Worship: Head, Heart, Hands

Why Be The Church? Well, quite simply, we’re called not to just be Christians by going to church. We’re called to live as Christians during the week. Hence Being the Church.

There is a certain way we are called, according to Scripture, to behave and live a certain way we’re called to live. These practices we as a church have summarized into four simole words. These practices are on our permanent logo on our sign and our website and all our publications. And that logo is on your screen now. These practices are on our summer theme logo that’s on the screen now. These practices are going to be the focus of our summer series. We will cycle through all four of these over the next couple of months. Today? Worship: Head, Heart, Hands.

Each of these three elements of worship, head, heart, hands, is represented today by a character. The characters are mine. The images come to you courtesy of Noah Michael Mace of 603 E. Church St. Cherryville.

Each of these characters has a strength and a weakness.

Notice with me these three characters, will you?

Mr. Head: The Thinker

Everyone, I give you Mr. Head. What is Mr. Head like? Well, Mr. Head is all head. That’s all he has - no heart, no hands. Just a head.

Now don’t let his smile fool you. He looks happy. But he’s not. He wishes he weren’t just a man with a head. But that’s not the hand he’s been dealt. So here he is - just a guy with a head.

Mr. Head. Now as a man with just a head, he has a mind, but that’s it. He can think. He can reason. He can critique. But he can’t feel emotion. And he can’t get to work serving.

And that means that at church, all he can do is think about how bad or how good the sermon was. There weren’t enough illustrations. There were too many illustrations. The pastor used too much humor. He didn’t use enough humor. It was too theological. It wasn’t theological enough.

He also can’t be active. He can’t operate the bulldozer. He can’t help put the sign down in the concrete. He can watch; he can critique; he can complain. But he can’t do much more. This man is an armchair churchmember...Actually he’s an armchair everything, because he doesn’t have a head.

But when it comes to worship, it’s not much better for this poor guy, and here’s where I’m really going with this.

His problem is that he can’t do much other than critique the music - it wasn’t fast enough, it wasn’t slow enough, the song is too old, the song is too new. The song is appealing to visitors. The song appeals only to visitors. The key was too high. The key was too low. The choir shoud have sung along with it. The choir shouldn’t have sung along with it. You get my drift here? Point is, Mr. Head doesn’t feel much when he worships God with his church. Mr. Head is too busy making sure everyone else is worshiping correctly; he can’t himself worship.

There was a man once who walked up to the pastor after the service and said, “Preacher, I didn’t like a single one of the hymns we sung this morning.” The pastor smiled cheerfully, patted the man on the back, and said, “That’s okay – we weren’t singing them for you!” [Morgan, p472]

That’s Mr. Head. Consider yourselves introduced.

Mr. Heart: The Feeler

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Mr. Heart. Mr. Heart..... Technically, as you can see, he’s really just a torso. But that is the part of the body where his heart would be. So this is Mr. Heart.

Now remember Mr. Head? Mr. Head was all thinking. Mr. Heart is all feeling. Mr. Heart is easily moved. He’s emotionally self-aware. He’s emotionally-expressive. He doesn’t mind feeling things while he worships.

Mr. Heart doesn’t really care about the lyrics of the worship music. He’s not concerned about whether they’re biblically correct or theologically deep. He likes a song not because of what it says but because of how it sounds and how it makes him feel.

Problem is, Mr. Heart’s lack of attention to intellect carries a consequence. It tends to make him less discerning. He’s more prone to fall into theological error. He’s more prone to go after false teaching. And in worship, he’s more concerned about how a song makes him feel. But lyrics matter much more than the music that accompanies it. Mr. Heart forgets that.

Now every church has people who are like Mr. Heart. They’re feelers. They remind people like Mr. Head that it can’t be all intellect. God gave us emotions and He wants us to feel deeply when we worship and experience deeply when we worship.

So don’t roll your when Mr. Heart speaks up. Don’t be surprised when he acts like Mr. Heart. That’s how God has wired him. Recognize that God has given him to our church to balance the rest of us out, just as he’s done with the other two.

