Undeception

“God desperately wants an intimate relationship with you!”

Relax, I’m not going to spend the entire post bagging on this claim and those who make it. I will spend the greater part of this post explaining the problem that many Christians have with that statement, but you might be surprised where I end up — I certainly am.

Recently a friend pointed out how frustrated he was with this particular evangelical meme. I, too, have been annoyed by just such claims before. “Cerebral” Christians like myself are usually critical of those who simply trust what they think they know about God, since we have – not infrequently correctly – identified many of their beliefs as erroneous understandings that are sometimes counterproductive to the Christian mission. Surely no small part of the disgust that many feel toward those who typically speak of an “intimate relationship” with God issues from a sense that these evangelicals are stereotypically not as close to God as they seem to think they are: for these, daily prayer times, emotional worship services, and a commitment to avoiding “the world” seem to be the central components and hallmarks of a robust “relationship” with God, but this more often manifests as a general out-of-touch heaven-mindedness. In effect, it all sounds so make-believe, and a disappointing deficit of healthy fruit this type of “relationship” seems to produce bears that out.

Many of us shake our heads when we hear someone make the above “intimate relationship” claim because it seems so self-centered. In contrast, biblical worship consists of more than nice, positive feelings about God, immaculate and unquestioned doctrine, a disgust with grave moral sins, and the fond, firm conviction that we are buddies with Jesus. It is also characterized by a resolve to whittle away at the small niggling sins, such as bad attitudes, selfishness, gluttony, judgmentalism, etc. and to develop Christ-like attitudes such as a genuinely passionate compassion that begins with a profound awareness of the most tangible needs among humanity. The Gospels present Jesus’ teachings as preoccupied with righteousness, which, far from merely harping on the importance of some ritually distinctive and esoteric moral code, he instead fulfilled by spending the rest of his time meeting the physical needs of the destitute and railing against unproductive religiosity. Consulting the life of Jesus as displayed in the Gospels, we come away with the impression that both personal holiness and active participation in somehow bringing about God’s ideal world order of peace and love are the most recognizable characteristics of God’s kingdom. And yet evangelicals are, as a group, among the least concerned with meeting physical needs among Christians, due to an unnerving conviction that what sick, poor, and hungry people really need is to repent and get in on that “intimate relationship” with God.

Another important reason some Christians look askance at the statement in question is that the claim is being made that God is pursuing a relationship with us in a way that is not at all likely if we understand “intimate relationship” in the same way we mean that phrase in human terms. However immanent we believe He is, God is undeniably also transcendent, and not likely to engage in even the most metaphorical sort of “pillow talk” with us, except perhaps through media such as Scripture or through the encouragement of one another. He interfaces with us in a much less direct fashion than we are taught to approach Him; the statement should perhaps be more accurately phrased, “God wants you to pursue a relationship with Him in which you want desperately to be intimate with Him.” He is God, so if He really did “desperately” want a relationship with us, surely He’d be more successful at performing His side of the bargain. As a frank Catholic friend of mine likes to point out, “What’s up with this ‘personal relationship’ deal? I can’t pull up a chair and have a chat with Him like I can with a human being. I can’t hear Him talking the same way He can hear me.” It seems one-sided: He knows every thought, emotion, and unseen desire of ours, but we strain to discern His thoughts about everything relevant to the living out of our lives, our future plans, etc. There’s something about the “intimate relationship” expression that would have to be considered metaphorical in a way that doesn’t seem to be recognized among those who are wont to use the expression.

However…

Surely it is telling that some of the kindest and most godly people I know would speak of their relationship with God in just this way. As I become more convinced that Jesus modeled our ideal relationship with God, I begin to see that our pursuit of holiness and a singleminded determination to actualize the Kingdom of God through our righteous acts should indeed be motivated and characterized by a desire for “intimacy” with God in the sense of a oneness of purpose and a carefully cultivated love for His ways. I have come to the conclusion that there is something important missing when we go about doing good deeds and fulfilling righteousness without a personal dimension and a recognition of the initiative God takes with us, calling us to understand what MacDonald called God’s “fatherheart” and thereby motivating our actions beyond rote legalism. It’s not enough to either just believe the way God wants us to believe or to do what God wants us to do — our righteousness should be undertaken as a response to God’s love for us and an attempt to develop the love in ourselves that motivates God Himself.

I’m not really talking to anyone but myself in this post. I am a mostly “cerebral” Christian who has recently come under the conviction that God is indeed pursuing me in ways beyond the ethical or the intellectual. He wants us to participate in His plans for the world, behaviors and attitudes that aren’t simply a divine demand motivated by abstract principles, but are foremost an expression of His love for us. When I recognize God as the Father who revealed His Word to us in the person of Jesus, who desires all sin systematically and surgically purged from my life so that I can be ever closer to Him, how can I come to any conclusion other than that God does desperately desire for intimacy with us?

Yes, granted, it’s a less blithe and more costly brand of “intimacy” than is often conceived by those who use the expression above (and we are right to call them on this), but it’s the kind of relationship I recognize that I most desperately desire and need.

