Becoming a Worshiper

Many of us get distracted during worship.  David, perhaps the Bible’s premier worshipper, offers three ways to focus on worship: 1) acknowledge that God is in control, 2) accept God’s forgiveness, and 3) see God’s work in your life.  The following essay explains this plan more fully.   The psalm in 2 Samuel 22 appears after the article.

Do you have trouble worshipping?

Does the church service begin whether you’re ready or not?   Do you sometimes find yourself focused on something besides God?   Are you thinking about the meeting last Thursday or recalling looking over your son’s midterm grades?  Do you sense that others are more deeply engaged in the worship of God than you are?

Am I the only one who deals with such distractions?   Are others like me finding themselves in church but far from centered on worship?  What can I do to tune out the world and focus on God?

My dilemma leads me to David, the great worshiper in the Bible.  How did David focus on God?  David faced the pressures of leadership, but yet became a model worshiper.  How did he deal with distractions?  Is there any place where he tells me how I can become a worshiper?   I found help in David’s psalm in 2 Samuel 22.

What I discovered has not made me a perfect worshiper, but it has given me a place to start, and a process to follow when my body is in church but my spirit is not.   David points me to a three-stage sequence that reunites my body and soul and connects my spirit with God.

 

Stage One: Acknowledge that God is in charge   

The first stage of worship comes in 2 Samuel 22:2-20.  In these opening verses, David remembers how God saved him from a threatening situation.  He says the “waves of death swirled about me” and “torrents of destruction overwhelmed me.”  It the midst of that chaos, David turns to God as a stabilizing force—his rock and his fortress.

I identify with David’s chaos.  For me it is waves of distraction and torrents of work.   That chaos often distracts me when the Sunday service begins.  The rush of life refuses to stop when the church service starts.  Even preparations for worship sometimes overwhelm and distract me.

So how can I worship when I’m so frenzied?   The distractions of life push their way into my heart and get in the way of worship.  How are we supposed to go through the week dealing with the waves and torrents of our lives, and then suddenly turn off all the distractions and push the worship button?

In the midst of his distractions, David appealed to God: “In my distress I called to the Lord” (v. 7). In response, God heard (v. 7) and came down (v. 10).

What is David saying? Here is stage one in becoming a worshiper: Acknowledge that God is in charge. That’s David’s point in this section: “God, please come into my chaotic world.  Be my rock.  Take control.”

We want to be in charge. Our culture values autonomy, freedom and control. We’re told that life does not revolve around the sun, it revolves around the self. The focus on the human ego and personal freedom keep us from worship.

Each time of worship raises the same questions: Who will be in charge of my life today? Will I loosen my grip and let God rule or will I try to drive my own life?  Not giving God control keeps me focused on the chaos and crippled in worship.  When we loosen our grip and let God run our lives, we give him the chaos. Once we give God control, we are free to worship. With our egos out of the way, and chaos out of our minds, we can focus on the Father.

A couple of weeks ago at church, I realized I was not worshiping.  Suddenly David’s confession came to mind.  With that prompt, I, too, acknowledged, “God, you are in charge, not me.”  That simple confession cleared the chaos and I was drawn into worship.

When I realize that I’m in church but not centered on worship, I turn to stage one.  While the congregation worships around me, I confess, “God you are in charge of all the distractions.  You are in charge of this worship.”  Stage one opens the door to worship.

 Stage Two:  Accept God’s deliverance

Another barrier to worship is guilt.  If I do not sense God’s forgiveness, my praise has no joy.  Even my inability to worship intensifies the existing feelings of inadequacy and inferiority.  I begin to wonder why God would even want somebody like me to worship someone like him.

David’s psalm takes a radical turn in verses 21-28.  He moves from God being in charge (vv. 2-20) to David’s own righteousness (vv. 21-28).  In this section, David claims to keep all of God’s laws.  But does he?

Most recall enough about David’s life to question this second section. Is David blameless? Is David righteous? Hardly. We know about the affair with Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah. We wonder about David’s repeated mistakes as a father. We remember God would not let David build the temple because of the blood on his hands. How can he claim to be blameless?

David had accepted God’s forgiveness.  Note the last part of verse 25: “according to my cleanness in his sight.” Note the last three words: in his sight!

Did David do wrong? Yes. Did he commit adultery? Yes. Did he murder? Yes.

Did God forgive David for all these sins? Yes. Yes. Yes.

Stage two in becoming a worshiper is: Accept God’s deliverance. God makes us blameless. Boldly reach out and claim his grace.

