is communicating the intimacy of God to us.  God dwells among us, not only when we gather as a church for worship, but in our everyday, ordinary lives.  God in the Old Testament, while His people wandered in the desert, dwelled in the tabernacle at the center of their camp.  He wanted to be among His people.  Today, He dwells among us and wants a relationship with us everyday.  God loves us dearly and is our Father.  It can't get more intimate than that!  God is intimate, yet He is wholly other.  Our worship should reflect both aspects of this.

I will close with a quote I found particularly interesting from Worship Come To its Senses:

"The way remains closed to those to whom God is less real than a 'consuming fire,' to those who know answers but no wonder."     -Abraham Herschel