worship necessary for congregational
participation (2 Chronicles 5:11-14)
An ‘act’ on the other hand also means
to ‘stage’ a situation; also to ‘make-
believe’ or ‘pretend’. Considering
Jesus emphasis on worship in truth
in John 4, the aspect of ‘acting’ is an
important consideration for us to note.
In other words, the Father seeks true
worshippers who will do it in spirit and
in truth and not those who will pretend
- opposite of ‘truth’ is ‘falsehood’ Does
this suggest there could be subtle
deceptions in our worship on the
individual and corporate levels? Well I
think so.
To a large extent today’s believer
identifies ‘worship’ with outward and
the expressive rather than the inner,
spiritual intimacy which only the Father
can appreciate. Humanly speaking our
outward expressions to a very large
extent are what most people use as a
measure of whatever we do including
our worship. Because it is generally
accepted that we reflect what we have,
wrong conclusions can be drawn from
what we do on the outward. Remember
that outward expressions can be
easily learned and so any able bodied
person can ‘lift’ their hands, ‘bow’ the
knee or ‘prostrate’ if required without
necessarily worshiping. Worship can
therefore be acted out to show a form
of piety without the real deep and
intimate connection with God. Just as
we act plays to communicate ideas and
principles to our audiences, we can
easily act out worship for convenience
- the words, songs, actions and all. The
worship leader can ‘act’ out worship
just as the congregation member also
can. Interestingly though, the worship
leaders act could actually provide the
atmosphere for true worship within
the congregation or for the listener!
More on this later!
For now let it suffice that what we
all need to do is to develop the ‘art’
of worship and not focus on the
‘act’ of worship. The ‘art’ will lead
to a spontaneous expression, and
the ‘acts’ that follow will be genuine
expressions that will give glory to God
and not mere staged performances.
Sidney Koranteng
Chief Facilitator, Asaph’s
Corner Ministries.