Firstly, let me say that this is not
just another post about just praising God because He created the cosmos, but
one that seeks to go deeper than what may appear on the surface level. Second,
it is easy to be someone on the outside and say something like, “your God is an
egomaniac and a narcissist who needs the praises of others to feel good about
Himself,” yet, is worship, a fundamental tenet of Christianity, really that
shallow?
Right off the bat we need to realize
that when we view God the latter way, we are imposing a human paradigm on Him.
In other words, God is being brought down to the level of a human being and
being judged as if He is one. If I heard a fellow human being asking me to
worship him, or who required his followers to worship him, I would likely agree
that there is something seriously wrong with that person. However, God is not
such a person. In fact, if we want to discuss God fairly, then we must
acknowledge that He, properly understood, transcends all of the created order.
In other words, God created the cosmos, and therefore, since he preceded its
creation, is not contingent on it. God does not need the cosmos to live, and He
did not originate in the cosmos. All of creation, therefore, is a direct result
of God’s action and volition. If this is true, then creation is contingent on
God, who built into the very fabric of time and space, our base desires, needs,
purpose and meaning. As such, God is anything but ignorant of what is good for
us (since He built them into us).
What then has He built into us? What
then was our purpose from the beginning? Our purpose from creation was to live
in relationship with God; not as equals, but to commune with Him. As we know,
God did not want automatons, so He gave us the choice to accept and commune
with Him, or to reject Him. This ability to choose stems from the fact that we
were “made in His image” (the “imago dei”); we were given the capacity to
reason one way or another, to choose personal desire or God. Yet, our capacity
to choose did not change what we are, and what we have been created for.
So what happened? Sin entered the
world. Sin is anything that brings us farther from our highest purpose:
communing with God. Everything that constitutes sin ultimately brings harm not
only to the sinner committing the sin (as everyone is a sinner), but also to
others. In God’s mercy, He sent us His only Son to pay the price for our
choices and for us rejecting Him. In summation so far, whatever is harmful for
us is sin (as the Bible depicts harmful), sin that by its very nature rejects
communing with God and brings us farther from Him.
What is meant by “communing?” When
God created us, He created us in such a way that we find our deepest longings,
satisfaction and desire only in Him. The completeness and highest realizations in
our lives are entirely contingent on God. God does reciprocate these strongly,
as His love for us is immeasurable, but He Himself is not contingent on them. He does not “need” our worship, but rather,
we need to worship Him!
Therefore, when we worship God, we are not stroking His ego, but are receiving
the needs and desires of our hearts for which we were created. Worshiping God,
then, does immeasurably more for the worshiper than it does the worshiped. The
fact that we can worship God is an act of love and mercy in itself. Worship
allows us to commune with God and be in relationship with Him. Those who reject
God and do not worship Him are simply causing themselves great harm and are
subjugating themselves to a miserable mediocrity; a mediocrity that lives
primarily for the short-lived kicks in life, not unlike a mouse and a pleasure
button. As Christians, we need not fall victim to the allure of cheap
substitutes, but have the real thing: God Himself. Those who worship God,
worship Him at their great benefit and fulfillment; those who do not, to their
harm. God has us in mind when He asks
us to worship Him.
Yet, here is an interesting point: If
we worship God with the chief end being our benefit or desire, we are not
worshiping God, but ourselves. At this point, our worship has become vain, and
we live as though we do not worship Him. Rather, our identity must be in Him,
and this is what worship enables us to do: to put our identity into someone who
cannot be shaken. How many of us put our value in pervasive personal identities
like being an “effective teacher,” or “someone that everyone likes?” We each
have our own identities that we are particularly susceptible to. Yet, we are
freed from the harm that comes from having so much value in such finite and
contingent identities that are ultimately outside of our control. Life and circumstances
can cause us to be ineffective teachers, or to never be as effective as we
like. This incapacity and finitude can only be remedied by moving our value of
our personal identities into an infinite God who has ultimate control over the
whole of reality; a God who is faithful and can be trusted; a God who cannot be
shaken. Placing our identity in Him transforms our whole life into an act of
worship. It affects how we think, what we say, and how we act as we begin to
see our lives in His terms and based on His purposes, rather than in our finite
identities. Therefore, rather than finding value in being “an effective teacher,”
we can find our intrinsic worth, meaning and purpose in God, who gives us the
capacity to love and obey Him in a way that is fulfilling on the deepest level,
but is not self-centric. Our fulfillment is then peripheral to worshiping God (which
is both obeying and loving God with our lives).