But Mr. Heart isn’t perfect. Mr. Heart needs to learn how to think and study and learn like Mr. Head. And Mr. Heart needs to learn from Mr. Hand, the doer.

So that’s Mr. Head, the thinker. Mr. Heart, the feeler. Now I give you Mr. Hand, the doer.

Mr. Hand: The Doer

Mr. Hand is a doer. He’s not happy sitting around thinking or feeling. He’d rather be out doing. Mr. Hand is the first one to spring into action when someone has a flat tire in the church parking lot. Most days he can be found fixing someone’s leaky roof, working on someone’s lawnmower, building a ramp for a shut-in. That’s Mr. Hand, the doer.

Just like with the other two, every church has a Mr. Hand. Where would we be without Mr. Hand, the doer? Are you a Mr. Heart? You remind us to walk what we talk. You push us to work out our faith with concrete obedience. You understand that we are not saved by our good works, but you also understand that good works follow salvation, good works spring from saving faith. You exemplify Paul’s command to the Philippians: “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil 2:12).

But Mr. Hand is not perfect. Mr. Hand has a heart time with worship too. Mr. Hand struggles to sit through a sermon. Mr. Hand has a hard time just standing and singing. Action seems to mean more to Mr. Hand. Let’s not stay in the church and sing; let’s go outside the church and be the church. And we need that reminder.

But Mr. Hand, the doer, needs to learn from Mr. Heart the feeler and Mr. Head the thinker. Mr. Hand needs to understand that while God calls us to get out and serve and do, first He calls us to fill up in here. Mr. Head can teach Mr. Hand how to listen to the sermon and benefit from it and store God’s word away in his heart. Mr. Heart needs to teach Mr. Hand how to worship with feeling, with deep affection for God.

Worship: Becoming Whole

Mr. Head, Mr. Heart, Mr. Hand. Each of them has something that’s important. But none of them are complete in and of themselves. Just like us.

There’s no Mr. Head, Mr. Heart, or Mr. Hand in the room. All of us have been created head, heart, and hands. We’re all created to think, to feel, and to do.

In our house, there’s a lot of outside wiring. I don’t know if that’s normal; I haven’t really walked around my friends’ houses looking for wiring that runs along the walls. But at our house there’s wiring that runs from the top of the laundry room window outside to the bottom and goes back in. There’s a metal wire that runs from inside the crawl space outside along the brick foundation all the way back to where our HVAC system sits, and then the wire mysteriously goes back inside the brick. Who knows? We shoud call an electrician and have it looked it.

In the same way, our wiring is faulty. We’ve been mired by sin. Nothing with us is now the way it was with Adam and Even in the garden. We’re fallen. That means head, heart and hands are disconnected. They’re fragmented. There like those tree stumps where a strong wind has peeled away have the trunk just above the stump. The one whole stump has been torn apart and fragmented.

You know that pull you feel between what you know you should do in your head and what you want to do in your heart? You know how our hands are always being given over to things our minds and hearts know are wrong?

Well, we have also come to know Christ our Savior - or at least I pray that we all have. And church, one of the things He wants to do for us is rewire us. Put the fragmented pieces back together. Fix the faulty wiring. He wants to repair the disconnect between what we know in our minds that He wants to do and what we know in our hearts we really want to on the one hand, and what our hands find to do on the other.

In other words, our Christ has come to make us whole again. He is already doing that now for those of us who have trusted Christ. He is working on that union of head, heart and hand. One day we will be perfectly complete.

And actually this has all been exaggerated. Why? Because there is no Mr Hand or Mr Heart or Mr Hand. God has given each us of a heart, each of us a head, each of a hand. And God wants all three of those parts of our nature engaged in worship. Head, heart, and hands. What does that look like?

Let’s take them all three.

Engage your head in worship

Picture the realities in your mind

Use your imagination

Think deeply about what you’re singing

First, what does it mean to have your head engaged in worship? Here we’re talking about your mind. God wants us to use our minds in worship.

