Worshiping God Face-On
“Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”
Psalm 73:25-26
It was 1958. I was a restless, adventurous nine-year-old, and I was on a steamship, sailing with my mother and grandmother to Bermuda. When we woke up the first morning, the sky was as cold and gray as the churning, white-capped waves. A bitter wind and a spitting rain kept most of the passengers indoors, sipping tea behind the glassed-in deck or wandering the ship’s galleries. My mother gathered my grandmother and me into the auditorium to watch a slide presentation about ocean currents and trade winds. Sitting in the dark, warm room and hearing the click-clicking of the projector progressing from one slide to the next, I became more and more restless. Why weren’t we out on the deck, holding on to the railing, with our faces to the wind and spray? Why were we experiencing the ocean secondhand?
Our worship of God is often the same. We need to stand face-on into the bracing, raw truth of who God is. It would ignite a passionate response such as that of the child who stands facing the storm, grasping the rail, hair flattened and voice straining: “This is awesome!” Worship should have us apprehending raw, honest truth about God; it should provide the channels for the heart to respond to the beauty of that truth. “In your face” biblical truth about God ignites the heat of our emotions about him. Our worship of God becomes shriveled when we fill our minds with secondhand information about him as well as settle for a less-than-real experience of God.
Don’t let your worship decline to the performance of mere duty. Don’t allow the childlike awe and wonder to be choked out. You have capacities for joy that you can scarcely imagine. These capacities were made for the enjoyment of God. He can awaken them. Open your eyes. Be awed and inspired by his glory. And then…be blown away as you worship God.
Let me stand face-on beholding your beauty, Lord. I worship you.
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