What to Do When You Are Having Problems Worshiping

There are a myriad of answers for this issue, but I will only focus on one area.  Let’s begin by thinking a little differently.

Have you ever ordered fast food from the pictures you see on the restaurant’s display and then were a little taken back when what you received bore very little likeness to the savory dish on the wall? Sometimes what we expect and what the reality is are two entirely difference things. Sometimes one of the reasons we have trouble worshiping is that what we thought our worship experience should be does not match what really happens.

To get the heart of the matter, we need to answer some basic questions: What determines how we enter worship? What do we expect to happen when we enter the sanctuary to worship on Sunday?
    –An overwhelming experience with the Living God?
   – How do we learn to base our expectation?
   – Past experience?
   – Preconceived ideas of those leading?
   – The situations or arguments from which we left to go to church?

Our expectations, what we believe will happen, greatly influences how we will worship. What do you expect when you walk into worship last Sunday? On what do you base your expectation?

Part of our preparation for corporate worship is faith that the God we worship will hear and receive what we bring. However, if our focus is inward, then we approach worship from what we will 'get out of it' and base our expectations from that viewpoint. Let me give an example.

I remember going to the store with my wife to get Christmas gifts for our children when they were young. We knew what they really wanted and have saved for the occasion, since our income was limited and the option of getting 'anything or everything' wasn't possible. There was a joyful anticipation not only looking for the gift, but thinking about the smiles and giggles of watching them open and play with them.  The reason we got the gifts was not so we would feel good, but for the joy we knew it would bring them.

One of the problems with our personal preparation with worship is that sometimes our primary focus is more like the children looking for the gifts, than the parents giving them. These feelings are not bad, just immature. To the child, the point of Christmas is the gifts. The later demonstrates that the reason gifts were given was for the personal pleasure it brought to the person giving them. Our primary focus in worship must be God, not the feelings, or blessings, but hearing and responding in obedience to Him, so that we are bringing our lives, our will, our emotions, all that we are as a sacrifice before Him.

Our focus can also be revealed by how we describe the activity.  Statements like,  "I'm going to hear _____ preach," or "I'm excited because _______ is leading worship," seem to point more what we might receive than the opportunity of offering our 'sacrifice of praise.’ It is natural to respond to some leaders more than others, but the issue of whether we worship or not should not be governed by others. We are responsible before God to offer Him our worship regardless.

How many times do we think to ourselves or say to others, “I’m so excited because I’m going to spend time worshiping God!” ?  In the Old Testament, the responsibility to worship did not change even when the leadership was not godly.  When Eli was High Priest, his two sons, Hophni and Phineas were responsible for part of the sacrifices that the people of Israel were offering. The condemnation from God, spoken to the young Samuel, was to Eli and his sons, whom he failed to teach and who sinned flagrantly against God. God did not tell the young boy prophet that because the High Priest and his sons were wrong that the people did not need to offer their sacrifices. The people were responsible before God to be obedient and to worship Him regardless who was in charge. The point is this: our focus must be on God, not the leadership on the platform. If you are dependent on a specific person to be able to worship or hear a word from God, then there is a possibility that the focus is more on a person than on God, Himself.

I can remember leading worship at a specific time when I honestly wasn’t to thrilled with the person that was going to be preaching.  I tried to refocus, asked the Lord to help me through this and to help those there to really see Him.  God was faithful. From the lips of this very person I really didn’t want to listen to came an insight from Scripture that was just what I needed at that time.  When God turned my focus back on Him, I was more open to hearing what He had to say.

Another issue is the belief that those in leadership positions are responsible for how well we worship. No to unlike the Olympics, many in the congregation gather listening to the music, songs, sermon and then pronounce their judgment: “Great day, I felt a full 9.6 today. --Or the music was a little off, not enough beat, sermon wasn’t up to par, only got to at 3.5 this morning.”  Whether or not we say it out loud or not, when we think such things we are revealing that our worship is dependent on the good performance of those on the platform more than our obedient response to God’s revelation.

True worship is that obedient response to God’s revealed nature and character. It is a choice we make, not a feeling we have.

