The River of Worship

We do not swim in a pond every Sunday.
pond worship
The activities we do in church, the liturgies in which we participate, are not simply a splashing around in a pond.
We do not climb back out as we walk out the doors into the world.
Whether you stand or kneel, pray from the Book of Common Prayer or spontaneously lift your hands, worship is not meant to be contained in a building.
pond worship
The weekly liturgies of the Church are, instead, a rushing river that refreshes us, sustains us, nourishes us,
and then carries us out the doors into the world.
river worship
What happens in our church services should be a communal expression of our individual daily lives, not a break from them.
The praise within the music should be pouring from our lives.
The remembrance of the Eucharist should permeate our days.
The immersion in the Scriptures should suffuse our every activity.
We were created to worship.
We will worship, whether purposefully or not, so shouldn’t we be intentional about allowing our Sunday worship to flood our lives, spilling over into the rest of our piece of the world?
river worship
The foyers of our churches are not walls, keeping the world at bay.
The narthex should be a door.
A door that opens wide, allowing the rushing river of worship to sweep us out to a world that is dying of thirst.
Our world is bone-dry and cottonmouthed, desperate for a thirst-quenching drink of living water.
Who else can give that to them other than those who weekly are immersed in the river of worship?
We must allow our Sunday ventures to send us out to the world all around rather than splashing around in our shallow pond, experiencing only a brief time of refreshment before climbing back out to reenter our regular lives.
pond worship
Our world depends upon the river of life that flows through the Body of Christ.
Our own lives depend upon that river to flourish.
river worship
A pond, after all, often becomes stagnant.

Art credits: all photographs are by Kirk Sewell

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