Blog

Rehearsing the Gospel Story Pt. 2

Ok, so it’s taken a few months, but here’s the “what does this look like” post I promised.

No excuses, but if you’ve been around my church lately, you know it’s kinda been a roller coaster as of late, and keeping you all up to date has not been at the top of my list.

So, let’s walk through a Sunday morning service and see how this whole thing plays out, shall we? (The 4 parts of the Gospel story arc are in bold, see the last post if you don’t remember). This was our 2/8/15 Sunday service.

Creation – Celebration of the Magnificent Creator God
Call to Worship – We begin and end each service with scripture. The verses read here are about pointing our hearts and mind to the greatness of God, and to turn our attention to corporate worship. Some days, this is the first thing we do in church, so don’t be late!
Song – How Great is Our God – Again, the focus is on who God is. Holiness, greatness, glory, creator, (and similar) are all adjectives we like to explore during this first section.
Welcome of Guests – We don’t really announce much here anymore. This is more about welcoming people in the joy of the Lord and giving a few next steps to our guests.

Fall – In light of the Greatness of God, we see ourselves as fallen sinners
Prayer of Confession – We know that while forgiven for our sins, we need to remember that we still fall short of God (humility) so we confess our sins to Him. Many times, we will also do a song here, but this week, just the prayer (from the Worship Sourcebook, below).

Eternal God, you do not change.
You have revealed yourself to us in your Word.
You call us to worship you in spirit and in truth.
But we confess that we often worship
not your true self but who we wish you to be.
We too often ask you to bless what we do
rather than seeking to do what you bless.
Forgive us for seeking concessions
when we should be seeking guidance.
Forgive us when our worship shapes you into what we want instead of shaping us into what you want.
Help us to meet you here, that we might bow
before your unspeakable majesty
and so live for you now and ever, in Christ. Amen.
Redemption – God has a plan to forgive and redeem fallen humanity!
Song – At the Cross (Love Ran Red) – We sing the story of the cross, where God’s love was poured out for a sinful people so that we could now be in relationship to Him. “There’s a place where mercy reigns and never dies.” We are redeemed!
Message – The message won’t always be in this spot in the service, but this week’s message was a little hard to place. Basically, it was about our response in worship to the redemption of God.
Restoration – Because of Christ’s sacrifice, we are now restored to right place with God
Communion – what better picture of restoration than communion? Not only did Christ sacrifice Himself for us, but now His Spirit dwells inside of us empowering us to live a life of Restoration.
Song – Holy Holy Holy – Some songs work in multiple categories, this one would be great at the beginning as well. We sang this during communion, keeping our focus on God, and not on us (where it tends to drift all too often). I am also careful to reference each member of the Trinity every Sunday (we are Trinity Baptist Church, after all) which is more about the formation process (see other posts).
Song – Revelation Song – Part of the “restoration” area in our service is a looking to the future. This could include a sending on mission, a mention of upcoming service opportunities, or looking towards our ultimate future in Christ. Sometimes, you will see the word “Restoration” substituted with “Consummation.” This song is about the final consummation of the world when Christ returns.
Benediction – We begin and end each service with Scripture. Here is a final Scripture usually said over the congregation as a blessing or as a commissioning for the work of the Gospel.
So, there you have it. In under 700 words even!
Thoughts?
Comments?
I would love to hear them!

Rehearsing the Gospel Story

Well, I know it’s been a bit since where has been an update here, and a lot has happened since I last posted! So, here’s a quick refresher:

1. Worship is our love for something expressed. We worship a lot of things – family, money, possessions, jobs, status, sports, and of course, God. It’s how we align our worship that matters.

2. Formation is the way things and ideas are formed into our hearts and minds primarily through external influences – TV, advertising, education, friends, family, social media. When we let the Holy Spirit, and things of God do the forming, that is when we become more Christlike.

3. Worship Formation is when the practices we use to express our worship to God aid in the formation process

Now, we began to look at what this might look like for our church to actively engage in worship formation and came up with a plan to rehearse the Gospel story each Sunday morning. The framework of the Gospel can be summed up in 4 words:

Creation – A perfect and Holy God creates everything out of nothing.
Fall – Man rejects the life God offered and chose our own way, leading to a broken and hurting creation.
Redemption – God offered a way for man to be right with God by sacrificing His Son, Jesus.
Restoration – Through Jesus, man is now able to know God and all of creation will one day be restored to its original, intended form.

