A response to the "worship protesters"

This morning I was reading the Old Testament book of Amos in Peterson's "The Message" translation after having read the ESV. I've always felt sorry for these prophets and the heavy task of speaking God's message to people who had no ears to hear or hearts to receive. Can you imagine going to the local church and basically telling people that they are a bunch of self-centered, sinful, haughty folks with whom God is displeased, and that judgment is coming? I will just go ahead and say I couldn't do it. I would be a a modern-day Jonah.

The heaviness of Amos' task aside, I was also struck by God's repeated return to the issues of sin and their connection to social justice, or the lack of it. Take for instance Amos 2:6-8 (The Message):

God's Message:

"Because of the three great sins of Israel - make that four - I'm not putting up with them ay longer,

They buy and sell upstanding people.

People for them are only things - ways of making money.

They'd sell their own grandmother!

They'd grind the penniless into dirt,

shove the luckless into the ditch,

Everyone and his brother sleeps with the 'sacred whore' -

a sacrilege against my Holy Name.

Stuff they've extorted from the poor

is piled up at the shrine of their god,

While they sit around drinking wine

they've conned from their victims.

Then, 5:10-12:

People hate this kind of talk.

Raw truth is never popular.

But here it is, bluntly spoken:

Because you run roughshod over the poor

and take the bread right out of their mouths,

You're never going to move into the luxury homes you have built.

You're never going to drink wine

from the expensive vineyards you've planted.

I know precisely the extent of your violations,

the enormity of your sins. Appalling!

You bully right-living people,

taking bribes right and left and kicking the poor when they're down.

God's command to the people upon revealing their sins is even more telling in vv. 5:16-17:

"Go out into the streets and lament loudly!

Fill the malls and shops with cries of doom!

Weep loudly, 'Not me! Not us, Not now!'

Empty offices, stores, factories, workplaces.

Enlist everyone in the general lament.

I want to hear it loud and clear when I make my visit."

God's Decree.

Rejoicing or lament?

It is clear to me from these passages that God expects a specific response from the people: Lament. Repentance. Sorrow.

He called for it in Isaiah 1:10-15. Here again, in responding to the sins of his chosen people people, God called for sorrow, for lament.

"What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? says the LORD; I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed beasts; I do not delight in the blood of bulls or of lambs, or of goats." (1:11)

"When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you; even though you make many prayers, I will not listen; your hands are full of blood." (v. 15)

I was thinking of these verses a few days ago when I read an article about a large meeting of roughly 9,000-10,000 Christians in Nashville who met under the guise of a "worship protest," with few wearing masks, and all crowded tightly together. "The church will not be stopped!" was the cry of the organizer and "worship leader." YES: read the criticism in my voice at the use of "worship leader" to describe those who dreamed up this idea, and then led a sea of unprotected people in God's name. The shame is palpable.

Given God's track record in Scripture, I wonder if his response to this Nashville crowd would be much the same as it was to those in Amos and Isaiah?

I wonder how people can stand in front of a crowd and jump up and down, all while supposedly "rejoicing" over the greatness of God. Do we really think that is what is needed by believers and unbelievers, alike? I would argue it is not.

What DO we need? Dust and ashes, that is what we need. We need to sing sad songs, songs of mourning and lament, songs of repentance.

"When you come to appear before me, who has required of you this trampling of my courts? Bring no more vain offerings; incense is an abomination to me. New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations - I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly." (Isaiah 1:12-13)

In his love and compassion, God told the people- HIS people - EXACTLY what offering to bring:

"Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good. seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause." (Isaiah 1:16-17)

To stand in front of a crowd of thousands and jump, dance, and sing about God's greatness is, in my opinion, a "trampling of my courts." What is worse is the inherent narcissistic tone of so much of today's so-called corporate worship music. It's us singing about ourselves singing about God. As theologian Marva Dawn so expertly wrote in her book, Reaching Out Without Dumbing Down: A Theology of Worship for this Urgent Time, unless God is both subjectAND object of our worship, we are doing something far removed from worship. The inherent "me" in our songs, and in gatherings like this one in Nashville should concern us deeply.

Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann issued a stinging indictment of such behavior in his book The Message of the Psalms: A Theological Commentary:

"It is a curious fact that the church has, by and large, continued to sing songs of orientation in a world increasingly experienced as disoriented. . . . It is my judgment that this action of the church is less an evangelical defiance guided by faith, and much more a frightened, numb denial of deception that does not want to acknowledge or experience the disorientation of life. The reason for such relentless affirmation of orientation seems to come, not from faith, but from the wishful optimism of our culture. Such a denial and cover-up, which I take it to be, is an odd inclination for passionate Bible users, given the large number of psalms that are songs of lament, protest, and complaint about the incoherence that is experienced in the world. At least it is clear that a church that goes on singing "happy songs" in the face of raw reality is doing something very different from what the Bible itself does." (emphasis mine)

Folks, hear this: lament is not an act of "unfaith." It is not an indication of a lack of belief in God's sovereignty. The church should be lamenting. Congregations should be lamenting. We should be sitting in dust and ashes. Our insistence on rejoicing in the face of devastating loss and abuse in our world rings as hollow as a bass drum. Do we honestly expect people to be attracted to Christ when we offer such dissonance and disconnect? What would happen if, instead, we offered a place to gather and collectively mourn, to pour out our grief over loved ones lost to COVID, or crimes perpetrated against the innocent, or any number of losses upon losses?

Let us follow Christ's example. He lamented, he cried out in grief, he sweat as "great drops of blood." And just look what happened.