God's Valentine

Speaking of Valentine's day, I think God may have had something in His heart along this line when He brought something to my mind this morning. It had something to do with the Ten Commandments and especially the first two.

Whenever I wake up in the morning I always try to make it my first intention and purpose to turn myself over to God completely and connect my heart with Him before allowing myself to get carried away by any other distractions. If I wake up from a bad dream which has been too often lately but not terribly frequent, I bring my emotions into consciousness and offer them to God as a sacrifice of myself for Him to take and repair. If I just start getting busy thinking about all sorts of things without the context of first placing myself into neutral in the presence of God and inviting His Spirit to be the atmosphere, the “background noise” of my heart for the rest of the day, then I feel empty and vulnerable throughout the day.

Anyway, as I was talking with God in my mind this morning for some reason it moved toward the idea of images and my relationship with God. I wish I could remember more clearly the path that took me there but I am trying to reconstruct it in reverse as I write. I do know that it had to do with the misperceptions about God that still plague me and cause me to remain afraid of Him.

Yes, it is starting to come back to me now after asking Him to show me “the dream as well as its interpretation”.

I was praying for God to touch my wife's body with His healing touch because of the pains she has been having lately. But then one of my oldest false gods within starting his worn-out line about not having enough faith to get God to perform a miracle, that I had to either try harder to eliminate all doubt or just give up praying for miracles. Yes, that was it. The rut of thinking is so routine and familiar for nearly all of my life that it feels like my identity.

And that was another important ingredient in the mix now that I think of it – my perception of my identity. As I explored in much greater depth many months ago, these false gods, these lying spirits that take up residence in my heart and reside in lies buried in old memories heavily manage my thinking and much of my life. They claim that they are my true identity and that I cannot be anything else but what they declare me to be. To prove their claim they then influence me, confuse me and cause me to make mistakes in line with their claims and they always dispute and deny any truth about my real identity that God declares in His word and by His Spirit. But I am so used to their subtle suggestions that I very often buy into their claims that they constitute my identity and I feel trapped into a lifelong struggle to overcome their discouraging manipulations of my life.

As I was distracted a bit from my praying for my wife's benefit by these doubting spirits and their claim that I will never have enough faith to please God, the thought progressed to the realization that I have within my heart a false image of God that I have worshiped all of my life. To reinforce this truth I was directed to the verse in Genesis that speaks of Adam being created in the image of God. Because of our penchant of externalizing everything we tend to think more of his physical features being like God but I believe that it had much more to do with his whole being and makeup. Man was created to reflect the likeness of God even more so than a mirror reflects the likeness of whatever is in front of it. For humans were designed to be a multi-dimensional and interactive dynamic reflection of all the characteristics of the Godhead.

Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. (Genesis 1:26-27)

What does that have to do with my problem? It has everything to do with it because whenever I think of God it is necessarily referenced through the inner perception of what I think God is like – the image of God that has been created within my mind and has many false roots in memories of past experiences. But therein lies my biggest problem. My heart has been filled with false notions about God from all sorts of places and people for all of my life and so the God that I bow down to in fear within myself is most often a false representation of God, an image of a false god composed of the lies and partial truths of the lying spirits that still haunt me from my past. With some of them I can identify the lies even though they still remain attached, but because of the nature of deception many of my false beliefs still may feel very true and do not arouse enough suspicion on my part to even question their validity. They are simply the assumptions and paradigms which make up the context from which I make my moment by moment decisions and choices. They are the composite god that I know as God.

Then God spoke all these words, saying, "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. "You shall have no other gods before Me. "You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. (Exodus 20:1-4)

You shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them, for I, Yahweh your God, am a jealous God. (Exodus 20:5 WEB)

Now it is becoming more starkly clear why it is so important to always include the first verses of Exodus 20 whenever thinking about the Ten Commandments. By removing those verses the enemy of God has literally stripped away the very context and motivation that brings sense and power to the Ten Words of God and turns them into impossible demands that cause us to recoil in discouragement or work harder in desperation. It is the description of the true God and His heart motives that have to be the context for thinking about the “commandments” or else they throw us into instant legalism. Those verses are a hark back to the original image of God that we were designed to have within referenced in Genesis. By disconnecting them from the abbreviated revelation of God's character from Mt. Sinai we reinforce the false image of God in our minds that was implanted by the serpent from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.

I am beginning to see it more clearly now. Because most of my life is subtly influenced by the fears produced by the false image of God still wired into my thinking and the triggers still in place inside of my memories of the past, I am really being forced to bow in bondage to the power of that false image of God and in reality am in direct conflict with at least the first two commandments. I have seen this somewhat from an intellectual basis in the past but it is starting to make more sense to my heart today.