So, if you go to our church, you will be able to trace each of these areas in every Sunday service from now on. We will express our worship to God through Scripture readings, testimony, prayer, preaching, and song. Each plays a distinct but important part of our worship, and each plays a part in our formation.

When we talk about “seeing lives changed by the Gospel” we need to understand that “lives” starts with ME. Just because you know God does not mean that you don’t still need Gospel transformation every single day. So, we rehearse this Gospel story each and every Sunday because we know that we need a constant refresher on the story of God in order to carry that story to a broken and hurting world.

Next post – what does this actually look like? Coming soon.

Worship Formation

Well, seeing as I had to try 3 times to use the right password for my blog, it has been a while since I have posted last!

Busy summer, broken computer, new baby, and life in general has slowed this train down a bit.

However, here I am, ready to finally post defining “Worship Formation” as I see it. In many ways, this post has been quite a few years in the making, and I am so glad to be able to put words to what has been in my heart for so long. At the same time, I realize that a definition is just one small part of this journey, and I’m still at the beginning of discovering (along with all of you) what this might look like.

So, while I took care to define worship very broadly, as expressing our love for God in our every moments of every day, here I will narrow that view to specific acts we do to worship God: prayer, singing, devotional Bible reading, corporate worship, communion, etc.

Worship Formation then, is simply the process by which our worship practices form our hearts and our minds and in turn, our lives. In fact, there’s an old Latin phrase I found (showing that this is not a new idea) “lex orandi lex credendi lex vivendi” or how we pray is how we believe is how we live.

That is so true, isn’t it?

You can tell much about a person’s beliefs concerning the nature of God just in how they pray. For instance, if you believe that God still holds your sin over your head, you will continue to pray for forgiveness over sins committed years ago. This person probably has a hard time forgiving themselves for those very acts as well (how we believe is how we live). On the flip side of this, you can engage in practices that will shape your beliefs to deepen truth, expand your knowledge of God, and allow us to live out the Gospel in even greater ways.

Applying this to the local church (which has been the point of all of this, really), we need to discover practices for corporate worship that shape our beliefs and in turn direct our lives. Going back to prayer, if we pray corporately that God forgives our every sin, then throws them as far as the east is from the west, and we remind one another that we are released of that sin, we can then know the truth in scripture of the power of Jesus over our past misdeeds. Then, we are freed to live without the burden of our transgressions holding us back (pray, believe, live).

Makes sense, right?

This fall, at Trinity, we have a tremendous opportunity. Our compressed, three service schedule is moving to a more relaxed two service model. With the extra time in our services, we will begin to discover this together in greater ways. We will be able to engage in practices far beyond singing a few songs and hearing a sermon (while we will still do both!) that help shape our beliefs as we reenact the Gospel story each and every Sunday. The hope in all of this is that our hearts will fill up with the truth of Jesus Christ in new and fulfilling ways giving us fuel to live.

From here on out, this blog will move from theory to documentary on how we fumble through all of this and learn as we go. Please continue to support this writing with your thoughts and observations, or, better yet, join us at Trinity in Mentor, OH beginning Sunday, September 7th, it is going to be an awesome ride.

Ready to go?

Formation Defined

While “worship” is used frequently in church circles, I find that the word “formation” occurs with much less frequency, although I believe that is starting to change. I do not feel very qualified to make an adequate definition, but will attempt to do so here.

I will actually address formation in two stages, the first being what formation is generally speaking, then I will specifically address spiritual formation.

Formation is something that happens to us pretty much every moment of every day. In fact, as you are reading this blog, something is being formed in you (hopefully something good!) From the television shows we watch to the songs we listen to advertisements, and even who we follow on Facebook and Twitter, what we take in forms who we are. It is our choice to pursue after input that forms us in positive ways. As a simple example, I find that people who feel like the world is always against them prefer to be around people who think the world is always against them. They want to stay formed the way they are. In some ways, we all like to hang out with those who think like us, and then we all continue to form each other into our own images.

Somewhat confusing, but it makes sense, right? (Comment below if you’re lost)

Now, spiritual formation is the act of pursuing after input that forms us in a spiritual way, namely into the image of Jesus Christ. After all, our goal as Christians is to become like Christ as we worship Him. Perhaps the most common method of spiritual formation we think of are the spiritual disciplines, or maybe you were simply taught to pray and have a “quiet time.” The word “discipline” can be scary to some people, so let’s attempt to put it into a gentler light.

