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05.24.09

7th Sunday of Easter

SING! SHOUT! CLAP!

PSALM 47; ROMANS 11:33-36

• In Praise of God
• New Songs and Old Forms
• In the December 1992 edition of the devotional magazine Our Daily Bread, Martin R. DeHaan wrote these words on the subject of giving praise to God:
• “The song of the humpback whale is one of the strangest in nature.  It is a weird combination of high-and low-pitched groaning.  Those who have studied the humpback whale say their songs are noteworthy because these giants of the deep are constantly changing them.  New patterns are added and old ones eliminated so that over a period of time the whale actually sings a new song.”
• “There’s a sense in which the Christian should be continually composing new songs of praise around the fresh mercies of God.  Unfortunately, many of us just keep singing the same old song.  Most certainly, we must repeatedly affirm the fundamentals of our faith.  But as the psalmist tells us, the works of God’s deliverance in the lives of his people are many and give us reason to express our praise to him in new songs.  His works are more than we can count.”
• “So then, why is our testimony of God’s saving grace expressed in the same rote way year after year?  A fresh experience of the mercies of the cross and of Christ’s resurrection power should constantly fill our hearts and minds with new songs.”
• “The gospel story never changes.  Thank God for that.  But the songs of our praise should be endlessly new.”
• How sober we Presbyterians tend to be when we come into God’s house for worship
• In his first letter to the Corinthian Church, the apostle Paul instructed them in the matter of worship that “Everything should be done decently and in order”(1 Corinthians 14:40), and as Presbyterians we have taken his instruction to heart
• Part of our tradition is that we have a carefully crafted and formal order of worship
• But perhaps many of us have taken Paul’s words to the extreme
• We enter the sanctuary and take our seat in the same pew we always sit in
• We sit there stone-faced, afraid to crack a smile—as if smiling in church is a sin
• We’re uncomfortable greeting those who have come to worship with us because that greeting disrupts the somber atmosphere of our worship
• When we stand to sing our hymns of praise, so often we fail to look up, to lift our heads high in praise to the God who gives us life, and we barely sing above a whisper as if we don’t want God to hear our offering of praise
• It seems we have crossed the line and have moved beyond “decently and in order” to “dull and boring”
• The Form of Worship
• That’s not to say that there’s no value in our tradition, for the structure of Reformed worship is intended to help create an atmosphere in which we might have a personal encounter with God
• Our service begins with a call, summoning us to join in the worship of God
• Yet, before we can truly worship God and hear God’s word of love, the barriers that prevent us from experiencing God must be removed
• So our order of worship leads us to the confession of our sins, followed by the assurance that God is merciful and always willing to forgive
• Once we are gathered and our hearts and minds are focused, once we have confessed our sins and received God’s forgiveness anew, we are then ready to hear what God has to say to us through the reading of the Scripture and the proclamation of the word

• Our worship of God doesn’t conclude once we have heard what God has to say to us
• As the writer of James so aptly says, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves.  Do what it says.” (James 1:22)
• So our worship leads us to respond to God’s word so that it might have an impact on our lives
• We respond to God as we offer to God the best of our time, talents, and treasures
• We respond to God as we join together to confess our faith
• We respond to God as we intercede before God in prayer for the needs of the world
• We respond to God by going out from this place to live our lives for Jesus and make a difference in the lives of others
• And we go with a blessing to remind us that, as we go, God goes with us
• Interspersed among these elements of worship are hymns, anthems, and times of silent reflection
• Each of these play an important role in helping us connect with God
• Through music, we offer our praises to God
• Music is a universal language to which we can all relate—it is part of the gift of God’s creation which we can offer back to God as an act of worship
• The times of silence allow us the opportunity to listen for God’s voice speaking to us
• In a noisy and confusing world, we don’t always hear God’s voice, so these times of silence in our worship are critical so that we might hear what God has to say to us
• The problem, however, is that we often allow the form of worship to become more important than the act of worship itself
• We worship the form more than we worship God
• We become very unsettled when there is any variation in the form of worship, and we stifle the work of the Holy Spirit among us when we reject new ideas and innovations in our worship
• The Sacrifice of Praise
• Additional Elements of Worship
• There are elements of worship that were quite common in former days, but which have fallen out of use, especially in mainline congregations
• On the rare occasion when they do occur, they make us quite uncomfortable
• These elements are commanded in the words of Psalm 47, and they constitute the title of this message
• These elements are: Sing! Shout! Clap!
• That music is important in worship goes without saying
• Music is intended to lift our spirits and enable us to experience a deeper relationship with God, whether they are old traditional favorites or new songs for a new age
• Our lack of exuberance in singing, however, limits the power of music to connect us to God
• Too often we sing like we have nothing to be joyful about
• Our music is often more suited for a funeral than it is for a celebration of the marvelous gift of life God has given to us
• As Presbyterians, we are much too austere to recognize shouting and clapping as a legitimate part of our worship of God
• They are much too “secular” to be part of our worship—more fitting for the sports stadium or concert hall or theater
• How uncomfortable we are when a visitor might slip and shout “AMEN!” during the worship service
• We tolerate it out of courtesy, but deep inside we’re thinking “We don’t do that kind of thing here!”
• And clapping is often looked upon with the same disdain
• Yet, when we refuse to allow ourselves to sing joyfully to the Lord, or stifle rousing shouts of praise, or to be moved to applause in praise of God, we are, in effect, refusing to allow the movement of the Holy Spirit among us
• Our songs of praise, our shouts of joy, and our clapping of hands isn’t intended to be an accolade to ourselves; instead they are yet another way we can offer our thanks and praise to God
• The Reason For Our Praise
• The reason the psalmist commands these as part of the worship of God is because of all that God has done and continues to do for us
• God deserves our loudest praise because our God is an awesome God
• God has set us free from our bondage and reigns as King over all creation
• God rules over all the nations and is vanquishing the enemies that oppose the will of God
• Because of all God does for us, God deserves a rousing offering of praise
• The apostle Paul takes this one step further in the doxology we have read from Romans 11
• This doxology concludes a lengthy teaching section in which Paul expounds to the Roman Christians just how reprobate we humans are
• Paul’s conclusion is that we deserve the wrath of God and a sentence of death because of our sinfulness
• But Paul goes on to explain the glorious riches that are ours through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, declaring that, instead of wrath, God offers us grace, and instead of death, God gives us new life through faith in the name of Jesus
• In this doxology, Paul declares that there is no  way for us to fully understand the mind of God
• What God has done makes no sense to the human mind
• Although we can never fully understand the mind of God, we can accept the grace that God offers us in Jesus Christ and believe that God’s love for us is true
• It is this unfathomable grace and love of God that causes Paul to break into this joyful song of praise
• God’s love and grace is so amazing that, when it comes upon us, we cannot contain ourselves—we can do nothing else but worship God with the clapping of hands, with shouts of joy, and with exuberant songs of praise
• God deserves nothing less
• Writing to the Thessalonians, Paul has this to say as well: “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.  Do not put out the Spirit’s fire.” (1 Thessalonians 5:16-19)
• It seems that, with our addiction to the form of worship, we have put out the fire of the Holy Spirit among us
• Without the fire of the Holy Spirit, we cannot have a true experience with God
• Our God is awesome, and God’s love and grace are amazing
• That love and grace ought to fill us with joy overflowing so that we cannot help but to worship God with singing, shouting, and clapping