The (sometimes bewilderingly) controversial theologian Brian McLaren wrote an article in a newsletter (I think) in which he enunciates his take on where we are and where we should go in modern worship music. He addresses it as “An open letter to songwriters” (direct pdf link), and presents some well-stated observations and requests in his typically humble way. Here are a couple excerpts:

Let me make this specific: too many of our lyrics are embarrassingly personalistic, about Jesus and me. Personal intimacy with God is such a wonderful step above a cold, abstract, wooden recitation of dogma. But it isn’t the whole story. In fact—this might shock you—it isn’t, in the emerging new postmodern world, necessarily the main point of the story. A popular worship song I’ve heard in many venues in the last few years (and which we sing at Cedar Ridge, where I pastor) says that worship is “all about You, Jesus,” but apart from that line, it really feels like worship, and Christianity in general, has become “all about me, me, me.”

It’s embarrassing to admit, but some of us are thinking right now, “If spiritual songwriting is not about deep, personal intimacy with God, what else is there?”

The Bible is full of songs that wail, the blues but even bluer, songs that feel the agonizing distance between what we hope for and what we have, what we could be and what we are, what we believe and what we see and feel. The honesty is disturbing, and the songs of lament don’t always end with a happy Hallmark-Card-Precious-Moments cliché to try to fix the pain. Sometimes I think we’re too happy: the only way to become happier is to become sadder, by feeling the pain of the chronically ill, the desperately poor, the mentally ill, the lonely, the aged and forgotten, the oppressed minority, the widow and orphan. This pain should find its way into song, and these songs should find their way into our churches. The bitter will make the sweet all the sweeter; without the bitter, the sweet can become cloying, and too many of our churches feel, I think, like Candyland. Is it too much to ask that we be more honest? Since doubt is part of our lives, since pain and waiting and as-yet unresolved disappointment are part of our lives, can’t these things be reflected in the songs of our communities? Doesn’t endless singing about celebration lose its vitality (and even its credibility) if we don’t also sing about the struggle?

McLaren lists five neglected topics/themes and six “stylistic observations and requests”; of the latter, my favorite is, “Can our lyricists start reading more good poetry, good prose, so they can be sensitized to the powers of language, the grace of a well-turned phrase, the delight of a freshly discovered image, the prick or punch or caress or jolt that is possible if we wrestle a little harder and stretch a little farther for the word that really wants to be said from deep within us?”

Good stuff, hopefully altogether uncontroversial, and good to hear from someone as influential as he is among the next generation of songwriters.

ElShaddai Edwards has tagged me with the Weird Worship meme, in which I am supposed to come up with five worship songs with strange, perplexing, or otherwise – well, weird lyrics. My peeps know I’m highly critical of worship songs in general, but this has been more difficult than I thought to come up with songs whose lyrics I might characterize as “weird”, as opposed to simply badly written, wrong-focused, or theologically errant, or which there are a host of songs I might mention. But here I go…

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When the Church of Jesus

When the church of Jesus shuts its outer door,
Lest the roar of traffic drown the voice of prayer:
May our prayers, Lord, make us ten times more aware
That the world we banish is our Christian care.

If our hearts are lifted where devotion soars
High above this hungry suff’ring world of ours:
Lest our hymns should drug us to forget its needs,
Forge our Christian worship into Christian deeds.

Lest the gifts we offer, money, talents, time,
Serve to salve our conscience to our secret shame:
Lord, reprove, inspire us by the way you give;
Teach us, dying Savior, how true Christians live.

- F. Pratt Green (#319, Baptist Hymnal)

I’ve been musing about this for years and have finally decided to put it down in electronic pen and paper. It concerns something I’m afraid is taken for granted by many people in the “worship movement”. I can imagine some who know me thinking that I’m just trying to justify what the generous would call my “conservative style of worship”, or what the more critical might suspect is my rebellion against a perfectly unassailable institution that I happen to have trouble participating in because – well, I must not feel enough love for God within my bones.

At ten years of age, my family stepped into the equivalent of a post-Yorktown environment at our new Baptist church: the decisive battle had been fought in the War on Hymns, but the sedition of obstinancy fomented by over-aggression was still stewing. I was a little too young to notice or care about the debate and its significance; all I knew was that we didn’t sing as many hymns as at my previous church, and people seemed to be more “into” the singing, what with holy hands and vocal interjections lifted spontaneously and frequently. I recognized the musical style as more modern (the drums), and for what it was worth, I approved of that.

The controversy had repercussions for the next 10 years at least, with Loyalists whispering among themselves, even occasionally rounding themselves up for a sortie against our progressive leadership. As I grew, my thinking began to echo the prevailing sentiments, “What is the deal here? It’s just a different style of music, people! Get over it! Get your fix of hymns and southern gospel on the radio.” I sang along, enjoying a good lyric and melody here and there, and sincerely praising God when I thought about it hard enough. When I was older, I got to where I played piano and keyboard for the services. Lacking the talent of singing and playing at the same time, I was kept from singing somewhat, since I was genuinely occupied with something that required a bit of thought, but I always prayed that what I was playing would glorify God and allow others to worship Him.

