(Un)Dignity in Worship

Carrying the Presence

Historical Background:

David had it in his heart to take the ark up from Kiriath-Jearim (see 1Samuel 6:21-7:1), where it had been since the Philistines returned it (see 1Sam. 5-6), and before Saul was anointed King (1Sam. 10:1). We read about his first failed attempt and second successful attempt in 2Samuel 6. This is some time after David has been king, conquered Jerusalem, and is beginning to enjoy a time of relative stability.

Excessive or Expressive?

What I want us to notice today is in both the failed and successful attempts to bring up the ark, the worship appears to be excessive and noisy (at least by Reformed standards of worship!). The first time we read this: "David and all Israel were celebrating with all their might before the Lord, with castanets, harps, lyres, timbrels, sistrums and cymbals" (2Sam. 6:5).  During the second time the worship seems even louder: "Wearing a linen ephod, David was dancing before the Lord with all his might, while he and all Israel were bringing up the ark of the Lord with shouts and the sound of trumpets" (2Sam. 6:14–15).

Now, for those champions of decorum in worship, we might have expected a less expressive, a less noisy and more dignified worship after a failed attempt. After all, didn't the first attempt fail because of the lack of respect Uzzah had for the ark (2Sam.6:7), what the Bible describes as "his irreverent act"? After all, isn't all this noise and hullabaloo also wildly irreverent too?

The Regulative Principle 

There's this really weird thing in Reformed theology called the Regulative Principle. The intent of this is right: God should only be worshiped in the way Scripture prescribes that He should be worshiped. It was created during the Reformation, ostensibly to get rid of a lot of superstition that had crept into the Church during the Middle Ages (or perhaps just to be "not Roman Catholic").

The weird thing about this principle is that it is so unevenly applied. Certain things are accepted as prescribed in Scripture, other expressions of worship found in Scripture are not understood this way. I believe this is because the principle has come to be filtered through cultural assumptions. For example, although Psalm 150:4 says "Praise Him with timbrel and dancing," Some object when someone actually plays a timbrel (tambourine?) and certainly if they would dance in a worship service. Or how about "Shout for joy to the Lord all the earth" (Psalm 100:1)? How do we Reformed types feel about shouting for joy during a worship service? Although these things are actually commanded in Scripture (they are in the imperative voice), we somehow believe that these things are not valid for us. Where is the principle?

Dignity and Humility in Worship

 As David brings up the ark to Jerusalem, he dances with all his might, stripping down to his undergarments (possibly to be able to move more freely - or maybe he just got hot). His wife Michal, daughter of Saul, despises David for his wild dancing (2Sam. 6:16); she objects to all this as a vulgar display (2Sam.6:20). In other words, David is not acting as a king should act. He is not behaving with the dignity with which a king should act before his subjects.

David's response is meant to teach her and us about worship: "It was before the Lord..." he says. While Michal's concern is the people, David's focus is the Lord. Often in worship people will or won't do certain things because "what will other people think?" Or, if someone seems to cross some imaginary culture boundary of propriety, they will judge that person as acting in an improper way (and may even talk to the pastor about it!). This is a Michal-like response. Michal, by the way, isn't worshiping God at all, she's just watching--and judging.

To further turn on its head the way Reformed Regulative Principle is often understood and applied, David says "I will celebrate before the Lord! I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes," (from 2Sam.6:21-22). In other words, David is saying that in his celebration before the Lord, he is only beginning to explore the bounds of expressive celebration. He doesn't care one wit about his dignity. He doesn't care what other people think about him, or even what he thinks about himself! Personal dignity in worship is not the issue!

In this chapter, the phrase "before the Lord" occurs six times. Michal missed it; she missed the significance of this event and even more importantly she missed the Lord's presence among His people! Her focus was completely wrong, and therefore so was her assessment of David's expression of celebration before God.

I would never suggest that exorbitant celebration is the only proper form of worship. Of course not! It's also important to be quiet before the Lord (Psalm 46:10; Habakkuk 2:20, for example). But silence isn't the only form of worship. There is a time for quietness and a time for loud celebration.

All the Colors of Worship

Worship has many forms, many shapes, many colors, many sounds. It may be in a minor key, or a major one, Dorian or Mixolidian. It may be blue or yellow, gray or red. It may find the shape of high liturgy, or the freedom of total spontaneity. It may be all of those and blends of all of those. 

One thing worship is not is monotone, or monochromatic. Reading the Psalms, the worship book of the Bible, we find a very wide variety of expression. It's hard to think of an emotion that can't be found in the Psalms in some form or other, as all our emotions belong to God in worship.

I suppose there may be such a thing as excess in worship among some groups. I suppose that there are people who get so carried away that they actually are more interested in their wildness and freedom in worship than the One they claim to be worshiping. I don't think that's an issue among us Reformed types. If anything, we're more inclined to hold back too much. We take "decently and in order" out of its context: "do all things" (including speaking in tongues and prophesying in worship - 1Corinthians 14). I suspect the Reformed understanding of "decently and in order" is not the same as God's.

As David shows in this passage, and throughout the psalms that he wrote, God's greatness requires everything in us that can praise Him. This includes singing, playing musical and rhythm instruments, shouting, blowing trumpets, dancing, as well as tears, quietness, peace. It includes the type of joy that that's noisy and the type of joy that's at rest. 

God deserves our worship in all of its colors. Let's not outlaw certain of them because they don't fit our assumptions. Let's recapture the regulative principle and turn it on it's head: if it's in the Bible and it's not condemned there, it's okay for us too!

The Table That the Crumbs Fall From

...even the dogs...

