Worship Fully

Sermon for Sunday, Nov. 27, 2011 at First UMC of West newton
First Sunday in Advent
Scripture: Luke 1:39-55

This year, First United Methodist Church is conspiring during Advent. That means we're planning and plotting together to make a noticeable difference in this world. After all, that is our call as Christians - to be disciples who transform this world in the name of Jesus Christ.

We will do so by joining with countless other churches in the Advent Conspiracy. The Advent Conspiracy is a different approach to preparing for Christ’s birth. There are four themes to the Advent Conspiracy, and we'll focus on one each Sunday in Advent. These themes and practices are: worship fully, spend less, give more, and love all. But in fact, these are not mutually exclusive actions. Each one affects the other. Spending less frees us to give more, love all, and worship fully. Loving all motivates us to spend less, give more, and worship fully. And spending less, giving more, and loving all is a wonderful description of how to fully worship God.

And that is our topic today: what does it mean to worship fully, and how can we conspire to do so, not just during the holiday season, but every day of the year?

The word worship comes from the Old English word "weorthscipe", which means giving praise or honor or worth to someone or something. Worship is proclaiming, in words and action, belief that someone or something is valued more than anything else in our life. By that definition, we all worship fully already. But it may not always be God who we're worshiping. We fully worship a number of things. At any given moment, we could probably be found worshiping popularity, our career, our comfortable way of life, a celebrity or athlete or sports team or band. I'm sure most of us could easily recognize when we've placed ultimate value and worth in these things rather than God.

Sometimes less easy to recognize is when we worship things that are good, but not ultimately where we should direct our worship. At times, we may find ourselves guilty of worshiping the Bible, or morality, an ideology, or even a good Christian leader. We might also worship the Church or our church, or we may worship our family and friends, placing one of these things in the position of primary importance in our lives. Again, if we're honest with ourselves, we are all probably guilty of taking these good, valuable things, and putting them above God in the time and attention and devotion we give to them, of worshiping them rather than the God who created them.

A little over a week ago, Lisa and I were in downtown Pittsburgh for the annual light-up night. One of the first things we went to see was the Pittsburgh Crèche (Nativity), on display every year at the Steel Building. Only this year, the setting was a bit different than any other year. Across the street from the crèche, in Mellon Green, is the Occupy Pittsburgh movement. So, as we approached, we encountered these hearty protesters seizing the opportunity of large, passing crowds to loudly proclaim their case against Wall Street, corporations, capitalism, greed, and whatever else the Occupy movement seems to be fighting against. They were passionate, if not articulate.

As I walked past and quickly scanned the scene of this makeshift tent city, I thought about their passion. Here are people who have dedicated themselves to live in a downtown park, for as long as it takes, for a purpose. Here are people so wrapped up in a movement that they have given their lives to the movement. Now, we won't go into the validity or merit of the Occupy Wall Street movement - that discussion is for another time and place. But the point here is, I saw people worshiping fully - they were fully worshiping, fully dedicating themselves, to participate in a movement seeking change the world.

Of course, the same passion can be seen by activists on the other side of the ideological spectrum: the Tea Party movement is full of worshipers, dedicating all of themselves to a cause that they too proclaim as a form of justice. They too are incredibly passionate, if not articulate. But again, this is neither the time nor the place to justify or dismiss the Tea Party movement - I'll leave that for political pundits and cable news talking heads and voters on election day.

In fact, all I will say now is, if you do feel called to join a movement such as the Tea Party or Occupy Wall Street or whatever else comes our way in the future, that may be fine, but if you proceed, do so with caution. Those two movements and many like them are politically or socially motivated, man-made ideologies that will never satisfy your spiritual hunger and will never provide hope in the way that only Christ can provide. I believe there is only one movement worth sacrificing everything for and dedicating your life to, and that movement is the work of God through Jesus Christ, empowered by the Holy Spirit.

But as I walked by the Occupy Pittsburgh camp last week, I couldn't help but wonder when the last time was that I heard of or saw Christians so taken by the movement of the Holy Spirit that they left all they had to literally set up camp downtown. I don't often see that from Christians. Nor do I often enough see Christians organize rallies like the Tea Party to support the cause for God's justice - justice over slavery, poverty, disease, war, and famine. But just last week, in the midst of the kickoff of the downtown holiday shopping season, the most consumer-driven time of the year, Occupy Pittsburgh rang out in that moment as a counter cultural prophecy to our infatuation with the American capitalist Christmas.

On the opposite side of Sixth Street, where the crèche is, I saw an entirely different form of worship. There was no shouting, and in fact very little talking at all. Sure, some people treated the crèche as little more than a tourist attraction, eager to take and post a picture on Facebook with their phones to prove they were there. But even those people sensed the need to do so reverently. And by and large, the crowd stood silently, just taking in the beauty of it all, in a moment of reflection and meditation. Nearby was a choir singing so angelically: "Silent night…holy night…" And it was there, in the chaos and confusion of the light-up night crowd of half a million people, all was calm, and all was bright. The creche and its impromptu congregation stood as an oasis of peace that nourished the soul in soothing, restful ways.

And the road that ran between the crèche and the Occupy camp was Sixth Street. I believe worship of God can look like both sides of this street. Sometimes, worship is a soothing, peaceful moment of rest in an otherwise chaotic and out of control world. It can be a way to draw us safely into God's presence, where we may turn our eyes upon Jesus and nothing in this world can threaten to distract us. But other times, worship of God might look more like the Occupy movement: prophetically preaching on a street corner against the ways and systems of this world, standing up for what we think is fair and just, proclaiming the movement we're a part of - not only with our words, but with our whole being.