Some time ago, after my neighbor and I had a brief argument, I patched things up between us.  Then, I asked God to forgive me and he did.   But after breakfast the next day, as I went to the chair where I spend time every morning in praise and prayer, I found I was mouthing words of worship, but offering no heart-felt praise.  I said the words of a prayer, but was not being drawn into God’s throne room.  Then it hit me:  I had not accepted God’s forgiveness.  I was still feeling guilty over the argument with my neighbor.   That guilt prevented worship.  I turned my attention to sensing his forgiveness.  As his forgiveness became real to me, my worship turned genuine.  I again became a worshiper.

We come to worship as forgiven sinners. We have a Bathsheba or Uriah or something else hidden in our lives. We have failed, sinned and messed up. My personal worship can be interrupted by my sin. As I ponder God, that flair of anger at my son or the memory of a careless word pops into my mind.  I must acknowledge the presence of God’s grace.  God views me “according to my cleanness in his sight” (v 25). Others may blame me. But God has forgiven me!

When it comes to sin, there is only one opinion that counts. It isn’t what they say in the neighborhood about me or what the elders of the church might conclude. It’s not even what my own guilt and shame whisper. How God sees me is all that matters.

Accept God’s forgiveness. When we accept that forgiveness, the guilt disappears. When we think we’re no good, when we drown in our personal regrets, worship is hindered.  But once we realize and accept that God has forgiven us, we are open to worship.

I find David’s second stage kindling for my own worship fire.  In the midst of my own coldness toward worship, I confess my sin and accept his grace.  When I do, I am able to worship.

Just as confessing that God is in control chases away the chaos which blocks our worship, so accepting forgiveness frees us from the repercussions of sin which keep us from giving praise. Both are key stages in becoming a worshiper.

Stage Three: Reflect on the work of God in your life

With those two obstacles out of the way, something more naturally begins to happen to my budding worship.  I see God’s hand in my life.  David’s psalm takes up this exact topic in verses 29-46.   Here I discovered the third stage in becoming a worshiper.   At first read, this section seems to echo verses 2-20, but there is a substantial difference. In the first stage, David asks God to take control of his life; in this third stage, he celebrates that God has taken control of his life. Verses 2-20 are confessional, verses 29-46 are testimonial. One is hopeful about the future; the other is joyful about the present.

David celebrates how God walked with him, helped him face his enemies, supported and buoyed up his life. In verse 30, after declaring his joy and his confidence in God, David makes this amazing claim: “with my God I can scale a wall.”   With God, I can do anything!

David’s celebration marks stage three in becoming a worshiper: Reflect on the work of God in your life. David sees God’s power at work in his life.   With the distractions out of the way and the sin forgiven, David recognizes how God works in everyday life.

Yet, David instead of scaling walls sometimes ran into walls.  In the Psalms, David confesses weakness, powerlessness and distress. He was encompassed, entangled, snared and assailed.  David often felt ineffective.

I know about ineffectiveness.  Questioning my own effectiveness can dominate life.  Why did I say that to my son?  That comment in class last Sunday must have sounded stupid.  Trevor will never accept my awkward invitations to come to church.   I run into one wall after another.

But when I give God control and accept his grace, he opens my eyes to reveal his own hand.  I sense power where there was no power. Newness replaces the old.  Hope overcomes the darkness.  Reconciliation soars over hatred.  I see what God has done.  When we see God’s work in our lives, we add our testimony to David’s.

One night at my men’s prayer group, Larry took a few moments to tell about a crisis in his life a few years before.  His testimony surprised me when he mentioned the important role I played in his healing.   When I saw what God had done through me, I naturally felt praise and adoration for God.  I still remember the marvelous prayer time that night.  Seeing the hand of God in our lives transforms our worship experience just as it did for David.

A Sequence Leading to Worship

If I’m in control of life, it’s hard to see the hand of God. In our self-centered world, there is not much room for God to part the curtains and come down.

If I think I’m no good, that blocks our praise.  When I accept that I am blameless in his sight, worship comes naturally.

If I look beyond my own efforts to what God is doing through me, there is reason to celebrate his victories.

When we let God rule and accept his grace, he opens our eyes to his work, prompting us to testify to the way in which he wins our battles and stands at our side.   When I follow this sequence, I find myself worshiping.

The psalm changes direction one last time at verse 47. The rest of the psalm reflects pure worship as David celebrates God as the rock of his salvation, exalting, praising, and extolling him. David is now a worshiper.

