Reading for the week

It's a bit uncanny how the choice of books came together for the week. One book setting the stage for the second without me even having a clue. The first book purchased in a book store, the second book, well it seems to have chosen me to read it. It nearly jumped off the shelf at me, actually it fell off the shelf and landed at my feet.
First book choice, "Satisfying the Longing Hunger of Your Soul" by Jon Dybdahl. The title appealed to me as did the authors name, I knew a fella with the last name of Dybdahl many years ago. I wonder if they are brothers. The book is good, not great. Its not a smooth read all the way through. But what counts is that there are thoughts and concepts in this book that are akin to light bulb moments. I don't agree with all I have read, but he states that that might happen as you read the words contained in this book.

One chapter in particular has had me thinking for two days on little else. "Worship: Gateway to Communion" with a sub chapter that is titled, "What Worship Is (and is not). I am tempted to copy out the whole chapter for you to read, it feels that important to me. Its an eye opener. Its light along a dark road. Its a map to a place we thought we were going, but we ended up the wrong place, never realizing we were lost.

Here are a few lines for you to chew on....."We may define worship first of all, as a response to God's presence and/or action. Worship, then, sees Him as our primary audience, one whom we believe sees our reaching out to Him in praise. While this response can be personal and happen in my private prayer closet, often it will be corporate and take place as a group of believers together seek Him in Joy.

Second, worship is a holistic response in which our entire being reaches out. Matthew 23: 37,38 calls on us to love God with all our hearts and soul and mind. When that happens, the body is involved as well, and spirit---is involved.

Third, worship assumes a real divine-human interchange. God sees and responds to worship..."

Think of how worship in the tabernacle worked.... Gods presence was sure felt there.

Later down on the page Dybdahl writes a few lines that were light bulb moments....

"One of the problems with worship is that it has become a word used for many things that are not really worship. I see at least four false models of worship. The first three can operate either corporately or individually.

The first false model is that of the classroom. It views worship as learning. In either our private devotionals or church gathering we evaluate what goes on by how much knowledge we acquire. Church becomes a lecture hall, and personal study becomes God's homework. Study is vital, but it is not worship. What study should be is prelude to worship. Knowledge of God leads to worship, and further study should give birth to even more fervent and meaningful worship.

The second false model is that of the evangelistic tent. It regards corporate religious service as a place of proclamation that invites sinners to accept Jesus. Private devotions are to convert or perhaps prepare one to share their faith with others. Again, evangelism itself is not wrong, but it is not worship. Rather evangelism should be the result of worship. Meeting God in worship should inspire and empower us to invite others into the joy of worship.

The third false model is that of the psychologist's couch... the sermon is a kind of mass counseling and private prayer is do-it-yourself therapy....." Dybdahl has really good points on this false model but honestly this will become the whole chapter for you if I keep typing. You can figure he goes the same route as the first two false models....Worship is not mass counseling.

"The fourth false model is that of a spectator sport For many,corporate worship is watching the professionals perform. We evaluate them, if they do well, we cheer, and if they do poorly, we criticize.....our place in corporate worship is to be a participant, not a spectator."

" The Bible has a rich vocabulary in regard to worship, probably fuller than that concerning any other concept. English stretches to do it justice. Words include "reverence," "glorify," "honor," "praise," (four different Hebrew words) "magnify," "bow down," "fear," "bless," "extol," "adore," "give thanks," and we could go on. "

You can see many often fall so short of actually worshipping God and maybe that is why we often get an empty feeling from what we think is worship.
I can tell you that for years, lighting the Friday night candles to welcome the sabbath was worship for me. It held for me all those words in the paragraph above. I now understand why it brought a tear of joy to me each week. The special veil put on my head, the light of the candles, the prayer, sung in Hebrew, the hand movement of drawing the light to me, the meaning of the two candles, all of it was so much more than anything I experiences in a traditional church service.

The second book I am reading came purely by chance. I was drawn to it in Goodwill. Maybe the title spoke to my heart of my own yearning...."So Close, I Can Feel God's Breath". It's written by Dr Beverly Rose, raised Jewish which is where I connected with her, she wrote about her mothers candle lighting on Friday night and it all came together for me, this concept of true worship. Her book is about meeting God in the thin places of life. Rose is now a Christian.

Much of this book is on line at Google Books . Take a peek at it. There is a thread in that book that resonates in me. I understand.

She does say something in there that I had heard before but it made me think about the Christian church and home. "It has been said that if every synagogue were to disappear from the face of the earth, Jewish religious life would survive intact, sustained in the home. But if Jews were to rely solely on synagogues for their religious life, Jewish commitment would not last for more than a generation." Makes you question if your home would sustain such faith.