In one of the most unusual stories of Jesus in the New Testament, a gentile woman comes to Jesus on behalf of her demonized young daughter. Jesus seems to at first ignore her (Matt. 15:23), and then rebuff her (Matt. 15:24), and finally insult her by comparing her to a dog (Matt. 15:26). At this time dogs were not so much pets as they were scavengers. Dogs are always depicted in a negative light in Scripture. Dogs eat what humans discard. To compare her and all gentiles to dogs is a sharp insult, one that echoes the attitudes of most Jews of Jesus' day--especially the Pharisees.

This doesn't sound like Jesus, does it? Yes, he insulted the members of the religious establishment, but He never once rebuffed anyone coming to Him for help, let alone insult them for trying. Yet, here...

Let's let the dissonance settle in for a bit. Jesus seems to go along with the Jewish assumptions about their superiority. His response to this woman seems to suggest that He also thought that the Jews were not only God's chosen, they deserved to be! Or, at least, the gentiles deserved it less.

But... But... That doesn't sound like Jesus, does it?!

I don't take it that way either. This story comes immediately after challenging some deeply held Jewish beliefs about what makes a person clean or unclean (in both Matthew and Mark's telling of the story). The very context makes us question the assumption that Jesus is playing the Jewish race card here, as racial purity was just as significant as dietary purity for the Jews at this time.

Let's suppose Jesus has already decided what He's going to do in the end--that He's going to grant this woman's request. Let's also suppose that He sees this as a teaching moment. Both assumptions seem to me to fit the way Jesus often responds to new situations. When He was told about Lazarus being sick, He deliberately stayed two more days, in order to teach His disciples about the power of God over death. It was a set up then. I read the "offensive" part of this story as a setup too.

By echoing the assumptions of His day, Jesus exposes these assumptions for what they are: assumptions that fail to reflect the character of God. When He accedes to the woman's statement "Even dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table," He confirms her assessment as correct theology: we do not receive from the hand of God because we are deserving, but because His table is bountiful.

This Got Me Thinking

What if she is right on another level? What if she not only recognizes that God will give her what she needs because of Who He is, rather than who she is, but that what she is asking for is trivial? What if she recognizes and Jesus affirms that healing and deliverance are crumbs that fall from the table and not bread eaten at the table?

For one involved in power ministry, especially coming out of a functional cessationism*, it is quite easy to see healing ministry, or the power gifts as the bread, compared to the crumbs of trying to live out of mere theological truths.  It's pretty cool when someone gets healed in front of your eyes, or their life is set free from years of demonic oppression. It really is! It's amazing! I wouldn't trade it for anything and I'll never go back to trying to do Christianity that has no demonstrable power in it.

But what if this woman is right: that compared to eating the bread of the Master's table, healing and deliverance are like crumbs that fall? What if the greater thing actually is eating at the table, in fellowship, as part of God's family?

I don't mean to diminish the importance of the miraculous, the importance of showing God's love for His children demonstrated in healing, deliverance and the like. As I said above, I don't want to ever live without that anymore, and I don't believe for a second that God wants us to!

On the other hand, I've been a part of healing ministry, where someone got healed and then returned to their same lifestyle as before--even doing the things that required them to come for healing! I've seen people delivered in amazing ways, only to return to bitterness and envy. It's crazy! Or is it? Maybe it's just that "crumbs" aren't enough. Maybe we should stop trying to understand crumbs as bread. Maybe we should stop trying to confuse a demonstration of the love of God with an encounter with the love of God.

The Bread At the Table

There is a bread for the children of God that feeds and fills. This bread is more than crumbs that fall from God's table. This bread is bread that is eaten at the table.

If the crumbs that fall are demonstrations of God's power and love, then the bread is that powerful love.

When we consider ourselves outsiders, undeserving ones, anything other than God's real children, we can find ourselves content with crumbs. We deserve no more--and apart from what Jesus has won for us, that's true. But what Jesus has won for us is this: Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God (John 1:12).

In Christ, our proper place is at the table, not fighting for the scraps that fall from it, nor being satisfied with crumbs. Our proper place, our rightful place is as children at the table.

Jesus' purpose for us was to make a way to the Father (John 14:6), and to receive the Father's love (John 14:21, 23). Yet for so many of us, whether within our outside of the charismatic camp, we live our Christian lives expecting no more than crumbs. We live with the assumption that we are dirty dogs, scavenging for crumbs. Yet our proper place is at the table, in loving fellowship with the Triune God. Our proper food is bread loaves, and not merely bread crumbs.

How do we do this? What does this look like to eat bread rather than crumbs? Mostly this is a matter of understanding who we are in Christ, and coming to believe that what Jesus accomplished for us actually applies to us and has been applied to us.

For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. (Rom. 8:14–16)  

 

It's a done deal. It's accomplished. And while there is more to come, we are sons and daughters now. When we were born again, God became our true Father; we were born into His family. That's not a metaphor, that's the new reality.

As God's children, His sons and daughters, we sit at the table as if we belong, because we do. We go to Him in prayer knowing He'll hear us as our Father. We go out doing what He asks because we trust that as Father He asks us to do what is good, and that He will be with us. We minister to His children knowing He loves them more than we do and wants to show them His love. We spread the Good News so that all God's children can find their proper place at the table too. So much more than getting our head on straight, bodies healed, people delivered, and even sins forgiven, we invite people into their place in God's family.

I hope these musings make sense. I've not said everything that could be said on this story, nor on this topic. I'm pondering what this might all mean, but I know that Abba loves me. Do you?

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*Cessationism is the belief that all so-called power ministry (healing, deliverance, miracles, even speaking in tongues) ceased when the Bible was assembled in the form we have it today (that is, when the canon was closed). A "functional cessationism" doesn't hold to this assumption as theology, so much as simply does not function in any of the so-called "power gifts."