These are not my words, but I cannot remember the author at this moment (likely Dallas Willard). When we discipline our bodies (exercise) we beat our bodies into submission in order to gain something (health, weight loss, muscle, etc), but when we engage in the spiritual disciplines, we instead create a space where something incredible can be formed within us. How freeing is that? It is not about a hard task we must work at (although we must all the work to happen), but instead about an emptying of the distractions in our lives to make a space for the Spirit of God! Of course, all of this is the work of God that we are welcome to participate in, but it is not for us to transform ourselves or others.

Hopefully that makes sense. Here’s a fantastic article (much longer than this one) if you would like to delve further into the topic. Spiritual Formation: What it is, and How it’s done by Dallas Willard.

Enter into the conversation below and soon we shall begin to work on a definition of worship formation!

Start from the very beginning

that’s a very good place to start.

First, let me apologize for my hiatus, I got a bit crazy there for a while, and now I am back!

When we talk about new or uncommon terms, in this case, “worship formation” it helps to define some of those terms individually before we get into a deeper discussion of what the new meaning might be and how we are going to pursue after those things.

Today, I will attempt to define “worship” and will most likely fail because over the years so many have succeeded at writing incomplete definitions for worship and I think you can now add my name to the list. While it is tempting to provide Webster’s answer for worship, I am going to stick with specifically Christian uses of the word and avoid (however valid it may be) other contexts.

Ok, so here we go.

I have heard numerous definitions of worship over the years, and perhaps the simplest is offered by Pastor Robert Morris from Gateway Church, he says that worship is “love expressed.” I appreciate the simplicity of this definition more than anything else. Of course, this definition applies to any context, but the importance of what he has written here is the word “expressed.” We can “love” many things: peanut butter, The Beatles, gourmet food, but until we express that love some form, worship does not occur. I think we get caught in the trap where we think it is ok not to express our love for God.

“I don’t want to sing, God knows my heart.”
“I don’t know how to pray, so I mostly avoid it.”
“My company is completely secular and doesn’t have anything to do with God.”
(or, my personal favorite)
“Yeah, but, cheering for [insert sports team here] is different than praising God.” (it should be, but I bet this one is backwards!)

Somehow we have allowed ourselves to think that it is acceptable to love God in our “hearts” but not express it! We have settled for such low and disappointing definitions of worship. We cloud our lives with the worship of lower things, expressing love for self, family, money, jobs, sports, technology, and more while continually loving God “in our hearts.”

So, I arrive at a basic, but workable definition: worship is putting our love, hope, and worth in someone or something and then expressing that love. Incomplete? Probably, but it’s a place to start, I suppose.

Humans are made to worship. In many ways, we constantly worship something, and are constantly being formed (more on that in the next post) by what we worship. When God commanded us to not make for ourselves an idol, he knew one day we would have all of the non-statue idols we have today, and knew that we would seek them above Him. It is ok to love and express love to things other than God, but God is always the greatest and ultimate recipient of our love, hope and worth.

John Piper, on his son’s wedding, wrote a poem entitled Love Her More, Love Her Less encouraging his son to love and care for his new bride over everything else on earth, but his worship of God should make his love for even her pale in comparison.

Finally, I’ve included this video below to spark your mind on what it means to worship and destroy the idols in our lives.

Have anything to add or subtract?
Please comment below!

why I began this journey (part 2)

In case you didn’t read post 1, please go there first!
http://daviderlandson.com/2014/04/03/the-journey-begins/

When I was starting in worship leading, we were pretty much coming to the end of this round of the “Worship Wars” (I say this round, because it’s bound to happen again) where people were fighting over what was the appropriate style of music for use in the church. Now, I understand people having different likes and dislikes about music, but, you know what? I’m not going down this path…

Anyway, it has to be about more than music! We keep saying that “worship is a lifestyle” and quoting Romans 12, but I have yet to find more than a handful of people even trying to discern what that means, let alone talking about it. I think there’s some sort of weird assumption that people just know what that means. In fact, people have told me that exact thing – why bother teaching on worship, most people in church already know.

Well, I’m supposed to be the “expert” on worship and I don’t even know!

So, I thought I might actually be on the right track, because I knew I couldn’t be alone. Then, it happened. Dan Wilt (worship leader and teacher) posted this on Twitter:

The future of worship leadership will look very different from our present. Formation leaders will replace Experience leaders.