Then I went to college. A Pentecostal college. I joined the “symphonic band”, which was not interested in playing good music, but rather sought to compete with the four or five worship choirs on campus. We played such worthy symphonic masterpieces as “Majesty”, “Hallelujah! Jesus Is Alive”, “Let the Veil Down, Let the Praise Go Up”, and “Enemy’s Camp”. I had the opportunity of playing in no less than forty different Pentecostal churches across the Eastern U.S., and what I saw increasingly sickened me. Everyone talked about how important worship was, but their lives didn’t show much fruit. I began to wonder what the big hype about “worship” was.

The conviction was birthed in me that “worship” is not something you sing, but something you do. We have trained our ears so that when we hear the words “worship” or “praise”, we automatically think of singing. Yet singing “I worship You” with all the meaning and fervor you can muster no more accomplishes actual worship than saying “I wash you” to your car actually cleans it. Even in our relationships with other people, saying “I love you”, while admittedly a sugar rush for awhile, can quickly become meaningless if not accompanied by loving action. It is the Parmesan cheese which falls on the plate next to the spaghetti that children will spend too much time trying to eat while leaving the noodles and sauce untouched; it’s the crunchies invariably accompanying the fish platters from Captain D’s (or Long John Silver’s) that tempt the immature to neglect the actual meat.

I’m convinced that there is a pervasive, unconscious belief that good worship covers a multitude of sins. If the first and greatest commandment is to sing powerful praise and worship songs, then surely a generous helping of Redman or Tomlin will make up for bad attitudes gone unchecked, the nursing of unhealthy habits, and outright disobedience. Too many times have I heard someone say, “Boy, I really had a bad week! I can’t wait for worship Sunday.” Notice that by “worship”, these people mean “singing”, not the acceptable act of worship that requires living out a life of discipline and sacrifice that might well have spared them the bad week in the first place.

What does biblical praise and worship music look like? You’ll be hard-pressed to show me that singing was as integral to the Christian’s life in the first century as it is now. Paul mentions it all of three times (1 Cor 14:26; Eph 5:19; Col 3:16). Moreover, in both of those passages it is quite clear that Paul was expecting “songs, hymns, and spiritual songs” to be sung by the believers to one another every bit as much as the singing done “in [their] hearts” to the Lord, “for the strengthening of the church.”

This reflects the Psalms, which show no shortage of those whose sole purpose was to instruct or exhort the human hearers to praise God; only in the occasional (but oft paraded) example is it mentioned that this was to be done with music. When the Psalmist said “Praise the Lord” and “Hallelujah”, those were not his acts of one-on-One worship, but acts of convocation, calling his fellow Israelites to recognize God’s glory. The acts of one-on-One worship consisted of more than bland and emotive ejaculations (“I love you”, “You make me want to dance”), but were responses to specific acts or attributes of God; sometimes they were requests. In short, biblical music was intended as “horizontal” at least as much as it was “vertical”; that which was horizontal was didactic and exhortative, the vertical was specific and testimonial, and both necessarily consisted of doctrinal, not simply emotive, content.

How much does it matter? Well, do you not think that Paul would find the modern church derelict in its duty to itself and others by allowing such a high percentage of our (mostly doctrinally anemic or questionable) songs, hymns, and spiritual songs to be self-absorbed and all about one’s own feelings about God? I mean, let’s face it – some of us are afraid that if we pull away from our one-on-One songs to sing songs to one another that we’re going to miss out on some of that “sweet worship time” for which many of us inappropriately value our Sunday services the most. Why should we place so much emphasis on something Paul spent little time advocating?

Paul does talk about praising God and offering Him our gratitude, which can be set to music quite well, and Hebrews 13:15 refers to a “sacrifice of praise” that we in the New Covenant offer in place of the animal sacrifices – but how much of a sacrifice is it to stand there singing songs you love to sing anyway?

The worship and gratitude we show by sacrificing ourselves and to proclaiming His truth to one another should occupy our thoughts every bit as much as the song time of our worship services. The very existence of the epistles is a result of Paul’s enormous commitment to spreading the truth revealed to him, and this, for him, was a sacrifice in every since of the word; it is his service to God through his ministry to the Church that has lasted two millennia, not his times of one-on-One worship. Offering ourselves by living lives that are disciplined and obedient to the tasks He sets before us in the service of others is the true heart of worship. Yes, the crunchies are good, but Daddy didn’t pay for your meal to have you neglect the fish in favor of them; you’re not going to get nourished, and Daddy will have wasted money meant for your sustenance on what ended up simply as a fun experience.

So what does real worship look like?

Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. (Romans 12:1, 2 NIV)

(Personal note #1: “Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.”)

(Personal note #2: On review, I feel compelled to commend the music team of which I am a part, which has made great strides in this respect and has consciously avoided most of the pitfalls I described above.)