Idle Worship

Idle Worship

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Idle Worship

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God's presence in worship opens our lips to proclaim his glory. When we see God as both the subject and object of worship , then true praise follows.
Source: Australian Presbyterian , 2001 . 2 pages.
In an address on the theme “declaring God’s praise”, James Nestigen reminded us of the biblical definition of praise. Based on the liturgical line “O Lord, open my lips” , and the response, “And my mouth will declare your praise” , he defined genuine praise as that which comes forth only when God opens our lips.
These lines from Psalm 51:15 emphasise the interrelation of God as both subject and object of our worship, for his presence opens our lips to proclaim his glory. We cannot respond to God as the object of our praise unless we first see him, know him, let him be God in our lives. Nestigen protested that “sometimes these days it is hard to distinguish praise from schmooze” and insisted that real praise happens when God becomes God again for us.
I hope churches will continually use fresh words and music to praise God, but it worries me that so many new compositions dumb down our perception, knowledge, and adoration of God. A principal cause of such dumbing down is the contemporary confusion of praise with “happiness”.
Some worship planners and participants think that to praise God is simply to sing upbeat music; consequently, many songs that are called “praise” actually describe the feelings of the believer rather than the character of God. In the extreme, a focus on good feelings distorts the truth of the gospel into a “health, wealth, and victory” therapy. We must recognise this for the idolatry it is. Centering on happiness makes us forget that the world gains redemption not through the Church’s glory but through Christ’s sacrifice and the suffering of God’s people.
Genuine praise of God depends upon truth. It is not just an attitude of appreciation or an emotion of wellbeing or delight; instead, it acknowledges a superlative quality or deed. Genuine praise challenges our secularity and idolatries and narcissism by concentrating not on our feelings of happiness, but on qualities in God that are truly there, not just there for me.
An emphasis on what we “get out” of a worship service — above all, that we feel good about ourselves — displaces the theocentric praise of God with man-centred utilitarianism. Since the worship of God is an end in itself, making worship useful destroys it, because this introduces an ulterior motive for praise. And ulterior motives mean manipulation, taking charge of the relationship, thereby turning the relation between Creator and creature upside down.
Instead of trying to force happiness or making the music more upbeat, the Church best renews its praise by gaining a fresh apprehension of God. Because we have lacked new visions, we have let modern idolatries reduce God into such an anaemic irrelevance that we must entertain people instead of introducing them to God.
“Praise” that uses only “upbeat” songs can be extremely destructive to worshipers because it denies the reality of doubts concerning God, the hiddenness of God, and the feelings of abandonment by God that cloud believers going through difficult times. I have counselled numerous people whose experience of worship that focused only on happy praise left them with huge feelings of inadequacy. “Why do I feel so discouraged? I know I should praise God, but I just can’t,” they say.
That is because the worship has not dealt with their feelings of guilt, their doubts and fears, their sense of hypocrisy and sinfulness. Many question their faith because they are not able to be as happy as their fellow believers. They can’t enter into upbeat worship if their lives are in a shambles. Instead of recognising the inadequacy of worship that teaches only one aspect of our relationship to God, they blame themselves for inadequate faith.
Closely related to such wishful optimism in worship is the problem that the lyrics of many of the new praise songs are so shallow. Constant repetition of only one attribute of God can lead to profound reflection upon it, as in the gentle choruses from Taize, but often endless repetitions are only boring failures to reveal new aspects of the infinite God or presumptuous rejections of the multiplicity of images found in the Scriptures.
To sing over and over again only that God loves us is to miss the truth of God’s wrath, the need for our repentance in light of God’s justice, and God’s mercy and truth in answer to the confusions of a broken and sinful world.
This same kind of narrowed outlook in worship also occurs if pastors’ sermons are based on only one kind of text. We miss “the whole counsel of God” if we neglect various forms of biblical literature, the multiple portraits of God. Worship requires a blend of the infinite attributes of God — focusing appropriately on God’s majesty, humility, wrath, grace, hiddenness, ambiguity, love, hate, mercy, creativity, holiness, power, suffering, immanence, transcendence, beauty, glory, and mystery.
The whole point of a sermon is to bring forth God as the subject and object of our praise. Genuine praise of God involves all our emotions and needs, not by focusing on ourselves, but by proclaiming God’s truth and God’s attributes and actions on our behalf. Only when we see God as God truly is can we know ourselves aright — and then we can respond with offerings of praise.

