Worship

All I think when I hear the word ‘worship’ is negative.  I don’t like this word.  Confession: when I saw it was the theme of this weeks #FmFParty I cringed a little.

On the one hand I hear…

…crazy Christians worshipping Jesus.  Jesus.  As if that’s a thing.

…Sunday morning worship where a bunch of old people sit and listen to pre-historic hymns & irrelevant fundamentalist teachings on homophobic and racist anti-liberal platitudes.

…that weird thing Pentacostal Christians do when they run around like shizophrenic beheaded chickens.

On the other hand I hear…

…wealthy Americans bowing to worship wealth, fame & notoriety at all costs.

…drunken teen-agers hanging over the edge of a toilet bowl, bowing in worship to the toilet gods.

…selfishness.  Selfies. iWorship myself. Lovers of our ourselves with every indulgence possible.

I have very few good associations to the word.  Hyper as I am, to the relevance of my faith in an increasingly hostile anti-Christian environment I don’t typically find myself sprouting off the words, “I worship God.”  I tend to use the lingo “I follow Jesus, ” instead.

Jesus.  The accessible one.  Jesus, the one who lived his life out in worship without ever needing to yell in folks faces I WORSHIP GOD OH YES I DO!

The best worship I can hope to do is rooted in selfless love for God & neighbor.  Hubby & kiddos.  City & world.  Poor & broken.  In a best case scenario.  Worst case, which is often true, I’m slummin’ it with e’rybody else iWorshipping my own life asking for Jesus’ help.

What about you? What do you think of when you hear the word worship?

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“On Fridays around these parts we like to write. Not for comments or traffic or anyone else’s agenda. But for pure love of the written word. For joy at the sound of syllables, sentences and paragraphs all strung together by the voice of the speaker.

We love to just write without worrying if it’s just right or not. For five minutes flat.

Here’s how we do it:

1. Write for 5 minutes flat with no editing, tweaking or self critiquing.

2. Link back here and invite others to join in {you can grab the button code in my blog’s footer}.

3. Go and tell the person who linked up before you what their words meant to you. Every writer longs to feel heard.

OK, are you ready? Give me your best five minutes for the prompt: Worship.”

–Lisa-Jo Baker’s Five Minute Friday