For: The Institute Of Contemporary And Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt (ICEWS, eb 08 )
I see so many elements of ‘being awake’ as a good metaphor to the worship lifestyle and leadership, so will use that as a hook on which to hang this all.
Awake: to the foundation of worship.
We were designed to worship God and reflect His image. When God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, created the world, we were invited into the eternal, circular dance of relationship with the Trinity. Even with this divine invitation, we see our inclination to turn away from the embrace of His love. This causes various levels of ‘sleep’ over our souls, some even to the point of death. Yet still God continues His pursuit toward us by self-revealing as Creator, King, Trinity and Saviour. Through the rescue mission of Jesus, we see the Imago Dei (1) again awakened as His redeemed Sub-creators, Imagebearers, Community Builders and Salvific Storytellers.
Awake: to what worship is
Worship means literally, “acknowledging the worth of something or someone. It means recognising and saying that something or someone is worthy of praise.” (2)
Worship is a living act, which is only possible because God loved us first. (3) He is always the initiator, we are always the responders. He is the always the giver, we are the recipients. He is God, we are not.
As we learn the sacrifice, surrender and lifestyle of worship, we see that worship is also what makes us fully human. It is reconnecting, through Jesus, to the creational and redemptive Biblical Story. (4) It is something that He has called us to live out as individuals, but also as a redemptive community of followers. (5)
There are echoes of His voice, speaking to us in our sleepy state of consciousness, and we hear the whisper increase in volume in our search for justice, in the quest for spirituality, in our deep-seeded longing for relationship and in the yearning for beauty that throbs in every human heart. An awakened worshipper will begin to join His story to reclaim these aspects of His nature in our world. (6)
Awake: to the power of music and the arts
We will be calling people out of various states of brokenness in thousands of different ways to allow truth to reveal Himself. Using every creative tool available to us, we will give voice to hope and justice, re-shaping of culture, through the power of the Gospel encounter. We will open the way for the story to be re-told and re-framed for our day.
Song allows “affection to be expressed and thoughts affirmed”. (7) It also carries the power to educate our hearts and minds. We see much song expression in the Bible. It gives witness to the salvation story, telling of the acts of God. “They expressed their belief in salvation in lives of prayer and obedience, social structures of justice and compassion, and a moral life that honoured their core identity, male and female, as the image of God. It covers all of economics and politic, science and geography, literature and arts, work and family, body and neighbourhood.” ( 8 )
Through-out history, singing has been a unifying act for participating together. Music is an art-form that is significantly the primary language of our culture. It carries revolutionary power if we are awake to it.
Awake: to imagination and explanation
As worship artisans, (9) we give space to allow flourishing imagination.
In the life of the kingdom, (where everything originates and depends upon what we cannot see and is worked out in what we can see), imagination and explanation cannot get along without each other.
“Explanation pins things down so that we can handle and use them – obey and teach, help and guide.
Imagination opens things up so that we can grow into maturity – worship and adore, exclaim and honour, follow and trust.” (10) When the Story is given robust and healthy expression, the two work in graceful synchronicity.
Awake: as leaders
As spiritual leaders we have the privilege and responsibility to disconnect from unhealthy cultural perspectives, and reconnect with solid theologically-based understanding. (11) We recognise we live in one sacred world, in the mysterious mix of brokenness and beauty, and we are part of God’s recovery mission. If we are wide awake, we will be approaching this wholistically with heart and head, hands and feet, orienting our whole lifestyle to honouring God.
Awake: as life-long learners
It is important for us to be life-long learners. We are always to seek understanding to our faith. We need to be creatively exploring fresh ways to connect the people we lead in this kingdom story. As the dominant language of the Holy Spirit is through story, we allow the Story to bring out the childlike in us – we venture in as expectant, wondering, responsive, delighted discover-ers, not approaching as experts.
Awake: as Kingdom participants
We intentionally make space for liminal moments, when the kingdom intersection of heaven and earth is present. We integrate the mysterious mix of brokenness and beauty, of joy and grief, of pain and healing. We ‘realise and extend creation through human re-enactment’. (12)
Through every gift we have been given, we release the freedom for each unique, redemptive, creative voice to be heard in our community. We expect the Spirit to continue to uncap new expressions which will re-cover the story for this generation, and those to come.