What does that mean? It means think about what you’re singing. Picture the realities in your mind. The words are there to serve a purpose. They point to a reality.

So for example, take the song we sang earlier. “I’m coming back to the heart of worship”, we sang earlier. How does it go next? ...”And it all about you. It’s all about you, Jesus. “I’m sorry, Lord, for the thing I’ve made it, for it’s all about you, it’s all about you, Jesus.” Picture yourself standing before throne of Christ. He invites you into His presence. His smile is upon you. He is genuinely pleased you are there. He wants to spend time with you. Picture yourself carrying bags of worry, bags of lust, bags of guilt and shame, picture yourself carrying bookbags of selfish ambitions, the desire to look spiritual, the desire to be entertained. Those are the things we make worship into. Picture Jesus, smiling tenderly at you, hands outstretched to receive those bags of junk. There’s no shame in his eyes; no hint of condemnation or anger or disgust or frustration. He knows these things weigh you down; it is His pleasure to unburden you. “Come to me,” he says, “all who are weak and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.”

Or take a hymn like Holy Holy Holy. It says “all thy works shall praise they name in earth and sky and sea.” While you’re singing, imagine that day when we join with all creation in praising God. It says “perfect in power in love and purity”. Engage your mind in worship. Maybe you’re less of a mind person and more of a heart person. You’d rather feel than think. That’s okay, good even. That’s going to help you. But here you need to discipline yourself to think deeply about what you’re singing. That is what it means to have your head engaged in worship. Think deeply about what you’re singing.

But the head engaged alone isn’t enough. What’s in our heads must make its way down the 18 inches to our heart. And so we must also worship with our heart engaged. Here we need the help of Mr. Heart.

Engaging your heart in worship:

If you’re not feelin’ it, stop & pray

Think about the words as being true for you

So what does it mean to have your heart engaged in worship? It means you allow yourself to feel the truth of what you’re singing. Raise your hand if you’ve ever had this thought during Sunday morning worship: we’re singing about the greatness of God and the joy that He gives; we’re singing about his great salvation and His majesty and beauty; and yet I don’t feel anything in my heart that matches up with that.

Have you ever felt that? I have. In fact, some mornings I don’t always feel the affetions that are appropriate to what I’ll be preaching. If we’re honest, we come to church tired, worried, unable to focus. If you’re honest, that has been and often is your experience.

And yet, God is not honored by half-hearted worship. The Bible says, “Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord” (Rom. 12:10). God loves exuberant worship! “Oh come, let us sing to the Lord,” the psalmist says, “let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation; let us come into his presence with thanksgivingl; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise” (Psalm 95:1-2 ESV). God is worthy of our emotions, not just our mind. He is worthy of the affection of our heart, not merely the thoughts in our heads.

So here’s what you do. Jesus wants to help us with this. When the music starts, and you’re not feeling it, do this: forget what anyone around you will think, don’t sing, and instead sit down in your seat. Pray. “God, I am not feelng it this morning. You know it already. I might as well admit it. You are worthy, Lord, of all the affection my heart can muster. Will you first forgive me for my apathy, and then will you help me to worship you in a way that is appropriate to your majesty, your greatness, your glory, your grace?” That is a prayer God will answer.

The second thing you can do to engage your heart in worship? Think about the words you’re singing. I know that’s like a $2 answer. It seems obvious. But how often do we go through the motions? We know most of these songs. Most of us know the words to at least some of the songs we sing. And when we know the words, often we can go on autopilot. So it really is no wonder if we sing about the glory and greatness of God but our hearts remain cold and distracted.

Even if you know the words, especially if you know the words, think about the words.

The last way to engage your heart in worship? Realize you’re not alone. Take a look to your right. Now take a look to your left. Turn around and look at the people behind you. Now look back at the people in front of you. You are singing these songs with them. You are bound with these people forever. Not even eternity will separate. Indeed, we’ll spend eternity with the people in this room.