What God seems to be trying to say to me, if I perceive it correctly and am translating it properly into words, is that somehow I have to become completely disconnected from any reliance on the distortions of Him that make up the false image of God inside of me and learn to trust only what comes through His word as interpreted by the Spirit of Truth and Love that reveals His true likeness to my heart. In other words, I have to rely totally on objective truth instead of subjective truth. But before someone lunges to affirm that statement as meaning I can never trust my feelings but have to maintain a completely dispassionate, intellectual head religion I must say that is not at all what I am perceiving here. That is another counterfeit of God's true plan, I believe.

What I am attempting to form into language but remains mostly outside of that restriction is my need to actually engage my whole being – body, soul and spirit – left brain intellectual capabilities and right brain emotions and intensity equally – in a much more balanced and intentional way. I need to interact with God through every means possible and have His image reinstilled within me while having the false gods of stony hearts removed. I have learned that I will never, ever win the arguments that I have with these lying spirits that have so long stolen my identity. They will never change their minds about who I am and unfortunately they often use other people around me to reinforce their assertions about my identity. Whenever I feel shamed by someone or am accused of self-serving motives or a desire to exploit others for my selfish satisfaction, the false gods within are eager to link up with the accusing spirits without and emphatically declare that what I am hearing is uncontrovertably true and that I just need to live with it.

All of what I am writing is coming to me as I write it and feels so real that it is unnerving. I think God must be taking me places inside where I have to let go of my control and trust Him to explore areas of my heart that make me very fearful at times. I really don't know what might be ahead of me, but I do want to accept the truth that I am seeing right now so that I may be equipped to cooperate with whatever He has planned for me next.

God, thank-you for communing with me this morning about this. How do I respond? I can only confess that I have been bowing to a distorted image of You for all of my life for that is all I have known. I cannot free myself from these lying images of You because I not only don't have the power to be free from bondage to them but I also still don't really have a very clear revelation of the real truth about You.

But what You have been sharing with me over the past few years has been very appealing to my heart and I choose to embrace it. But it is up to You to finish the work of restoration in me, of re-forming me into Your image, of once again breathing Your Spirit-breath into my lifeless soul that has been deformed in rebellion against You. I choose to cooperate with whatever You are doing today to reveal Yourself more clearly to me and free me from bondage. Please deliver me more completely from the unbelief of Egypt's spirits and break the bonds of lies that still enslave me. For I know that as the Almighty Yahweh that is supreme above all gods You are going to accomplish Your word and Your promises in my life.

Because You are my God Who delivers me from the enslaving, lying spirits of Your enemy and You break their bonds that hold together the false image of You in my sinful flesh, I will more consistently reflect Your true character as revealed in these simple statements of reality that You shared about Yourself. I renounce all permission for any of these false gods to have any influence any longer in my heart and mind and I invite Your Spirit of freedom and humility to replace them. I devote all of my allegiance and affections along with all of my burdens and cares, fears, guilt, shame, hopes and dying dreams to You, the One whose image I was formed to truly reflect.

Revive the unused parts of my heart that have been broken or damaged to interact with Your heart and Your thoughts and emotions. Continue Your massive repair operation within me. I claim Your covenant promises and protection for not only my own life today but for my family that You have given me. I ask for a flood of blessing to fill our lives with overwhelming attraction to You and fresh revelations of Your beauty as we see more clearly past the distorting misrepresentations of You that have made us so afraid. Let Your true glory intensify in our minds, hearts and emotions until we are swallowed up in Your consuming fire. Glorify Your name today and for the rest of our lives.

Does God Respect Me?

I just had a thought that made me feel very uneasy but seemingly without justification. I was telling God how impressed I was at how He orchestrates various readings or events to all talk about the same subject just when I need it and He replied, “So I'm organized. What's such a big deal about that? Wouldn't you expect Me to be organized? There's a lot of other things about me a whole lot more attractive than being organized!”

I certainly had to agree with that and realize that in my beginning stages of being attracted to the truth about God that getting really excited about His characteristic of being organized is a bit simplistic, though certainly not bad. But He wants me to move beyond my amazement at His ability to coordinate things in life to really getting excited about much more intimate things that will bond us much more tightly together. Jesus had a similar problem when people of His day were more interested in experiencing miracles than they were in experiencing the inner transformation of the gospel, the real truth about God that He came to show us.

Then I heard something that struck me as strangely odd. He said that He respects me. That is even why He does not make me feel stupid for getting awestruck about such a mundane thing as being organized.

Respect me?! God respects me? Something about that seems very strange and almost irreligious. Then it began to dawn on me – the reason it sounds so strange is because my typical perception of God from my past does not allow for me to believe that about Him. It is exposing yet another lie about Him that prevents me from appreciating His attitude toward me and responding in love and admiration for Him.

The more I ponder this idea the more awestruck I am even to the point of tears. The idea that God would respect me almost seems to have more impact on me than the almost worn-out phrase that He loves me. But then it also makes a lot of sense in light of the things we learned about the differences between men and women from the Love and Respect seminars. Women crave and need love more than anything else in life to thrive and flourish, but men's most deepest need is to feel respected. This goes far beyond any desires to feel loved even though that is a very real need. When a man feels respected it connects with something at the deepest level of his psyche and brings an intense emotion of satisfaction and – well – a sense of real love and value. A male mind spells love with the letters, r-e-s-p-e-c-t.

