The worship of silence

Our worship often consists of doing things.

I sometimes introduce church services with these words: ‘let us worship God by singing of his goodness, thanking him for his mercy, depending on him to meet our needs, admitting our wrongs, listening when he speaks, offering ourselves for his service and encouraging one another by our presence and conversation’.

I sometimes end services with these words: ‘let us continue to worship God by going to live lives worthy of our Lord in the wherever, when ever and whatever of our week.

I think that’s right and proper. It has a good balance of the intentionally of gathered worship which is framed within the primary sense of whole-life worship.

However, I also think that God is to be worshipped in the empty space of inaction and silence.

Thus I hear of a devotional routine that includes times of talking to God in prayer but also a time of sitting as still as possible, settling the inner person by focussing on your breathing, saying nothing (whether vocalised or in the mind) and just consciously being still and knowing that he is God and we are not. This is a time to just rest in God and bathe in his presence – much as we might sit in a companionable silence with the dearest of friends.

Of course, this silence is given shape by the surrounding acts to vocalise prayers and read the Bible. Thus it is not a time of egocentric stillness, but one of theocentricity.

So now we can add: ‘let us worship God in our silence and stillness’.

Review: Sing for Joy

Sing for Joy

Sing for Joy, Matthias Media 2010. Available from: http://www.matthiasmedia.com.au

I confess that I can’t sing. What’s worse, I failed when a skilful music director tried to train me to sing somewhere near on-pitch (‘stand at the back and mime’ was the last ruthless word when I was pressed-ganged into a ministry leaders’ choir).

However, I love the musical part of church gatherings and think it a taste of heaven to stand with a large number of God’s people and sing songs of admiration, thanks, praise, encouragement, dedication and similar. As a preacher, I am often lifted to a pulpit-ready high by music that has been chosen to mesh with the service theme and which is well presented.

Music and singing also have a dark side. They readily promote conflict in churches and are often the front line of the worship wars as the battle over psalms, hymns and spiritual songs reaches new depths of dischord. Singing in church is also a topic when Bible-driven thinking is often replaced by the imposition of personal opinions, sloppy sentimentalism or mainly musical values.

Sing for Joy is a series of six small group topical studies designed to help careful thought about singing in church. Each study includes sections of Bible text; questions to help probe the Bible; supplementary notes to give background and related comment; questions to help tease out the implications; and suggestions for prayer.

This is a great help to help think Biblically about singing in church and it joins some other resources that cover the same field. As a study book, Sing for Joy should help people go a step further. We often only talk about these matters in the setting of an argument or when trying to take a decision. This study book could enable a calm discussion that can help avoid arguments and inform better decisions.

These studies could be well used as a filler series by small groups, or when a church is about to change its musical repertoire. Likewise, they could form the base of a good in-house learning programme for members of choirs and worship committees.

(David Burke has been singing in church for many decades and values those who are ruthless in the pursuit of excellence in church music.)

Just another kid?

My grandchild is due to be born tomorrow*.

I have three children and this is my fourth grandchild. Just another kid! No way! I have a sense of awe at the new life that the birth represents. Today, my son and his wife are a childless couple. Tomorrow they will have their firstborn to hold in their arms.

Of course, the first thing we want to know is the child’s gender. But then the bigger wonders: what will this baby grow to be like? What abilities will develop? What study and career path will shape its adulthood? How will this baby contribute to the family line as it grows, possible pairs off and reproduces?

It is an awesome event. Two adults come lovingly together as one flesh and a new life results.

In Christian view this event has an extra awesomeness, for the Bible speaks of all human life bearing God’s image (which is why it is not our call to wilfully destroy it. Gen 1:26-27; 9:6).  Irrespective of how beautiful, clever, helpful etc this new child is, the child has the highest worth because it bears God’s image. This child is a prince or princess of his kingdom and over his creation. And that is before it is able to do anything or actually does anything.

Compare that with the view of prominent atheist and ethicist Peter Singer: “Human babies are not born self-aware, or capable of grasping that they exist over time. They are not persons”; therefore, “the life of a newborn is of less value than the life of a pig, a dog, or a chimpanzee.” Peter Singer, Practical Ethics, 1st ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), 122–23.

I’m thankful that my grandchild is born into a world that God rules and not Peter Singer. His criteria of human identity and worth seems rooted to what the (non)person can or cannot do. On that logic, its not just all newborns who need to watch lest he comes calling, but any person who has disability or the weaknesses of old age. This grim reaper’s calling card will be cast broadly.

Compare again with the Bible’s view that God watched over my unborn grandchild from conception: You formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. … My frame was not hidden from you when I was being made in secret intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there were none of them (Ps 139:13-16).

Through his intricate paths of genetics and DNA God has set my grandchild’s nature. To me these mechanisms are mysteries before which I bow. Were I to understand the biological complexities behind my mysteries I expect I would the more in awesome wonder. The biology tells me how these happen. The Bible gives the back-story that shapes their meaning.

My grandchild is not a ‘thing’ waiting Singer’s inspection and certificate of humanity. Its worth does not depend on its capacities. And that is why I will love and treasure this child and would give my life for it. And it is why God loves and treasures this child and why the Son of God gave his life so it could be redeemed and live in fellowship with its maker.

The child is not just a ‘thing’ or just another kid.

* Update 2 March: I'm pleased to report that Xavier Alexander Burke arrived as expected and is much loved.