Let’s summarize “What to Do When You Are Having Problems Worshiping”
    – Look at your expectations in worship
    – Remember that we are not the focus of worship, but God
    – We are responsible to worship, regardless of the leadership.
    – Worship is a choice to respond in obedience, not a feeling we have.

How can we transform our expectations to those that will be pleasing to God?

This list is by no means exhaustive, but may serve to at least get things started:
1. First, we need to be students of what biblical worship truly is. Then, begin to ask the difficult questions:
2. Are we coming with 'clean hands and pure heart'?  Psalm 24:3-4
3. Have we been reconciled with others; forgiving those who have offend us and asking forgiveness from those we have offended? Matt. 5:23-4; 18
4. Are we approaching worship 'thanking God for what He has done and praising Him for who He is? Psalm 100:3-4
5. Are we being obedient to what God has already commanded us to do?
6. Are we coming to worship focusing more on what we may get out of it, than the joy of pleasing God?
7. Is our focus on those that might be leading or preaching, than on giving to God an obedient response?

As we begin to shift our focus and expectations our experience of worship will take on new depth and meaning and we can begin to address at least one of the problems involved in worship.

Disappointments, Expectations and Worship

Sometimes plans change, or are changed and you get caught in the middle. Even when you think that you were following God’s direction, all of a sudden you find yourself in completely different circumstances than what you had expected or planned. Did you miss God’s will? Did God speak and you just miss hearing His voice? Did you do something that caused God to stop talking? I would not pretend to understand how the Father chooses to reveal Himself, but I do know that many times in Scripture there were men and women who were trusting and following God and the answers did not come as they expected.

Abraham believed God would send a son through Sarah, but years passed and nothing happened. It was not until he was 100 and she was 90, when everything looked hopeless, did God step in and work in a way that would bring Him the most glory. Moses led the people to the Red sea and realized that although he was following  God’s plan as best he knew, it looked hopeless until God worked. In fact, the 40 years in the desert was a time of learning that Jehovah  was God over deserts, food, water, enemies and every situation they would encounter.  God chose not to fulfill the human expectation, but bring glory to His holy name.

Naaman, the pagan general, before Elisha is another wonderful example of misguided expectation. When the prophet told him to go and wash, he said, “I thought he would come out and wave his hand over the spot and say some words and make me clean, and all he says is go wash in a muddy river?”  Thankfully one of the general’s servants convinced him to obey and his response is one of worship to God alone.

To the disciples the greatest disappointment was the cross. Three and a half years of seeing the unbelievable, seeing even the dead raised to life must have made the disciples believe that Jesus was invincible. They must have felt that their position and power because of Him was secure.  ... And then there was the cross. I’m sure they passed those two nights without sleep in grief and vain attempts to figure out what had happened. Had they been deceived? When Jesus appeared to the after three days the depth of their despair turn into the heights of rejoicing. Indeed the risen Christ was Lord of all, their preconceived expectations melted as they watched him eat the fish and explain the Scripture, passages they knew, but did not understand.  Disappointments, failed expectations, all can cause us great anguish.

What about worship? I am not saying that sin will not block our understanding of God’s will or hearing His voice. But sometimes the way God teaches us to trust Him is in the silence of obedience in unfulfilled expectation. We walk into a worship service, having confessed our sins, claimed the love and forgiveness of the Father, thanked Him for such grace and mercy and expected an incredible experience of worship, only to hear ...nothing......just silence. Our expectation might have led us to believe that we would feel something “extra” today or there would something quite special and unique about the service and nothing happened.  Yes, we need to check to see if there is something wrong, but this just might also be a time of silence that we must stand in obedience and worship with only the assurance that God is Who He says He is and will do what He says He will do. 

The measure of our worship is not based on our expectations, but the assurance of God’s nature and character. My thoughts, feelings, emotions change like the tides of the sea, but God never changes. Our worship is not dependent on the feelings that can be generated in response to a sermon or song, but on the obedient response to the revelation of God’s nature and character.  Let’s give Him our expectations, our disappointments, and bow in worship, even if it’s in silence.