So if God says that He respects me He is telling me that He really does understand me and is willing and even eager to meet my deepest needs to realize a sense of value and identity. And as I continued to think about this issue of respect I also realize that respect is at the heart of all true freedom. There can never be real freedom without a great deal of respect. That is why we are seeing the very rapid erosion of all of our freedoms today in our society. People in power have lost all respect for others and are employing their authority in abusive ways to dominate and control the lives of everyone under their influence. Power corrupts. They are living only for themselves and increasingly use their position to exploit others for their own selfish ends.

But God is not like the way we have been treated by abusive leaders and parents. God is full of both love and respect for all of the beings He has created. That is precisely why this whole Great War has gone on for so long. It is because He has so much respect for our freedom to choose for ourselves that He has allowed the whole sin experiment to run its full course. He knows that to shorten it in any way would create a loophole for it to return again for another round and He does not want that to ever happen. So He treats everyone with the utmost respect for their freedom and dignity because His opinion of each one of us is of infinite value no matter what we have done or thought about Him.

God's respect for my freedom means that I am allowed to make mistakes without censure or condemnation from Him. And even seemingly more crazy than that, He then has to step in repeatedly to limit the natural consequences of my mistakes so that I can learn from them instead of being destroyed by them. (I just finished writing about this very thing this morning and am posting it on my other site.) Respect also involves exercising His grace to protect me from myself and the full impact of my mistakes while I am given undeserved opportunities to come back without fear and then grow through the experience. That is a level of respect that is foreign to me but is also very appealing. Yes, that is definitely even more attractive than the ability to be organized.

(But I still think its cool when He has a devotional reading or some surprise source to reinforce what He has brought me from another direction or talked to me about in my heart just before I came across it.)

Close Encounter

I wish I could write with my heart and not have to go through my head and my hands. But I can't and if I don't write I am afraid I will lose many things that I don't want to forget so here I am again.

Yesterday I felt God surprise me while I was driving home on slippery roads by saying something very intimate to my heart. He said something like, I want you to love me intelligently, not just blindly. How would you feel if someone you loved just blindly did whatever you told them or wanted them to do without any spontaneity or passion. You would not feel loved, you would just feel like you had a very submissive servant. But there would be no spark there, no excitement, no back and forth interaction like two lovers animated to find ways to make the other light up with pleasure. But that is the kind of relationship that I want us to have with each other.

I was surprised and delighted and confused all at the same time. My first question (the plague of my intellectual orientation) was, “How do you have an interactive relationship like that with someone who already knows everything you think and everything you will think. The element of surprise would seem to be one of the most important parts of intimacy but it is obviously impossible to surprise God. So how does this work?”

I told Him all that and He reminded me that, as a matter of fact, He is bigger than the little box I am trying to put Him in with that question. Just because I am not capable of being surprised if I already know something doesn't translate to Him not being able to deal with that problem Himself. He is much bigger than the simplistic problems my mind comes up with like this and I can trust Him to handle His side of the relationship very well without my having to understand how He can do it.

I accepted that gentle rebuke and then began to ponder just what this offer really means. I could not mistake the fact that I had felt the invitation and that I wanted the same thing myself. I felt that He was getting tired of many of my attempts to expect Him to do all the loving on both sides even though He is the only real source of love to start with. What He seems to be asking me to do is to begin to use more of the creativity and inner resources of my own heart to begin to make this relationship more dynamic and “balanced” and not so limp and tiring.

In one way that sounds like an impossible request. After all, the imbalance between us is so extreme it is ludicrous. How does a lowly, stubborn, sin-confused peon have a dynamic intimacy with the One who is bigger than the whole universe, who is so intimidatingly awesome that... well, you get the point. But on the other hand that is really what the whole plan of salvation is about and He wants me to start getting more serious about it on the intimate level.

That is mind-staggering and I definitely am going to need His help in teaching me how to love the way that He wants. Intellectually I may understand the theory about all of this (or maybe more like a little part of it) but for Him to come and personally invite me in such a quiet, surprising way to turn my attention in that direction with my heart is, well, flattering. To even write about it seems to spoil its excitement to some extent. Maybe I am spilling too much and He might prefer to keep this between us. I don't know yet.

On the other hand, I know there are many others like me who are hungering for that personal touch, that personalized invitation from God to step across the line from theory to intimacy and discover the sparks that breath real life into the inner being. I know that is what He wants for me and He also wants to make an example of me to attract others into the same kind of relationship with Him as I am privileged to enjoy. Yes, I say that all with my head, but my heart is still back there somewhere asking the basic questions about how to start from here.

I am glad, though, that the questions are finally starting to originate from my heart and not just my left brain spouting off blissful-sounding aphorisms. I want to live more from my heart and keep my left brain as a supporting partner instead of a dictator/suppressor. I want to learn how to nurture and enhance this intimacy in ways that elicit positive feelings in God's being and make His eyes light up with pleasure. Wow!