This view of the psalm in 2 Samuel 22, with its three simple stages, may tend to over-simplify the complexity of worship. David, writing near the end of his life, saw his worship with clarity and left us with a primer on worship. Learning the ABCs in kindergarten doesn’t make us readers, but we can’t read unless we learn the basic lessons.

When I allow David’s psalm to guide me, I find myself more drawn into worship. Few in Scripture worshiped like David. As we seek to become worshipers, he may be one of the best teachers around. Praise God for David and, then, praise God like David.

 

 

 

2 Samuel 22:2-51  RSV

 

Stage One:

2 And David spoke to the LORD the words of this song on the day when the LORD delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul.  2 He said, “The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer,  3 my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold and my refuge, my savior; thou savest me from violence.  4 I call upon the LORD, who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies.  5 “For the waves of death encompassed me, the torrents of perdition assailed me;  6 the cords of Sheol entangled me, the snares of death confronted me.  7 “In my distress I called upon the LORD; to my God I called. From his temple he heard my voice, and my cry came to his ears.  8 “Then the earth reeled and rocked; the foundations of the heavens trembled and quaked, because he was angry.  9 Smoke went up from his nostrils, and devouring fire from his mouth; glowing coals flamed forth from him.  10 He bowed the heavens, and came down; thick darkness was under his feet.  11 He rode on a cherub, and flew; he was seen upon the wings of the wind.  12 He made darkness around him his canopy, thick clouds, a gathering of water.  13 Out of the brightness before him coals of fire flamed forth.  14 The LORD thundered from heaven, and the Most High uttered his voice.  15 And he sent out arrows, and scattered them; lightning, and routed them.  16 Then the channels of the sea were seen, the foundations of the world were laid bare, at the rebuke of the LORD, at the blast of the breath of his nostrils.  17 “He reached from on high, he took me, he drew me out of many waters.  18 He delivered me from my strong enemy, from those who hated me; for they were too mighty for me.  19 They came upon me in the day of my calamity; but the LORD was my stay.  20 He brought me forth into a broad place; he delivered me, because he delighted in me.

 

Stage Two:

21 “The LORD rewarded me according to my righteousness; according to the cleanness of my hands he recompensed me.  22 For I have kept the ways of the LORD, and have not wickedly departed from my God.  23 For all his ordinances were before me, and from his statutes I did not turn aside.  24 I was blameless before him, and I kept myself from guilt.  25 Therefore the LORD has recompensed me according to my righteousness, according to my cleanness in his sight.  26 “With the loyal thou dost show thyself loyal; with the blameless man thou dost show thyself blameless;  27 with the pure thou dost show thyself pure, and with the crooked thou dost show thyself perverse.  28 Thou dost deliver a humble people, but thy eyes are upon the haughty to bring them down.  29 Yea, thou art my lamp, O LORD, and my God lightens my darkness.

 

Stage Three:

30 Yea, by thee I can crush a troop, and by my God I can leap over a wall.  31 This God — his way is perfect; the promise of the LORD proves true; he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him.  32 “For who is God, but the LORD? And who is a rock, except our God?  33 This God is my strong refuge, and has made my way safe.  34 He made my feet like hinds’ feet, and set me secure on the heights.  35 He trains my hands for war, so that my arms can bend a bow of bronze.  36 Thou hast given me the shield of thy salvation, and thy help made me great.  37 Thou didst give a wide place for my steps under me, and my feet did not slip;  38 I pursued my enemies and destroyed them, and did not turn back until they were consumed.  39 I consumed them; I thrust them through, so that they did not rise; they fell under my feet.  40 For thou didst gird me with strength for the battle; thou didst make my assailants sink under me.  41 Thou didst make my enemies turn their backs to me, those who hated me, and I destroyed them.  42 They looked, but there was none to save; they cried to the LORD, but he did not answer them.  43 I beat them fine as the dust of the earth, I crushed them and stamped them down like the mire of the streets.  44 “Thou didst deliver me from strife with the peoples; thou didst keep me as the head of the nations; people whom I had  not known served me.  45 Foreigners came cringing to me; as soon as they heard of me, they obeyed me.  46 Foreigners lost heart, and came trembling out of their fastnesses.

 

Worship:

47 “The LORD lives; and blessed be my rock, and exalted be my God, the rock of my salvation,  48 the God who gave me vengeance and brought down peoples under me,  49 who brought me out from my enemies; thou didst exalt me above my adversaries, thou didst deliver me from men of violence.  50 “For this I will extol thee, O LORD, among the nations, and sing praises to thy name.  51 Great triumphs he gives to his king, and shows steadfast love to his anointed, to David, and his descendants for ever.”