My wife was reading her Bible the other night and came in to show me something from the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament) which spoke of the attention to detail the Lord demanded in His worship. Every article of furniture in the Tabernacle, every curtain, every pole, every rod, every sacrifice was to be made and offered with the best quality fabrics and metals, with the highest quality of animals, and from totally devoted hearts. God considered it such a serious matter that He took the lives of Aaron's sons on the spot when they brought their own invented brand of incense to offer. After all, they had a better idea, or so they thought.
I got to thinking about that. In today's American church, we have two extremes. While I am certain there are many good churches in the middle where they should be, a lot of churches tend to drift to one extreme or the other. On the one hand, there are those who are so into quality that they almost become a performance. They are "slick" and polished with a human-made luster. The congregation becomes, for the most part, merely a group of spectators watching the high quality music and teaching from the "stage." (I remember when it was called a chancel).
But far more churches, in my view, drift to the other extreme, where "anything is good enough for God." They sing and read Scripture and lead in prayer without practice, without thought, without heart. Worship services are more "us-centered" than they are Christ-centered. We want to worship Him for what He can do for us, rather than just for who He is. Prayer, rather than exalting the glories and beauties of our Lord and presenting our greatest need before Him, turns into a "laundry list" of what we need. True reverence (to be distinguished from solemnity) is a thing of the past. We breeze into the service whenever we feel like it and then get impatient when it seems to be, in our minds, going a little long. Reminds me of the sarcasm of the prophet Amos in Amos 8:4 when he refers to worshipers saying, "When will the New Moon be over that we may sell grain and the Sabbath be ended that we may market wheat?" In other words, "When does church let out so we can get back to real life?!"
If we are truly going to see Christ as our Treasure, surely this means that, for starters, we must change our attitudes about worship. God deserves our best. Being Brethren, I know we have a value of simple living, which is a good value, when it is not abused. But sadly, most of us will worship in a dump and say we live simply, while we would never apply those standards to our own homes. If I read the Bible correctly, I think God says, "Apply the value of simple living to your own lives and homes and cars, but when it comes to me, it should be your absolute best, without any skimping."
"And (Christ) is the head of the body, the church; He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him. ... In (Christ) are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." (Colossians 1:18-19, 2:3, NIV), So let's worship like this is true.