So here are some tentative questions that my heart has – and it doesn't want platitude answers from the other side of the divide (in my head that is)!

In a lover-type relationship, how or what could I do to make God light up with delight? I assume that's one of the most prominent things good lovers do for each other. (Sorry self, I'm exposing you in other areas by even asking the question and hope I don't catch too much flak for it) Honestly, I think that if God wants me to contribute something to our relationship not based on performance to get Him to love me then I would like to know how to do that. I need some serious mentoring here.

The next thing that blows my mind is that God would even think I am capable of bringing something to this relationship that could really have an influence on His feelings. I have a hard time wrapping my mind around that one, but I need to because that seems to be exactly what He is asking for. He seemed to specifically note that He wanted me to view Him in some way as an equal partner in making this relationship blossom and deepen. So what does that look like? How do I start from where I am right now?

As I asked Him a few minutes ago about some of this and wondered how I fit into this process I finally just had to say, “I trust You to show me how to do this”. At that point He responded, That's something that makes my heart light up with pleasure – when you trust Me. Hey, that feels good. I think we are starting to make sparks already. I know its a slow start and quite a way into my life, but its never too late to fall in love.

As I even contemplate posting this on my site I feel fear rising up inside of me. What assumptions will people make about me? What expectations will they have about me? I will feel trapped into some kind of claim to holiness or something like that and I won't be able to live up to it. Hey, where is all this coming from?

So I asked God, “Do you want me to allow others to read this and find out what we have been sharing in secret?” and He said, Isn't that what commitment looks like? Part of having an intimate relationship with someone is publicly being committed to the relationship and not keeping it hidden. Hidden relationships are usually illicit and demoralizing in nature. I want us to be open about our commitment to each other. I even exposed my own nakedness on the cross in my expression of love for You. Are you willing to commit openly to your heart desire to be in covenant with Me?

I feel vulnerable, but I am in covenant with the biggest protector that can be had. I will trust Him to protect my heart and help me learn how to interact with His heart as this deepens. I like this.

While my brain is eager to join in this conversation and come up with all sorts of ideas and suggestions, I have to insist that my heart must lead in this one and utilize my intellectual imagination as a partner and resource instead of a director. Thanks, but no thanks, left brain. Only my heart is big enough for eternity and has the ability to really resonate with the passion and thrills that God wants to share with me. I'm starting to look forward to more close encounters of the Divine kind.

Canned Worship?

The compelling thought that got me out of bed this morning (actually the third or fourth thought but I lost the others before I could capture them) was the discomfort I feel whenever people use canned music for worship songs in live settings. I know that many people share my feelings about this and it sometimes even becomes an issue of sharp contention or even regulation in some places. But what I want to know is the real reason why I feel that discomfort in the first place. What is it about that arrangement that somehow makes it feel like something is wrong here?

Then the thought occurred to me. Whenever a real live person or group of people sing or play along with recorded music to express praise or worship, they have almost completely lost all of their actual freedom of true expression.

At first this may sound like too strong of a statement, but let me explain. As a musician for all of my life and one who primarily expresses music “by ear”, the ability to interact emotionally with other people within the context of the music is a very crucial element of making the music feel genuine. I believe, especially for worship, that for music to really connect to the heart it must be authentically and dynamically felt while it is happening. Since the most valuable characteristic of the heart and the greatest, most important element that God honors and protects about the heart is freedom itself, then whatever flows from the heart to others or to God must be in the context of freedom if it is to be real.

So how does canned music affect the freedom of the heart? Well, if you are not at least somewhat a spontaneous musician like me then this may seem a little confusing or nit-picky. But I can assure you that whenever I have to play or sing along with a recording, no matter how well done it may sound, how expressive it may be, how inspiring it was when it was recorded live the first time – in having to follow along with the recording I have lost all my current freedom to express what is happening here and now in my own experience. I am forced to stay synchronized with what was once possibly a very valid expression of someone's heart but it is not necessarily reflective of what is true right now. Even worse, the recording was probably produced in such a sterile environment of a studio that its appeal has much more to do with carefully crafted professionalism than it has to do with genuine spontaneity at the time of recording.

In my mind, and I believe really in everyone's experience, real worship music – actually real worship of any kind, to be genuine must have the freedom of spontaneity. That is not to say there is no harmony with others. Freedom of expression does not mean total independence. Insisting on individually asserting my own way and style without regard for synchronizing with others around me is actually falling back into the same trap in a sense, of being restricted by recorded music. While I can have the complete freedom to express my heart in any way I wish when I am alone with God, when I choose to worship together with others I am entering into a different mode of worship. To just do my own thing in that context without regard for or connection with the spirit of those around me is to try to dictate to everyone else the way the music should go. That is not much different from dictation from a recorded piece of accompaniment.