Could this be what it is really about? It’s not about creating an experience or making beautiful art, but about forming something in ourselves and those around us as we sing and proclaim truth about God. While this deep-embeding of truth, this forming, is happening inside of us, God is receiving great glory and praise and worship!

So it begins.
What does it mean to be a formation leader instead of an experience leader?
What would happen if our congregations are full of passionate worshippers?

I told someone this week I believe that if a church gets worship right: singing, praying, scripture study, life of praise (and more), then that church wouldn’t need to preach on giving or serving or evangelism because that body of worshippers would be an unstoppable force because of their great love for God.

I think we can make this happen.

Photo by Marilyn Peddle Licensed under Creative Commons from Flickr

why I began this journey

I don’t really remember the date this happened, but I do remember what happened.

I was walking into my office at church one morning, and was struck for a brief moment by the sign outside my door that read “worship pastor.” Now, you might not think I should be shocked by this as that is the position I have been assigned, but that day it made me pause.

For quite some time both in paid and unpaid positions, I have been “leading worship” at various churches. Now, this of course, means sing the songs on Sunday mornings (I know it means more than that, but bear with me). That day, however, I was more struck by the word “pastor.”

A pastor is a guide and a shepherd, and I read on that wall plaque that day that it was my job to shepherd my church toward worship, but what I realized that day is that since worship occurs as a lifestyle, maybe my pastoring should focus on a lifestyle of worship.

If people in our churches do not worship God Monday through Saturday, are we really doing our job of pastoring? Now, I know there are other avenues of discipleship people are involved in, but what can we do as worship pastors to form lives of worship in all our hearts?

This is where I started. What do you think? Have you had similar feelings about your ministries? What do you do to worship God in your daily life?

Read post 2 here:
http://daviderlandson.com/2014/04/11/the-journey-part2/

Worship Formation Project

I’m not going to take the time in this blog post to tell the whole story (that will be for another day), but let’s just say that for the past few years, I have felt that God has had me on a journey towards something beyond my typical “job” as a worship leader; more than just leading songs on Sunday morning.

I’ve been doing a ton of praying, reading, talking, and researching, and I believe I am ready to formalize my project towards “worship formation.” I’m actually not even sure if that’s the right term for what I’m pursuing, but that’s at least what I’m using for the time being.

So, here’s where I need your help.
First, if you know worship leaders or formation leaders, please connect them to this blog. I will be posting further thoughts on this subject and would greatly appreciate their input and expertise. I will also be posting surveys and questions, and I will need people to answer them!

Second (really, first), please pray for me! Like I said, I don’t really know where this is going to lead, but I’m very excited for what God might do through this journey.

Finally, please subscribe to this blog so you can stay apprised of what’s going on and give feedback when you can. Just fill out the form at the bottom with your e-mail address and tell your friends.

Thanks for all your help and I hope you will join me!

A Psalm

A simple song to God without any poetic form.

Praise God!
I will praise Him with all that I have.
I will praise Him for He is good and His loving-kindness endures forever.
I will praise Him because He made me, sustains me, and has redeemed me.
Though time and time again I stumble and fall, He reaches down and lifts me up from the pit. He reminds me that my sin is gone because His Son has saved me. When I turn my eyes away from Him, He calls me back and shows me the way to fellowship with Him. All creation will praise God, and I will sing with creation as it worships. The moon and stars shine with His glory; the sun shows His sustaining power. His word goes on forever. The earth and men will pass away, but His word began in eternity past and will go on forever and ever. His people will cry out His praises. Nature will cry out His praises. He has my heart and my soul.
I will praise His name now and forever more.
With everything, I will praise His name.

Loosely inspired by Psalm 103
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=psalm+103&version=ESV

Ephesians 5:18-20

Here is the video from Sunday’s sermon. Below is the full transcript as well if you prefer to read the message. Message begins at 4:20

Ephesians 5:18-20 (ESV)

18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, 19 addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, 20 giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ

I love the Discovery Channel show, Mythbusters. If you’ve never seen it, they take popular myths, urban legends, and movie scenes and test to see if they can happen in reality. For those of you who have seen the show, you know it’s really an excuse to create the biggest explosion possible. So, as matter of introduction today, we are going to do a quick bit of myth busting in these short verses. First, “do not get drunk with wine…” Now, some people like to use this verse to claim that Christians should avoid alcohol consumption. I am not going to make the case either way for that today, but I would like to clear the myth that this verse is calling Christians to abstain from alcohol. If you look back at the passage we studied last week, you discover that Paul is outlining a lifestyle that follows after the example of Christ. Giving up control of your body to a foreign substance can lead you away from the path of godliness, so yes, follow Paul’s command and do not get drunk. The second myth is that “psalms, hymns and spiritual songs” gives a prescription for what songs to sing in church. Now, I looked up all these words in the Greek, and read a bunch of different commentaries, and no one has a definitive answer as to what these words are specifically referring to. So, we can just understand it Paul encouraging us to sing the gamut of church songs, in whatever type or style you want, just sing to the Lord!