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Paramore - Idle Worship (Official Audio)
Standing here like I'm supposed to say something
Don't hold your breath, I never said I'd save you, honey
And I don't want your money
If I was you I'd run from me or rip me open
You'll see you're not the only one who's hopeless

Be sure to put your faith in something more
I'm just a girl and you're not as alone as you feel
We all got problems, don't we?
We all need heroes, don't we?
But rest assured there's not a single person here who's worthy

La, la, la, la, la, la, la
Don't let me let you down

Hey, baby I'm not your superhuman
And if that's what you want
I hate to let you down
I got your hopes up
Now I got you hoping
That I'm gonna be the one that let you down

Oh, it's such a long and awful lonely fall
Down from this pedestal that you keep putting me on
What if I fall on my face?
What if I make a mistake?
If it's okay a little grace would be appreciated

Remember how we used to like ourselves?
What little light that's left, we need to keep it sacred
I know that you're afraid to let all the dark escape you
But we could let the light illuminate these hopeless places

La, la, la, la, la, la, la
Just let me let you down

Hey, baby I'm not your superhuman
And if that's what you want
I hate to let you down
I got your hopes up
Now I got you hoping
But I'm gonna be the one that let you down

La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
Oh, no, I ain't your hero
You're wasting all your faith on me
Oh, no, I know where this goes
Think it's safe to say your savior doesn't look a thing like me

La, la, la, la, la, la, la
Don't let me let you down

Hey, baby I'm not your superhuman
And if that's what you want
I hate to let you down
I got your hopes up
Now I got you hoping
But I'm gonna be the one that let you down

Hey, baby I'm not your superhuman
And if that's what you want
I hate to let you down
I got your hopes up
Now I got you hoping
But I'm gonna be the one that let you down

Idle Worship demo at Adobe MAX 2010

Dedicated to all the artists, developers, players, and other people who made Idle Worship possible. Thank you!

Husband. Father. Pastor. Church Planter. Writer. Trying to be more like Jesus each day. Connect With Me: Facebook Email Me: Email
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We tend to think of idolatry as a sin of the past or something in eastern mysticism. Idol worship is contained to those who look to little wooden trinkets, a golden calf, or other images of gods for their needs.
We certainly don’t think we have modern day idols in western culture. But idolatry is surprisingly modern and very prevalent in our culture.
Part of the reason we don’t think about idol worship today is because our definition of idolatry is off. We think idolatry is confined to bowing down to a golden statue in an ancient temple or praying to a wooden trinket. Since we don’t do those things, we assume we don’t have idols.
But we do have modern day idols. Lots of them. They may look different than the idols of the past, but we still practice idolatry today. We are going to look at the 10 most common idolatry examples that are all around us.
Before we can do that we first need to get a better understanding of what an idol actually is. This will help us identify the worship of idols in our own lives.
Because we think of idolatry as an ancient way of worshiping gods we tend to miss the idols in our own life.
Idolatry isn’t confined to worshipping a golden statue or praying to trinkets. It’s much broader than that.
Here’s a helpful definition: An idol is when something or someone becomes more important to us than God.
By that definition even good things can become idols when we make them the ultimate things in our lives. Anything, or anyone, can become an idol if we place the value for that thing/person above our value for God.
In ancient times that would have looked like bowing down to worship a golden statue. That certainly is an example of idolatry.
Modern day idolatry looks different, but it’s still common. Remember, anything that becomes more important to us than God is an idol. And if we are honest, that list is pretty long.
Let’s look at how others are defining modern day idolatry.
Ed Stetzer, in an article called Idolatry Is Alive Today , gives this idolatry definition: Is it that a 12-inch tall piece of wood or bronze can do something bad to us? Or is it that we do something awful to ourselves when we place adoration and attention that should go to God in other things? When it comes to idolatry, the danger is not in an item… it is in us.
Tim Keller, in his book Counterfeit Gods answers what an idol is this way: An idol is anything more important to you than God, anything that absorbs your heart and imagination more than God, and anything that you seek to give you what only God can give.
So, what is an idol? What is idolatry? An idol is something that we have placed above God. Anything that is more important to us than God is an idol.
Idolatry is alive and well today, and all human beings are prone to have idols in our lives.
Let’s take a closer look at what the Bible says about idolatry.
We are only going to take a brief look at what the Bible says about idol worship. If you want a more in-depth look check out my article on Idolatry in the Bible: Idolatry In The Bible (the important truth you need to know)
To put it concisely, the Bible doesn’t say anything positive about idol worship. It is
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