One day a church member walked out of church and declared to the pastor, “I didn’t get anything out of worship today.” The preacher calmly replied, “Oh, good. I’m thankful. It wasn’t directed to you. It was directed to God.” I wonder if you’ve ever thought of it that way before. I believe that much of our fuzzy thinking about worship is due to our fuzzy thinking about God. J.H. Jowett, a preacher who lived a long time ago, wrote that we have robbed God of His awful glory and are poorer for it. He said we have picked and chosen the tender, easy parts of knowing God and left out the appalling. Or, let me say it in a more 21^st century way: Don Miller, in Blue Like Jazz, says we try to chart God on a grid and spend too little time allowing our hearts to feel awe and wonder.

 

Let’s imagine that worshiping God is like rock climbing. After all, v. 3 asks the question about who is able to “ascend the hill of the LORD”. I think I’m on to something because Eugene Peterson translates that verse, “Who can climb Mount God? Who can scale the holy north-face?” One of our college students, Adam Sanders, attends Colorado State University. He enjoys rock climbing as a hobby (when he is not studying, of course!). I asked him to reflect on the comparison of rock climbing and worship. Let’s listen. [watch the video].

 

I don’t know about you, but I think there are some great insights and comparisons between rock climbing and worship—we must be respectful and focused. This is not child’s play. We must be content with outcomes and know that the Rock is greater than we are.  

 

Now, get the picture. Most scholars think that this psalm is a re-enactment by Israel of God’s great deliverance. The people gathered excitedly outside the Temple, waiting to come in. Perhaps a priest stood up and shouted vv. 1-2. Worship begins with a declaration. God owns it all! He holds the title to everything! So what can we offer the God who owns it all? Just one thing. Ourselves, our love, our worship. Every week when we gather to worship, we are humbling announcing, “I’m not in charge. I’m not in control. God is.”

 

With that matter of humility established, the worship goes on with antiphonal, back-and-forth echoing, “Who shall ascend the hill of the LORD…?” (v. 3) Answer: “Those who have clean hands and pure hearts…” (v. 4). It might surprise you to know something about some of the Canaanite religions of the Old Testament era, and the religions of Palestine during Jesus’ lifetime. Not all of them tied together morality and worship. You could go to your temple and do your worship thing, but it had no connection to morality, choices made, telling the truth. Notice v. 4b: the vertical: we don’t lift our soul to empty idols. The horizontal: we don’t like and cheat others. Our hearts and hands are clean.

 

The other day I was having trouble reading signs on the road and reading the menu at a restaurant. It turns out I had outside and had smeared sun screen all over my face. I must have gotten some of the cream on my glasses. I needed to clean the lenses! If we aren’t experiencing real worship when we come here, maybe it’s because our hearts are crusted over with so much grime the Spirit can’t get through. And maybe if we got closer to God the other six days, we wouldn’t have to start all over again each Sunday!

 

Notice, when our hearts and lives are open, we receive God’s blessing (v. 5). But a warning here. We are not talking about works salvation. We don’t get clean in order to earn merit points with God. God does not give blessings to those who seek the blessings, but to those who seek Him. Not first of all His toys, His trinkets, His good things—but God. The face of God (v. 6)! God wants to bless your life. He wants to tell you how much He loves you and affirms your presence on this earth. You matter to Him.

 

Years ago, when our children were small, our oldest would see me kissing my wife Janet and say, “I see you guys are getting married again.” “No,” we explained, “you get married once, but you keep on loving and kissing.” Every Sunday worship is a time of falling in love with God all over again. It is rededication. It is a continual act of humility, saying, “I’m not in control. I didn’t bring all this into being. You did, God, I’m yours.”

 

 No now, the worshiping throng has been waiting, chanting outside the Temple, call and response about their readiness to receive what the might God has for them. Now, the whish! Movement of the congregation (vv. 7-10) with more responsive readings. And who leads the procession in? One of the priests? One of the congregation? No. The King of glory! Glory…think about it. One time in 2 Chronicles 7, King Solomon prayed and the glory of God so filled the Temple that the priests couldn’t enter, the glory so filled the place. Remember in Luke 9, Jesus took three disciples with him and went up on a mountain to pray and worship. In the midst of that, Jesus’ face and body were changed. Glory was all around! Glory!

 

The German philosopher Nietzsche observed that under the impact of technology and modern life, faith grows increasingly weightless…there is a hollowing out that involves the loss of glory, a weightlessness. Light-weight worship! Nietzsche didn’t use the phrase, because McDonalds hadn’t come into existence yet, but I think he was talking about “McChurch”, where we get in a drive-through lane, order the blessings we need and pick them up, arrogantly assuming we can have these things without a personal relationship with the God who gives them. What if instead we captured a glimpse of glory, caught up in radical wonder, stunned worship, in which our senses were renewed and we experienced God.  One who is greater than us has defeated all our enemies and loves us without ceasing.