Worship Cliché #1: Worship is a Lifestyle

“Worship isn’t singing - it’s the whole of your life”

Well done. What do you want? A biscuit? A medal?

This is the most frequently spouted cliché in regards to worship. It has become a declaration of tedium and piety. It pertains to be a ‘myth busting’ type statement - that we don’t have ‘times’ of worship and our worship is more than the singing of songs. Yet this often offered proclamation of true worship is inadequate and even unnecessary for a number of reasons which I will look at now:

1. When did you ever hear someone claim that worship was just singing? Nope me neither. One of the reasons why declarations of worship being your entire life can be so pious in nature is that nobody I know in the whole Christendom believes anything different - except maybe 7 year olds.

2.Worship can be the whole of your life but we still need ‘times’ of worship. Time set aside to have no other agenda but worship. For example when I am doing the washing up, I can do it with an attitude of worship and service to God and my family. But I don’t do it as worship. I do it because the plates are dirty. Equally as I am picking my toe nails it does not have to ‘all be for His glory’. I can pick my toe nails because I’ve got dirt in them. When we sing our songs of worship together it is specifically for Him with no other agenda than to please Him and honour Him. That is important and should not be diluted by claims of a superior ‘life of worship’ - which leads us to.....

3. Worshipping with your ‘whole life’ doesn’t mean you get out of singing in church. Get over it and sing up.

4. 'Worship is a lifestyle’ is an inadequate statement. It is just not extreme enough. ‘Lifestyle’ implies something you read about in a magazine or is just a bunch of consumer choices. The language of obedience and worship in the New Testament is a lot more graphic.

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. Romans 12:1

If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. Matthew 16: 24, 25

I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death. Philippians 3:10

Here it is: Sacrifice; Self Denial; Loss; Suffering; Death - can those things be adequately described as a ‘lifestyle’?

I don’t think so.

Most of our lifestyle choices end up being represented in a glossy magazine or clever adverts and even with great design none of these themes of death and sacrifice would look appealing. I think it is more accurate to describe worship as a ‘death-style’ or a ‘way of sacrifice’ rather than a ‘lifestyle’ or a ‘way of life’. It is a lot harder and all-consuming than our usual clichés would imply.

Although this way of phrasing worship maybe helpful in an initial simplistic way it is not actually that helpful in building a theology of worship - it is a starting point or a stepping stone - but certainly not the whole picture!

thoughts?

dg