Why bust these myths?
Well, if you get stuck on either one of these two myths, you miss the incredible gospel truths contained in this passage, and the real point Paul is trying to make!

Now that that’s done, let’s dig in.

First, if you will remember last week’s message, Kevin discussed Paul’s admonition to be imitators of God and to walk in love. Paul spends the first part of this chapter really just giving a list of things that we are to avoid; the things that come from walking in darkness. In verse 16, Paul tells us to make the best use of our time, and in verse 17, he instructs us away from foolishness and towards the will of God. So, verse 18, when we are told not to get drunk (and I would add that we are not to give our bodies over to any kind of mind-altering substance), it really is just the final item on a long list he began many verses ago. However, just as we saw last week that Paul gave us instruction not just to remove things from our lives, but to replace them, here we see him telling us to instead be filled with the Holy Spirit.

But, what does that mean?

Let me begin by saying that Paul’s main point in this section is for the church to act as Christ would act, and I would contend that being filled with the Holy Spirit is exactly what Christ would do. The Trinity itself is quite a mystery, and I would not say that I have any grasp on the complexities contained there, but I found something very interesting in the writing of Luke. In fact, it’s not just interesting, it’s awesome. In his gospel, he mentions no less than 6 times that Jesus Himself was filled with the power of the Holy Spirit! I always pictured Jesus working on His own power while here on earth, with some conversation with the Father, but in Luke 4:1, we see Jesus was full of the Holy Spirit and that He was led by the Spirit. Now, this isn’t even the best part. Luke writes again in Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” In other words, He is saying, “You know that power that’s been working in me all this time, that incredible miracle-performing, life-transforming power? Yeah, I’m leaving Him with you.” The Good News, the Gospel of Jesus does not just end with the Cross, or even the Resurrection, but in fact the story continues even today as the Spirit that empowered Jesus Himself dwells within and fills each person who surrenders their life to Christ! The fact that we can understand Scripture and hear God’s voice there, we are convicted of sin, we have prayers answered and miracles and incredible life transformation is because Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, is still telling His story today, through us, through the church!

Now, we know that at the point of salvation, when you admit your sin and give your life over to Christ, the old spirit of darkness is gone and then the Spirit of God Himself comes to dwell within us. So, why would Paul tell us to be filled if the Spirit already dwells within? Well, for that, we look at the Greek. The verb used here is in what’s called the present passive imperative tense. Got that? Yeah, me neither. So, I looked it up. Basically, Paul is saying that we are to allow the Spirit of God to constantly take control over our lives, as opposed to allowing something like wine to take control over our faculties. I do not think the Spirit leaves us at any time, but this is more of an additional thought from 4:30 when Paul tells us not to grieve the Holy Spirit, here he says the opposite. Instead of doing things that would grieve the Holy Spirit, do things that allow Him to show His fruit in you. The fruit of course, we see in Galatians – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Unlike spiritual gifts such as teaching, hospitality, shepherding, administration and the like that are for building up the church, EVERY believer gets EVERY fruit. So, I don’t want to hear someone say, “well, I have kindness, but God hasn’t give me the fruit of self-control!” When Paul writes about the “fruit” he groups them all in with the single word “fruit” not “fruits” implying that when the Spirit comes on you, all those things are now a part of your new self! How else are we filled with the Holy Spirit? Well, how do you get filled with wine? Drink a lot of it! We are filled with the Spirit when we drink deeply the Word of God, meditate, and pray, fellowship with believers and worship Him.

So, Paul is saying, live in the light, walk in love and be filled with the Spirit, just like Christ already set the example for you to do!

But, here in 5:19 we see that being filled with the Spirit not only gives us noticeable fruit, but it also leads to singing! I believe that our Spirit-filled singing is because God actually causes us to sing. Now, bear with me for a minute, this is going to get a bit crazy.