Awake: to the past, present and shaping future
We are to engage with the past, live fully in the present and look to the future. We intentionally grasp the pivotal, ongoing salvation action of God in history. We join with creation’s longing to express the beauty, greatness and goodness of God. We do this through thought and emotion, using Scripture, prayer, rituals, silence, stories and symbols integrating the best wisdom of the past. This is to shape the way we craft our emerging forms. We will embrace the value of both the formal and informal expressions, building avenues of honour inside and outside the faith community.
1. The image of God
2. NT Wright, Simply Christian, p 124
3. 1 John 4:19
4. Luke 10:27
5. “We grow, when we worship. We shrink as a human being when we give that same total worship to anything or anyone else.” NT Wright, Simply Christian, p 127
6. see Fully Human Response blog
7. Dan Wilt, What is Worship DVD
8. As we see with Moses and the Israelites. Eugene H. Peterson, Christ Plays In Ten Thousand Places p 180. 2005 Hodder and Stoughton, London
9. Dan Wilt, The Worship Artisan Article
10. Eugene Peterson, Subversive Spirituality, p134. 1997 Regent College Publishing
11. Romans 12:1,2
12. Levinson, Creation and the Persistence of Evil, p xxi
God’s Generous Rule (Essentials Blue Fall 08)
18 Oct 2008 3 Comments
by Di in ICEWS eb 2008, Recent Comments Tags: Dan Wilt, Essentials Blue 08, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course, St Stephen's University
For: The Institute Of Contemporary And Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt (ICEWS, eb 08)
Recently, at our National Gathering, Greg Trainor led us all through some excellent teaching on the Kingdom of God.
For example, his succinct phrase for the Kingdom of God was God’s generous rule.
He talked about the arrival of His generous rule through the Mission of Jesus in His message and ministry. We heard strong emphasis on the good news being the future has come into the present, and the age to come has dawned. Greg also taught about the gathering of the divine community, to live out the life of the Kingdom, which he named a preview or display community.
This language ‘God’s generous rule’ being put on display by a community loving Him, (through a ‘display community’) was a new expression catching my attention. Maybe these phrases have been around for ages, but Greg’s descriptions were brimming with new life and empowered livability for me.
Since then, I haven’t been able to let it go. I knew it was having its effect on me, and on those around me. It was re-capturing the reality of the words Jesus taught “The Kingdom of God has come near to you.” (Luke 10: 8-9)
It painted a different picture.
It opened a door to a new way of thinking.
It unfolded a whole dynamic of engaging with the Kingdom ‘at hand’
I was beginning to see and experience afresh, the power of new language unlocking new understanding.
This week in our Essentials course, where we are bumping up against even more expansive teaching from NT Wright, and Dan Wilt, along with other contributors, (including robust, honest, theological discussions in the ‘classroom’).
Then, Dan hits us with a challenge at the close of this week.
He acknowledges the centrality of the Kingdom of God in all the teachings of Jesus, as well as in our theological understanding within the Vineyard movement.
With a twinkle in his eye, Dan urged us, to enter into ‘a challenge’ for a short time.
He asked us to replace all our ‘kingdom language’ with this phrase, ‘new creation’.
So instead of our prayers being filled with ‘Let Your Kingdom come,” Dan has encouraged us to replace kingdom language with ‘new creation’ language.
Eg. “Lord let Your new creation break into this moment…” or “ this is God’s new creation activity happening among us …”
When we do kingdom actions, he challenged us to try something different…and call them new creation actions.
Eg. When we forgive, we are enacting an age to come.
As we are living in the new creation, Dan’s focus sharpens the use of that language in our world, knowing nothing is outside the reach of God’s new creation.
The ‘Dan-challenge’ caused me to reflect on what’s just happen since our Gathering.
I know engaging with the new kingdom language Greg gave us, (ie.the ‘generous rule of God’) transformation began in me.
I found my prayers formed out of a bedrock of God’s generous rule already at work.
I found myself delighfully care-free to pray in situations, with people, that in the past may have intimidated me.
I discovered my increased awareness of God’s kindness and goodness being present meant there was much less anxiety or fear. It meant I was living in an air of heightened expectation of His involvement.
I noticed the new language assisted to ‘see’ from a different perspective and my heart followed in new ways. I could give examples, but this blog is getting too long!
Good signs! I suspect time will tell whether this shift in language has changed the outworking of faith in concrete ways, as well as theological re-shaping.
So, I’m in! I’m jumping into this challenge…