What people call corporate worship (I hate that term – it sounds so commercial which has no place in God's relational system of organization) really means willingly joining a group of hearts together to allow them to synchronize and blend to create a collective identity during that period of time. Since real worship only comes from the heart this requires that the people involved are not only sensitive to the spirit of those around them but are also contributing their own spontaneity to a degree. All of the hearts thus connected are also reflective of what is currently going on in the lives of each person. They are able to have some influence on the group dynamics within the expression which is usually, but not only, in the context of music.

What this really means, as I think back on my own experience, is that not only am I listening dynamically to what others are doing musically and emotionally while we are in live worship, but I am able at the same time to influence everyone else through my part in the collective expression and in essence have a say in what direction the worship progresses. Again, this may sound somewhat confusing to some who have never enjoyed real dynamic, interactive fellowship within the context of worship music, but I will try to explain in more detail. And by the way, this is certainly not restricted to religious contexts by any means. Nearly all music is an expression of worship to some degree no matter what flavor it comes in. Worship itself I believe is nearly synonymous with music and music almost always, if not always, is an act of worship of something or someone. That is why music carries such power over our lives and has such mysterious influence on our hearts.

I believe that much of what is claimed to be worship of God is really better described as corporate worship with all the commercial implications included. Unfortunately corporate church has devolved into an institutional formula very similar to economic corporations designed to produce wealth and recognition in the world. We have refined and manipulated and entrenched our forms and routines. We have compiled pleasant-sounding arguments and inspiring experiences of external stimuli to satisfy our emotions. We have crafted very professional productions that leave us speechless and quivering with pleasure (or fear) and have come to believe that this is the religion that God wants for us. But if we are honest we have to admit that our deepest hearts are still empty in places where it really counts. Our lives are largely unchanged when we go back to “the real world” and religion becomes more of an event where we come to get an emotional fix each week than a dynamic, intimate interaction with the heart of God that transforms our whole being. An external religion is in the end a useless religion in the eyes of heaven.

If you are a musician that connects with your feelings through your music you don't need much explanation of what I am trying to say about music here. In fact, you very well might be able to express this much better than I am. If you are a technically good musician but have difficulty being spontaneously expressive you may be a little more confused or possibly even offended. It's also possible that you may be suffering from a locked heart which is a major impediment to authentic expression. If you are not a musician at all you also just may need more explanation.

Let me give an illustration that might be helpful. I have at times sung with what is known as Barbershop Music groups. The official name is so long that I can never remember it, but many people know at least something about it. It is that strange-sounding, tight harmony music that sends shivers of pleasure down some people's spine and that others find repulsive. I happen to be of the first order.

Anyway, for anyone who has ever sung in this kind of music successfully they know that expression and group awareness and unity is crucial to producing the kind of results that this music is famous for. The better and more complex the music the more attention the individual musicians must pay to each other during the performance. They must not only listen to the tone and pick up on the nuances from the other members but must also learn to blend, adjust their own tone and pitch to enhance the quality and sound of the whole and be willing to move in perfect synchronization with the group as they move through very tight harmonies that challenge each person to keep their note right on pitch. It is one of the best examples of the need for individual independence (requiring one to stay on a note so close to others that at times it feels like you are being pulled away from it by a strong magnet) balanced by the need for collective, unified expression as the director (or the group collectively if just in a quartet) moves in tight harmony and perfect synchronization through music that conveys a very unique experience and feeling.

One of the most important elements here is the collective group expression. That means that many times the “rules” of music, particularly the timing, is often broken quite flagrantly in favor of more intense expression of the message in the words or the nuances of the feelings of the director. Of course this is all practiced, memorized and repeated until by the time of performance it is quite predictable and repeatable. In that last sense it begins to move away from the point I am trying to make in this writing.

In my experience with worship music I have come to believe that a deeper experience is to be had if there is respect for the freedom of unified spontaneity reflective of the current condition or mood of the people involved. The closer a group of worshipers come to sensing each others hearts and keeping their own hearts open during the experience, the more authentic the worship becomes. That is precisely where the problem of canned music begins and tends to interfere with true expression.

Because recorded music – even if it was recorded by the very same people who are now performing – can only be truly reflective of the spirit at the time when it was recorded. After that it is locked into that original expression and is no longer free to adapt to what may be different in people's spirit today. If people are forced to follow along with a recording, which of course is not real-time humans with a spirit that are present and reactive to the rest of the group in real time, then this element introduces the element of control if everyone is to remain synchronized. And control is the antithesis of freedom.

That, to me, is the core issue that always causes me to secretly resent recorded music in the context of real worship. That is not to say we cannot worship using this means. I freely agree that there have been very many times in my life when I have joined in with recorded music and been deeply moved, inspired and lifted very high in my spirit into the presence of God. I still enjoy that experience. I like to crank up some of my favorite inspiring music in the car when I am traveling sometimes and sing at the top of my lungs where I feel more free than I can anywhere else. I am not advocating discontinuing, nor am I condemning the use of recordings. They have their place and are very helpful and enriching at times. But what I am saying is that in the context of live worship as a group it tends to be a dampening element, an inhibiting obstacle that subtly prevents some from being able to participate fully because the recording is completely insensitive to the current direction that their hearts need to move, even if it is only in the little nuances within the music.