God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit have an awesome and intimate relationship that we certainly will never grasp this side of eternity. God is infinitely loving, infinitely gracious, and infinitely joyful (to name a few). We know that God is fully satisfied in and of Himself. He does not need anyone or anything in creation to be fulfilled or to increase His joy. However, He created universe to display His glory in countless ways, most notably, the glory found in the death and resurrection of Jesus and His incredible display of love for all creation. We also see throughout Scripture that God is all about the promotion of His glory. Not in an arrogant human way, but in a perfect and just way. One of the interesting characteristics of the Trinity is the fact that each member gives glory to the others. Jesus constantly gave glory to God, God proclaimed His love and acceptance of Jesus when He was baptized, and the Spirit descended on Christ in glory at the same moment, as an example.

Since we know that God is ultimately for God, it only makes sense that His Spirit, now dwelling in us, would cause us to be ultimately for God as well. When a person is filled with the Holy Spirit, that person cannot help but sing God’s praises, His glory, His gospel, and His love, because that person is now infected with the presence of God Himself. This means that the act of Christian singing is not a natural, human response, but instead, a supernatural event caused by the presence of the Spirit in us.

Now, do we have to always sing in order to praise God? Of course not. We have to praise God, because it is a command, and that praise must be expressed, and that praise can only truly come through the power of the Holy Spirit, but I don’t think this always results in singing, at least not outwardly. But, when we read scriptures, especially the Psalms, we discover 50 commands to sing. Yes, that’s what I said, commands. Even here in Ephesians, it’s clear Paul is giving us a command. Ronald Allen says this, “When a non-singer becomes a Christian, he or she becomes a singer. Not all are blessed with a finely tuned ear and a well modulated voice; so the sound may not be superb-it may even be out-of-tune and off-key. Remember: worship is a state of heart; musical sound is a state of art. Let’s not confuse them.” I think his point is clear, we are to sing, but that singing starts in our hearts. God is not looking for someone who has a beautiful voice or sings the loudest or strongest, He’s looking for each Christian to sing with all his or her heart. Paul even says in verse 19, we are to make melody to the Lord with our heart.

However, there is a reason we use songs, right? Throughout all the Scriptures and all Christian history, we see that God’s people sang to Him. Why? Why would God deem it appropriate to use music to have us express our adoration for Him and our testimony toward one another? First, I think it is because of the power inherent in music itself. There is something great and transcendent in poetry and melody. Something that words alone cannot seem to capture. Melody, style, instrumentation, and sound bring a text to life in a way mere speaking cannot. John Piper says that “music and singing are necessary to Christian faith and worship for the simple reason that the realities of God and Christ, creation and salvation, heaven and hell are so great that when they are known truly a felt [deeply], they demand more than discussion and analysis and description; they demand poetry and song and music.” By singing to and about God, we are saying that thinking and talking are not enough! There must be deep feeling and singing!

We also know that we tend to retain things on a deeper level when we sing, right? My son loves the PBS show Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood. It’s kind of a continuation of the Mr. Rogers show I loved when I was growing up. Each episode, they take one concept for a child’s typical growth and development such as eating new foods, going to the bathroom, or visiting the doctor, and show how Daniel and his friends experience these things. Each one of these things is emphasized with song. When we give my son something new to eat, he now sings, “You gotta try new foods ‘cause they might taste good” or sits on the toilet singing, “When you have to go potty, STOP and go right away. Flush and wash, and be on your way.” Simple? Yes. But it works.

Many of you were around this time last year when we welcomed worship leader Charlie Hall into our church. He talked to me about a concept they have at their church called “gospeling yourself.” I think, beyond the praising of God, Paul is telling us to do just that here. You see, when we put simple (or even complex) ideas into song, just like Daniel Tiger, we are going to remember them. When, in verse 19, Paul says we are to address one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, he wants us to use the gamut of Christian poetry to remind ourselves and one another about the great truths of God, or the Gospel.

But, David, you say, I know the gospel, and I tell my friends that don’t know Jesus.
To you I say, “Great! But do you tell yourself the gospel over and over again and see how it is a constant part of your life?”

