My Heart of Worship

My heart is longing to worship today. I love days when I just want more of God in my life. I wish I could say it was like that every day! 


I've been thinking about worship since a conversation at our lifegroup last night. We've been learning how to study the Bible, particularly how to study the Bible within the context that it was written and finding the deeper, true meaning. Our study this week took us to Psalms where we got a little sidetracked. Psalms is all about worship...through every emotion we experience and many different styles of worship.


Yep, you guessed it. We got sidetracked into that age-old church-splitting discussion of worship style. If you've been in church more than once or twice, you've heard the discussion. "We don't sing enough hymns." "We sing too many hymns." "The music is too loud." "The music is too slow." "The words repeat too much"....and on and on and on the discussion goes. In a church of 4000, there are 4000 opinions of how the "worship" should be done. 


I think "worship pastor" must be one of the hardest jobs in the world. 


I once heard someone say that the current style of worship music reminds her of a child saying, "Mom, mom, mom, mom, mom" over and over and over, and it felt disrespectful to God to continue saying the same thing over and over again. 


I decided to carry that analogy out a little and apply my newfound hermeneutics skills and see where it takes me.... 


I'm a mom. And I remember when my kids were little and the long days of hearing "mom! mom! mom!" all day long. Usually when they were saying my name over and over it was because I was not listening the first time. It was one of those days where I was sidetracked or daydreaming or tired or preoccupied, and they would have to call my name several times before I realized they were calling me. Or sometimes I was paying attention, but they were just having a day where they needed me more than another day. 


I am not God. God does not have days when he's sidetracked or daydreaming or tired or preoccupied. When I call God's name, he hears me. (Ps 139:4 says Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord.)


On those long tiring days I would sometimes think, "If I hear 'mom' one more time, I'm gonna scream!" And then one of those little blondes would come in the kitchen and say, "Mom?" and when I turned to look into the shining eyes and cute smile and hear, "I love you mommy", my heart would melt, and I was forever grateful to be blessed to be a mommy. 


I am certain that God never tires of hearing us say, "God, I love you." Nor does He tire of hearing us say, "God, I need you." or "God help me". 


Revelation 4:8 says, Each of the four living creatures had six wings and was covered with eyes all around, even under his wings. Day and night, they never stop saying: "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come". 


On the days when my kids were calling my name with a bad attitude in their heart, I would send them to their room until they could come out and be nice. Over and over again if needed until they changed their heart. I always said, and still say, "It's not so much what you say, but how you say it". 


For you see, whether talking about children and parenting or music and worship, it all comes down to attitude and where your heart is. I know there are times where I need to send myself to my room and stay there until I can come to God with  a heart of worship. For it doesn't matter so much to God what I say in worship, but in how I say it. 

I think I will start a blog!

I decided today that I would start a blog. I was inspired by Jackie Sill, whom I have not yet met, but enjoyed reading her blog. I am looking forward to meeting this member of CCV.

Since I lived all of my life in the Snoqualmie Valley in Washington, and recently moved to the San Gabriel Valley in California to be a part of Christ's Church of the Valley, I thought Valley2Valley would be an appropriate name!

I look forward to sharing my thoughts on the changes in my life! And boy has life changed since last Christmas!