Worshiping with recorded music (either in a religious context or secular, its all the same – just different objects of worship) is like trying to love a well-crafted robot. You may be able to create a robot that could simulate all sorts of pleasure-producing activities and is extremely attractive and try to fool yourself into feeling like you are having a real relationship, but inside you really know that your heart can never be fulfilled with such an arrangement. I once watched an appearance of Twilight Zone when I was a kid that highlighted this very conundrum. I believe the same element to some degree describes the problem of trying to play or sing along with a “robot” (which is in essence what a recording has become) in an activity that in its essence must be spontaneous, heart-generated and real-time to be authentic.

Does that mean I am prejudiced against anyone who uses recorded music to assist them? I think it might be more accurate to say that I always feel some sense of disappointment, like in some way I have been cheated a little bit from seeing deeper into their soul. Yes I can enjoy it and receive a great blessing from it sometimes. But there is always that little part of me that says this is fake to some degree and I didn't really get to see their real heart because it was overshadowed by the robot controlling the expression. A recording is like a little dictator that demands allegiance and total compliance. If we want to not feel like a fool we have to go along with what has already happened when it was recorded.

That is why I believe that at times it is often better to have simpler music that is more authentic. I am not in favor of sloppy music in the name of authenticity – that is insulting. I believe that respectful worship requires that we invest time and effort in learning to do our best both individually and as a team. But it also requires the freedom to reflect and influence in real-time the emotions and heart-feelings of the collective participants. That is the kind of experience that I long for and that is far more fulfilling for the heart.

In my experience I have come to realize that deeper, fulfilling worship also involves having more awareness of the current feelings in the hearts of those around me. If we have taken time to share our pains, our heartaches, our joys, our desires and passions at a more vulnerable level, then when we join together in expressions of music it becomes reflective of our desires and feelings; the unity and joy we experience is exponential compared with the typical “worship” routine usually found in most churches.

Being part of a worship team for a couple years I experienced this to some degree and began to become “addicted” to it. Since that time I have had very little opportunity to enjoy that and I miss it greatly. I have visited church after church and found some that had nice performers that sounded good up front, but I always felt very disconnected emotionally and spiritually.

Performance is often the enemy of true worship. The two get very easily exchanged and confused, but performance, not matter how good it makes people feel, is not what I believe to be real worship – at least worship of the God who created us to worship Him as our source of life and joy. If we are willing to be honest with ourselves we could see that much that passes as worship is often really worship of our own skills, worship of the music itself and the good vibs we feel from it or even worship of the pride we have in our exclusive church or music group.

Much music is actually worship of the performers from which we learned the music. I have often observed, even in the teams in which I participated sometimes, that there are times the musicians are listening in their imaginations to the original music track that they heard on the radio or on a CD while they are playing along with that music themselves externally. What they fail to realize is that while their performance sounds rather good to them (due to the fact that they can hear all the accompaniment background music filling in the gaps within their own head), the audience around them can only hear the pitiful sounds of their whaming away on a guitar and sometimes off-key renditions imitating some music idol as they attempt to imitate some hero of contemporary music. But since most audiences are too polite to express their amusement or disgust, the musicians are led to believe that everyone thoroughly enjoys their performance and continue to go on with their show. There are of course many variations of this symptom from slight to very bad, but you get my point.

In settling for robotically-controlled music, whether it be from an electronic rendition or from second hand imagination-induced control, I believe many people have never even tasted the joy of genuine, authentic worship in the presence of the real God of heaven. We have often unknowingly settled for very stimulating counterfeits that we believe to be the real thing. But I also believe that if we ever get a taste of the real thing that all our pitiful counterfeits would lose their appeal. We would find a new hunger for connecting our hearts with the life-giving heart of our real Father and our desires for Him would eclipse the sad imitations that we now label as worship.

I realize that worship involves much more than music. But I know that I have a deep hunger for real, fulfilling, connecting, authentic worship of God in a community of open-hearted seekers of His heart. I get little bits of it now and then but I have very seldom had opportunity to experience it on a more transparent and consistent level. I enjoy at times the privilege of personal worship, connecting my heart alone to listen to the heart of God at various times. But fellowship-based worship with tuned hearts and joined spirits is something I long for and need and that God designed us to enjoy. It is the way we are designed to receive life from Him so that we can feel alive and thriving.

I believe that God is preparing people all over the world to participate and join together very soon as His body to experience levels of real worship that is now unimaginable and intense. I also believe that false worship will be likewise very intense, emotional and pleasure-producing as a means of distracting people away from the genuine.

But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. (John 4:23)

Emotional Synchronization

A close friend made a comment recently while we were listening to a song from a concert that has got me to thinking again about our cravings for life-giving sources. She said that it was a nice song but that she had grown to dislike it simply because she has heard it too many times.