In its simplest form, the gospel begins when we realize that we are bigger sinners than we thought. Not in a beating-yourself up way, but in a humbling, deep, understanding way. We will call this moving down the slope of repentance. You see, it is not just enough to know we are sinners, but we have to come to the conclusion that what we have done is wrong and ask God to forgive us. Thankfully, God does not leave us there, because the second half of the gospel is that Jesus is a bigger Savior than we could ever realize. We will call this moving up the slope of faith. We have faith that God is bigger than our sin, and humble ourselves before Him, and Christ, in His power, lifts us up to new life in Him! Now, when God looks at you, He sees His Son! He sees infinite perfection through the blood of Jesus in you! If you don’t know this truth in your life, let me tell you that it really is that simple, it really is that profound, and it is more freeing and wonderful than you could ever imagine.

For those of us who know and embrace this truth, where we tend to get stuck, is that we think the story ends on the day of salvation. We “pray a prayer” and “Jesus comes into our hearts” the Holy Spirit comes to dwell within us, and that’s it. When we talk about the gospel being “news for everyday living” we really mean everyday. This is not a one-time ordeal! The power of God can daily impact your life and your circumstances. The problem is, we tend to take our salvation for granted and just go on living our lives like God isn’t even there. So, let me tell you. There is not one joy, one hardship, one relationship, one test, one anything that is out of the reach of the gospel. We come together on Sundays to sing together, to fellowship, and to read God’s word because of the Gospel. We come to remind ourselves that we are not alone and that the power of God infiltrates every moment of every day. God’s story in your life did not end when you became a Christian, that is the moment it truly began!

The last thing I will mention about singing is that singing reflects the nature of God. Author and speaker Bob Kauflin recently wrote about this very subject. “The Father sings over his redeemed people (Zephaniah 3:17). Jesus sings with us in the midst of the congregation (Hebrews 2:12). One of the fruits of being filled with the Spirit is singing (Ephesians 5:18-19, we just mentioned that). We worship a triune God who sings, and he wants us to be like him.” Of course, this makes complete sense with our current train of thought: Spirit of God dwells in us, causes us to be more like Christ, causes us to pursue holiness, causes us to sing which leads to more Christlikeness!

The next command Paul gives us is in verse 20, but it’s more of a “how.” We are to sing songs, making melody in our hearts to God, how? Giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Why do we give thanks? First of all, it’s a command too. More importantly, a thankful heart prepares us to enter the presence of God. Psalm 100 says we are to enter His gates with thanksgiving. As ministers of God, filled with His Spirit, we have our eternities to be thankful for, but more importantly, we have Christ Himself!

Now, when are we to be thankful? Yes. Always.

And what are we to be thankful for? Yes. Everything.

Easy to say, hard to practice, right? It’s true, there’s something about being thankful that is just difficult for many of us, isn’t there? I think that, just like singing, it is the Spirit of God that truly empowers us to be thankful. How else can we be thankful for everything? How can I be thankful for my new promotion, instead of just being smug knowing I earned it? The Spirit of God. How can I be thankful that Jordan got the lead role in the high school musical instead of me, and I’m now expendable cast member number 3? The Spirit of God. How can I be thankful that after years and years of praying, God has decided to keep my physical afflictions in my body? The Spirit of God. You get it. It’s supernatural. We don’t have the ability to bring glory to God or spread His gospel apart from His Spirit dwelling within us and our constant filling with the Spirit through drinking deeply all that is God through Scripture, prayer, fellowship, worship, and so on. We do all this in the name of Jesus, trusting that He is our mediator between us and God.

As a recap:
Paul commands us to not give our bodies over to intoxication, but instead be filled with the Holy Spirit of God which gives us the fruit of the Spirit, and empowers us to follow the commands of singing, reminding one another of the truth of the Gospel, and giving thanks to God.

As the praise team comes up to lead us in singing, inviting the Holy Spirit of God to show us His presence in this room, I have one final encouragement for us as a church when it comes to singing. For this, I turn again to Bob Kauflin.

The singing in your church may be dreadful. Your voice might sound like a cross between a beached whale and an alley cat in heat. Singing might make you feel uncomfortable. Those who lead the singing in your church might do it poorly. And if there’s anything we can do to change the situation, we should.

But our confidence and comfort in singing comes from this: Jesus, our great high priest, makes all our offerings acceptable to God through his perfect life of obedience and his perfect sacrifice of atonement. The Father loves our singing not only because it’s sincere, but because when offered through faith, it sounds just like his beloved Son.

And besides. One day we’ll all have better voices and our songs will far surpass anything we’ve sung here. It’s then we’ll realize that eternity won’t be long enough to contain the songs worthy of the Lamb who was slain.