Are We There Yet?

Ours is a narcissistic culture. That’s a fancy way of saying we are lovers of self and our own pleasures. The sad reality is that we are all products of our culture to some degree- our blind spots keep us from seeing just how self-centered we really are. Francis Schaeffer was right when he wrote over 20 years ago that the two priorities for Americans are personal peace (leave me alone and don’t bother me with anything) and affluence (I want it all and I want it now!).

What’s the cure for self-absorption, aka narcissism? Marriage and parenting sure help as they surface new levels of self centeredness. But even then we can retain our consumer driven mentality that it’s “all about the customer- me!”

The best cure for naricissism is worship. Corporate worship becomes the time when it becomes all about God. We need God-centered worship. We need a focus outside of ourselves and onto Him who created all things and redeemed us in Christ.

This is why we need to stay away from an entertainment model of worship. What’s that? That’s worship where you come merely an audience member, as a consumer. That’s worship where you come and are a passive receiver and not one who gives. Worship is not a spectator sport. It’s meant to be engaging and God centered.

In God centered worship, His Word takes center stage because that’s where He reveals Himself. This should be reflected in expositional preaching (where the text of Scripture determines content of the sermon and not vice versa), Word based hymns and confessions, Word saturated calls to confession and assurances of forgiveness, along with Scripturally driven and informed prayers.

God centered worship is what’s right and what’s healthy. Through God centered worship you’ll come to know greater freedom from one of your greatest idols- yourself. You’ll come to see God as He is revealed in Christ. You’ll focus more on Him and less on self and that’s always a good thing. You’ll see how big and glorious the gospel is and, believe it or not, you’ll leave more encouraged and satisfied than when you came in. That’s the paradox of worship- when you give of yourself and focus on giving all to God is when you receive the most.

Worship- the cure for narcissism.

This entry (Permalink) was posted on Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 at 10:36 am and is filed under Worship. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response , or trackback from your own site.