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My God, My Treasure
At its core, worship is all about the heart. It’s been said that worship isn’t something you do, it’s something you mean. It’s an attitude before it’s an action. It’s about how we regard this amazing God of ours. It’s what’s inside. Jesus told a two-sentence story that illustrates this so well:
“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.” (Matthew 13:44 (NIV))
Wow. Pretty extravagant behavior, isn’t it? But Jesus isn’t just teaching us to sell all our stuff (I know plenty of folks who have “sold all they had” for something!). He’s telling us to look at the man’s heart-motive. His unreserved behavior was the result of the compelling conviction: “This treasure is worth more than everything else I have.” That’s where the heart of worship lies.
The Riches Of God
For a worshiper of Jesus Christ, the story of redemption is a present reality. God's heroic battle for His children is a premise upon which we build our lives. And the spoils our Victor has won for us are many and varied and precious. But His greatest gift was the actual goal of His fight: that the dwelling of God might be with man. That's it! The greatest gift God gives us, the gift above all gifts, is the gift of Himself. Emmanuel - God with us! Fellowship, relationship, oneness with Him is the "richest of fare" - these are the riches of God.
We who have stepped out of the "theory" of the gospel into its glorious reality have been plucked from the pit of sin and judgment and eternally established in a completely new and wonderful relationship with God through Jesus Christ. We have "tasted and seen" the goodness of God for ourselves.
First Loves
How tragic, then, when we forget that the One who IS the good news also spoke to us of first loves and weeds that choke out the seed of God. How imperative it is that we guard our hearts, and that Christ remain "set apart in our hearts" and forever be our unrivaled treasure, our first love!
The story has been told that a successful businessman was sharing how he had come to be a God-follower. Although the 50-something year-old was now at the pinnacle of his career, he had actually found great financial and professional success at a very young age. "But," he continued, "when God called me into His service in my mid-twenties, I walked away from it all and gave it up in order to follow wherever Christ wanted me to go."
As the expected awe and inspiration filled the room, a lone voice in the back said plainly, "I dare you to do it again."
Our unrivaled treasure. Our first love. This is where our self-examination has to start. Whether it's a personal self-examination or a pastoral evaluation of worship on the churchwide level. So let's ask the right questions. Let's look for the right answers.
It’s not found in the bass guitar. It’s not found in a particular liturgy or style. It's not about how loud, how long, how many or how much! In fact, it's probably not as much about Sunday as we think it is. It's about a heart that, in its joy, would sell all it has to gain the treasure that is its God.
...I dare you to do it again.