Worship can be the serenity of a Christmas Eve candlelight service, but worship can also be taking social or political action against poverty in your own neighborhood. Worship can be a moment of devotion to start our day, or the delivering of bed nets to sub-Saharan Africa. Worship can be defined as fully resting in a moment of peace and tranquility, or it can be fully dedicating oneself to a movement that glorifies God. Worship is any action that gives praise and honor to God, and asserts that God is valued more in our lives than anything else.

A life of worshiping fully is both a peaceful moment of rest and a passionate movement of unrest. Peaceful moments of rest, on their own, so shelter us from the world that we forget that Christ was seldom found in church because he was busy befriending the people in the street. But passionate movements of unrest are dangerous without that Silent Night chorus - they become a clanging gong or clashing cymbal that is not rooted in Christ's love for us.

To worship fully is to give ultimate value to the God who comes at Christmas, and to do so in peaceful moments and full dedication to the movements of the Holy Spirit in this world. To live a life of worship requires tremendous discipline and self reflection. It requires that at every turn, in every moment, with every decision, we should ask ourselves, “Is what I’m about to do or say giving praise and honor and glory to God, or is it giving praise to someone or something of this world?”

Even further, to worship fully requires the gathering together of the community of faith.

I often wonder why Mary, the mother of Jesus, made a trip to visit Elizabeth. And I wonder, had she not, would we still have the Magnificat, Mary's praise song in Luke 1:47-55? Sometimes I think, had it not been for Elizabeth, Mary would not have sung this song of praise to God. And had it not been for Mary, Elizabeth may not have believed in the prophecy growing in her own womb. Both their conversation and Mary's song had elements of peaceful rest and passionate participation in the movement of God’s kingdom breaking into this world.

Mary praised God in song - and I imagine that scene was as peacefully simple as soaking up a manger scene while listening to a choir sing a carol. The Magnificat is symbolic of Mary's peaceful moment of rest and acceptance of the divine call placed on her life. I believe her visit with Elizabeth is what moved Mary to be at peace with carrying the Christ child. Before Elizabeth, Mary's tone seems to be that of tentative assent. But after Elizabeth's words of blessing, Mary has moved to a posture of joyful acceptance of the blessing growing inside of her.

But as Mary's song continues, it also contains elements of prophetic hope and promise for a new generation. The coming of God in Christ signifies that God's kingdom is breaking into this world in a new way. And the hope and promise of that action is the lifting up of the lowly, the tearing down of the powerful people and systems of this world, the liberation of those held captive, the feeding of the hungry, and the continued fulfillment of the covenant made with Abraham. All of these hopeful promises are found in the few short lines of Mary’s song.

Simply put, Christmas is not just about warm, fuzzy feelings as we sip hot chocolate and listen to heavenly carols. Christmas is not about making us feel good. This holiday is fundamentally about God's kingdom breaking into our world to reform, renew, and transform. It is about God loving us enough to come into our lives and world in a new way, to give hope to those who need it and a new perspective of humility for those in power.

Our annual celebration of this event is a reminder that this movement of God’s in-breaking kingdom is still going on, 2000+ years later. And in particular, God is calling out to us from a street corner to get on board with the ways God is living and acting in this world.

Particularly this Advent, God is calling us to conspire. Part of the goal of Advent Conspiracy is to get us thinking differently about Christmas; to get us thinking about it as it originally was: a world-changing event, a time to give glory to God rather than each other.

So, I won’t go into it too much today, but one of the things we’ll be doing as a congregation is spending less on gifts for ourselves and each other, so we can be free to provide clean drinking water to those who have no access to it all around the world. We’ll do this through an organization called Living Water International, and they created a brief video that I want you to see:

If you couldn’t tell, that was taken underneath the running faucet of a new well drilled by Living Water International, so that people who didn’t have clean, safe drinking water now experience the joy of having it. I don’t know about you, but just watching that reminds me of how often I take clean water for granted. It has moved me into a posture of worshiping God with praise and thanksgiving every time I turn on a faucet to take a shower, wash my hands, or simply pour a glass of drinking water. We use water all the time, yet how often do we fully worship the God who provides it? And how often do we think of the millions of people who are unable to receive this great gift of life?

If you read Mary’s song closely, you’ll notice that she sees the coming Christ child not just as a peaceful, silent night, but also as a revolution on the way, a movement with great passion and energy. This too, I believe, was something Mary recognized only after visiting with Elizabeth. And that is why it's important for us to gather for worship with others - so we may help each other discern how God is living and moving in this world, and that we may encourage each other as we join this revolutionary movement, one that, when complete, will turn the whole world upside down.

This season, and all year round, I hope you find ways to move yourselves toward worshiping fully. I hope that, in living a life of worship, you can find peaceful moments of rest as well as passionate movements of unrest. I hope you'll journey down Sixth Street with your Christian brothers and sisters, finding a crèche on your left - perhaps Christmas Eve worship or a restful moment with family, wonderfully worshipful things. But I also hope you’ll find the revolution on your right – the reality of God’s kingdom breaking into this world or the conspiracy of giving clean water to others as your gift to God this Christmas. And I hope that, if you're tempted to spend all your time on one side of the street, you'll at least spend some time on the other side as well.

Yes, Christmas can be peaceful and angelic and heavenly. It is a moment of respite from the busy, chaotic confusion that often defines our world. Yet, Christmas is not ultimately about escaping this world. It is about God entering it with great promise and hope. Christmas is a reminder that God is living and active all around us, and is in the process of making all things new, of lifting up the lowly and tearing down the powerful, of leading a movement that calls us to take part.

This Christmas, find both God's moment and God's movement in this world. Fully immerse yourself in both that moment and that movement, and you will, like Mary, discover how Christmas truly can transform both your heart and this world. Will you conspire with me to worship fully, in both the moment and in the movement of Christmas? In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.