This is a very normal response and a feeling shared by many people I suspect, but I am the kind of person that likes to know why that is and what is going on at the heart level to cause such a reaction. Part of the reason I want to know is because when one person feels turned off by something that to their close friend is a source of deep inspiration, then the synchronization of spirits between the two friends is disrupted and an atmosphere of potential conflict is created. I am not saying that conflict is inevitable in situations like this, but the potential is greatly magnified by the dissonance caused by the disparate reactions inside each person.

One approach to addressing this problem is sometimes to try to change the other person's reactions and try to bring them more into alignment with your own feelings about that particular thing. This is usually not very successful as it is only symptom management and trying to force externals to be in line with another person's internals while still feeling the same discomfort inside that they did before. We cannot usually make another person simply start liking something we like through peer pressure when the underlying triggers causing them to dislike it have not changed. This is an approach of uniformity through coercion and is never effective at bringing hearts into closer proximity.

Another solution that is often practiced is to seek out someone else that has likes and dislikes closer to that of our own and form relationships with them in place of those who don't align with our feelings as much. This can easily be seen the sports scene, the nightclubs, clubs of all types and even the churches people choose to attend. Most of the groupings of people that are formed come from a rearranging of social attachments in attempts to find others to bond with who share the same reactions to the same stimuli that we have. How much this is good or bad I cannot say with any authority but it is very clear that many of our friends are acquired by this means.

But if we simply have friends only because they share our interests, which is generally the case with a great many people, are we not avoiding looking into ourselves to examine or challenge our own motives and reactions? Realigning our friendships to make ourselves more comfortable instead of examining our hearts to see if we are avoiding pain and addressing those issues looks like living a life of escapism instead of becoming more alive.

Another aspect of this that comes to mind is the whole idea of where we get our sense of aliveness and identity. Often we are unconscious of the sources we look to and from which we draw our sense of value. I believe most people are generally in denial of the fact that they are looking to any number of sources other than God to get their sense of well-being, value or whatever label you want to place on what we hope will make us feel alive and able to grow and thrive. Or maybe we have come to the point where we are looking for things or stimuli to just help us cope and mask the ever-present pain or sense of worthlessness that we cannot shake off. Every addiction is an attempt to address an inner pain that has not been faced clearly and addressed properly, and there are far more addictions in our life than those we typically give that label. Our mind has been deceived into believing that the temporary numbness or intense pleasure that we experience from our preferred addiction of choice is the fix that will somehow give us the resolution or satisfaction that we so desperately need. But of course it is just yet another lie in our confusion of selfish perspective.

But what about the original scenario where my close companion has very different reactions to a particular song than I do which then creates dissonance between us. In situations like this I notice a very distinct feeling of emptiness of maybe even loneliness when I realize that this person who I care for deeply cannot share my deep, positive emotional reaction to a piece of music due to what they consider as a negative experience with that same music. I am left feeling that I cannot share my heart with them at a level that I long to be able to do because of their antagonism toward something that I find so fulfilling. To put it rather bluntly, that bothers me a lot and makes me feel alienated and potentially even resentful.

But then the inevitable next question asserts itself – why am I bothered by that? I have to stop and think about that because there is likely more than one reason and also because I am maybe afraid to express some of my reasons for fear of ridicule or shame from others. In the way this world is set up, even our livelihood is often affected by how our set of likes and dislikes line up with enough others around us to make us “successful”, both socially and even financially. Those who seem to listen to a different drummer are not well received or compensated for their efforts to share their views with those around them. Not fitting in affects all areas of life which creates intense incentive to simply conform and become squeezed into the mold of those around us as Paul says in Romans 12:1.

What difference does it make if I cannot emotionally synchronize with my close friend while listening to one of my favorite songs? How far can I go in trying to change their opinion and feelings to align more closely with mine? Or how right is it to simply go off and find others who more closely share my feelings and reactions and preferences with which to keep company instead?

Sharing deep emotional experiences with others is an intense bonding episode. As such, we want to be able to do it with people that we already love and want to feel even closer to. There is usually nothing wrong with forming new attachments to others who share our passions, but that does not address our need to bond more closely with those who do not share a particular enjoyment that brings us deep inspiration. How am I to relate to this?

I believe there is much more here than what I can see right now. However, there is a factor embedded in here that I have not explored very much yet. It is the unconscious expectation that we can receive something life-giving, something that will transmit into our souls that spark of energy and vitality that we are all designed to long for and desire and seek. I don't think that most people are even aware of this desire very much at the conscious level but it is ever-present in all of our lives.

This inner drive to find and increase our sense of aliveness is displayed in nearly every aspect of our lives, and I believe it is revealed in some respects that many find shocking. I believe that many of the behaviors that most people find reprehensible in the lives of others are simply attempts to get life through illegitimate means. This intense desire to increase our sense of aliveness is really condensed well in the word “lust”. I realize that this word is typically associated with sexual issues, but in fact its primary meaning is an intense desire to have something – anything – immediately. I have written about this before and have discovered very enlightening statements that help me to understand it better.

