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Loving God 101, Part 10: Where God’s Voice Is Loudest (Corporate Worship)

August 4, 2015August 4, 2015Kirk WinslowLeave a comment

If we believe that God is actively seeking to communicate with us (see Loving God 101, Part 1 and Part 3), then we would be wise to go the places where we know God’s voice is loudest. We’ve already examined some of these (e.g., sacraments, acts of compassion and service to others). But the place where God’s voice is (or – if we are doing things somewhat correctly, should be) the loudest is in the corporate worship of the church.

Indeed, Jesus declares that “wherever two or three are gathered in my name” he is present (a vision of the worship of the early church [Gk., for “church” is ekklesia, and refers specifically to the community and never to the building]).

Thus when we gather as a community to “worship,” God is with us and – though the elements of worship (prayer, song, sermon, sacraments…) – offering contact. In other words, what we do on Sunday is not our gift to God, but God’s gift of his presence to us.

How much better we would be if church leaders and church goers could both come to see that our Sunday gatherings have nothing to do with giving glory to God for God’s sake (as if God is somehow lacking in glory or desiring a little extra dose!), but or ours. We are the ones who need to step into the glory of God’s loving presence and in worship it is there for us to find if we can open our hearts to experience it (and contribute to the experience for each other). (If that sounds heretical, perhaps take a moment to listen to this…?)

In this episode my friend, Matt Sasso, leads us through we will take another look at what we mean by “worship” and how we can grow by means of our intentional participation.

This is a sermon that was originally presented at Canvas (a Presbyterian church in Irvine, CA), March 15, 2015. To learn more about Canvas, click here!

Loving God 101, Part 9: Being Where Jesus Already Is (Charity)

July 29, 2015July 29, 2015Kirk WinslowLeave a comment

Love is learned by experience. I often think of it as osmosis – absorbing from the environment. In other words, if we want to love, we must begin by being regularly in the presence of love to let it have its effect on us.

Understanding this has many implications for the relationships we form, the communities to which we pledge our allegiance, how we spend our time… And, in particular, it explains how we are to think of spiritual disciplines and exercises: they are there to help put us in God’s presence (and using them for other purposes – e.g., to be pleasing to God – is both foolish and useless!).

As we continue our reflection on growing to maturity in Christ – intimately connecting to discerning God’s “voice” in our lives – we look in this episode at the “discipline” (you know I don’t love that word) of “service to others” (I don’t love that phrase either). In classical terms (which I much prefer!) it is known as charity (from the Latin caritas – which was used to translate the Greek agape (= “love”‘/”compassion” in the New Testament).

The idea is quite simple: One thing we know for sure is that Jesus is forever in the business of charity/compassion (see all the miracles of healing in the gospels). Just because Jesus has risen, does not mean he has stopped his work! Rather, by means of the Holy Spirit, Jesus is continually engaged in the process of restoring God’s broken world. And if we want to be in his presence – to be in Love’s presence – one sure and certain place we know Jesus will be is in caring for people in need.

In short: If we want to be transformed by the love of God, we have to be near God. And if we are looking for God, we need look no further than joining in the care of others.

This is a sermon that was originally presented at Canvas (a Presbyterian church in Irvine, CA), March 8, 2015. To learn more about Canvas, click here!

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Loving God 101, Part 8: Accepting the Invitation to the Table

July 26, 2015July 25, 2015Kirk WinslowLeave a comment

For most of Christian history, the central element of both corporate worship and individual prayer has been regular participation in the sacrament of Communion. Indeed, the Roman Catholic mass still centers on the Eucharist (as the Lord’s Supper is also called) as the priest consecrates the elements of bread and wine and invites the people of God to share in the body of Christ.

And while I share the Reformer’s opinion that, by the 16th century, the sacrament had become distorted in a manner that bordered on “magic”(seeing the priest being the agent who literally transformed the bread and wine into the physical body and blood of Jesus), their efforts to restore the Bible to the center of the Christian life has had the unintended consequence of pushing Communion to the periphery.

In far too many churches the sacraments are celebrated terribly rarely (I grew up in a church that celebrated Communion quarterly) and with such overwrought reverence that it has become empty ritual once again! Ugh! How much the early church saw things differently!

The sacrament is the very invitation our hearts are longing for – the direct call of God to come and be present with him. In the Lord’s Supper we are being offered a seat at the family table of the Father and Son, who fills the bread and cup not with physical flesh and blood of Jesus, but with his Spirit. There we have the opportunity to make direct contact with the God of love and compassion, if only we can learn to open ourselves to receive it. Such preparation is not about purifying one’s life (or who could come?) or the proper ritual to prepare the scene (Jesus never once stood on ceremony!), but about being present to ourselves and understanding – intellectually and emotionally – what is being offered to us.

This is a sermon that was originally presented at Canvas (a Presbyterian church in Irvine, CA), March 1, 2015. To learn more about Canvas, click here!

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