We talk often of seeing our blood family in heaven. Oh what a blessing that will be to know we are not separated from our loved ones forever! But church, it is equally a blessing to know that we will not be separated from each other in heaven. We won’t retreat to our family houses in heaven if we even have something like that. Biologicaly family ties in heaven will be secondary. The ultimate thing in heaven in Jesus and our common love for Him. The people you sing beside and behind and in front of now are the same peope you will stand before the throne of God in a mass of worshipers from every nation that we couldn’t even begin to number.

“In corporate musical worship, we are calling out to each other to praise God for his glorious character and works. We are encouraging each other, by the strength of our voices, that we are not alone in our confession, but that everyone else who is singing is affirming the truth and significance of the words being sung…This kind of congregational singing is a powerful encouragement to our souls, reminding us of our fellowship and unity in the truths that we sing.” [Dever & Alexander, The Deliberate Church, p120]

But do you know another reason, maybe the main reason we sing? God told us too. But after that, here’s why we sing: music opens the heart. It is the heart that God wants to change. It is the heart that changes the course of our life. So in a very real sense, if you want your life to change, if you want to become a better, more faithful, more generous, more selfless Christian, sing!

Lastly, and briefly, how do we engage the hands in worship?

Engaging the hands during worship:

Lift your hands in praise

Use your hands to serve

Use your hands. I mean lift your hands. Did you know that is biblical? “I will bless you as long as I live”, says David in the psalms, “in your name I will lift up my hands” (Psalm 63:4 ESV). I knew it was biblical to raise hands in worship. I didn’t know this: God actually commands the lifting of hands. The Bible says, “I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling” (1Tim. 2:8).

Recently I asked some of you in a smaller setting if any of you sometimes feel like you want to raise your hands in worship, like you should raise your hands in worship, almost like something is impelling you raise your hands in worship. May I ask you again by show of hands? How many of you have felt that way?

I have, and I’ll make a deal with you. If you’ll lift your hands when you feel led, I will lift my hands when I feel led. I know it feels weird. And we don’t want to get showy with it. It’s not a badge of our godliness. We don’t want distractions or inappropriate behavior.

But you know what we also don’t want? We also don’t want to deny God the worship He is due just because we’re afraid of what the person behind us will think. I am as guilty of that as anyone else. I’m saying I want to stop giving in to the fear of man. I invite you to join me. Now listen, if you don’t feel moved to raise your hands, that’s okay too. Some of us more expressive than others. When you feel moved and only when you feel moved, in worship, outstretch your palms or raise your hands. When you feel led to put them down, put them down.

The other way to engage your hands in worship, is to go use your hands to serve after worship is over. Worship that doesn’t lead to acts of love for others who are in need is empty worship. Worship shoud fill you up to the brim with gladness in Jesus so that you leave here with a desire to tell others about Him and serve them in His name.

Worship means becomig whole. Head, heart, hands, united in praise of our great and glorious God.

Conclusion and call for response

But probably the best thing we can say about worship is that Jesus forgives imperfect worshipers. Jesus forgives imperfect worshipers. If that means something to you, will you give me an amen? May it never be that someone walks into this church feeling beaten down with guilt and have their guilt added to by how we talk about worship. The Father can accept and forgive imperfect worshipers because His Son Jesus lived in our place and was a perfect worshiper of God - head, heart, hands, perfectly united and engaged in the wholehearted and glad worship of God.

Jesus is our example, yes. But before He is our example, church, Jesus is our Savior. He forgives us. He died in our place as our substitute with all our sin resting upon Him. He died and in so doing He absorbed all our sin and exhausted the Father’s wrath and put it all away, so that now your sins are as far as the east is from the west. Church, if that doesn’t make you want to worship, I don’t know what will. If you’ve not trusted in Jesus as your Savior, if you’ve never given your life over to let Him rule you, you need to do that today in order to find that forgiveness. It’s there for anyone who has enough faith to admit you need it.

The rest of us — our worship team is going to lead us in one final song with a twist. As they come, pray with me. Pray with me that we will worship the Lord for the next five minutes with head, heart, and hands fully engaged, for our good, our church’s edification, and the glory of Christ.

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