Lust, like pretty much everything else in this distorted world, is a counterfeit of something very genuine and healthy that God designed into our original creation. We are supposed to desire life with intensity and long for life-giving things. God designed the whole universe in such a way that all things are supposed to work together for the good of everything else and everyone else when synchronizing properly under the natural and moral laws under which they were created. Selfless love and service is the true economy of heaven and is what we are all designed to thrive within. Our needs are to be met by others and we are to give and serve others in joyful, self-forgetting love and with passion.

All of this activity and joy was designed to be coordinated by the original Designer who alone is the original Source of the life that flows from one being to another, from one part of creation to the rest. But it all works effectively and flawlessly only when those involved recognize that God is the loving Source of all life and everything and everyone else are simply intermediate channels through which the life of God is to flow. Whenever we allow our spirit or mind to think that the object, experience or person is a source of life for us without believing and living in the greater context of ultimate trust in the God who provided this resource for us, we will unwittingly in our hearts create a god of the thing from which we are trying to extract life for ourselves.

Whenever a person thinks that they can feel more alive by hurting another person, in reality they are trying to extract the essence of aliveness from that person to make themselves feel more powerful or more alive. Whenever a person shames others it is really an attempt to feel more valuable themselves by contrast. Whenever a person uses deception, force or manipulation to take advantage of others, be it financially, socially, sexually or emotionally, they are trying to satisfy a deep hunger to find a source of life that may make them feel better inside if even only for a few moments.

All of these choices and activities are rooted in beliefs deep inside the person that are counterfeits of true principles by which we were designed to live and to enjoy life. Our dysfunctions are driven by lie-based thinking that feels and seems very true and reliable to us. Deception never feels like it is false but feels very true and reliable until enough light of truth is allowed into our souls to expose the counterfeit beliefs that we have trusted in for most of our life. Most people really do not realize how many false ideas they have about how to feel more alive, they just follow their feelings or formulas depending on whether their nature is bent toward right brain deceptions or left brain deceptions.

So how does this apply to my first example of wanting to have a closer bonding experience of sharing my deep emotional appreciation of a favorite piece of music with a friend who thinks it is long past its prime? I think it is very helpful and enlightening for me to remind myself that the music and the musicians who perform it are only channels of life and not sources of life for me. When I remind my heart that the intense enjoyment that I feel when I listen with my heart wide open to the words and the deeply enriching music that so fills my spirit with unspeakable passion, that the music itself can never be trusted or relied upon to be a genuine source of real life for me no matter how much my intense feelings tell me to the contrary. If I insist on looking past the music (or even through it) to the God who originally inspired that music and musician to convey to me a very tiny part of the much greater passion and love that He has in store for me by means of many other sources, then I will not have my heart attached to the music itself but will direct it to be more attached and bonded by this experience to the Real Source, the only reliable Source of all life.

I don't believe this is just an incidental concept that is just a piece of nice theology. I believe that it is a fundamental and crucial truth that needs to be far more clear in my heart in relationship to everything that causes me to feel alive. I was created to enjoy life, to pursue life, to desire life and love and joy. There is nothing wrong with those desires, but I must be aware of the subtle counterfeits that are constantly trying to deceive me into believing that they can provide me life and invite me to, in essence worship the channels in place of God. For worship is what we all do all the time. Worship is the very act of looking to anything or anyone as a source of making us feel more alive, more happy or more valuable. As soon as we fail to see God behind every source of life He has provided for us and look to the person, object or activity itself as our source, then we have entered into the arena of worshiping false gods. And this is something we do far more than any of us realize. A famous theologian centuries ago got himself in a lot of hot water when he declared that every man who went into a house of prostitution was really looking for God. But he was really trying to articulate this very point.

In the situation with my close friend I ponder how I might relate to our difference of feelings. I want to share a deep bonding experience of mutual, intense enjoyment of something that makes me feel very alive together with them. That person has very different feelings about that song and cannot bring themselves to appreciate and share my experience. I have to choose to let go of that particular desire and leave it for some other time or with another person who is more in tune with my emotions. But I can also pray for the synchronization of God's Spirit to bring my heart and my friend's heart into closer unity through some other channels that are better suited to knit our hearts together. I need to keep a loose hold on the things that I feel strongly about and seek to find what is nourishing to the soul and heart of my friends (and even enemies). I can ask God to use me to be a channel of life-giving energy in some way that meets some empty part of other people's hearts in ways that are more enriching and satisfying to them.

God, keep my heart open to the channels you have for us that we often ignore or overlook. Your deepest desire is to impart real life into our hearts and lives and souls and bodies. Help me to be more aware of the ways and means that you have to channel life into me and transform me today into a more open channel of blessing to others. Fill me with Your grace, Your compassion, Your perspective of everyone I touch today. Cleanse me of the lies and the false gods that so fill my imagination with false promises of life. Make me real, alive and thriving in the strength of Your joy.