Cathedrals weren’t the same as the little churches we see tucked away on the side of the street. Obviously, the cathedral builders had much more money to spend, but these gigantic buildings with pointing ceilings that soared so in the sky, were made to make everyone who stepped into the mighty doors feel puny. The very purpose of these massive structures was, essentially, to shrink the size of humans.The monks, or the pope or the church owners/pastors, they weren’t trying to make all the people coming to feel low below them or anything, all they had in mind was glorifying God. When you entered these immense buildings, it magnified your smallness, your tinyness. Of course, as a lot of things happen to function, it works two ways. You get smaller, and when you look up and see God…he’s bigger and more amazing then you ever have seen him before. It’s not as the Creator needs help from buildings to be awe-inspiring, we just dumb him down. However harsh that sounds, our minds continue to degrade God. He is holy and mighty above anything we could possibly ever amount to. It almost feels like the cathedrals were made for someone bigger then us. Like a bug going into a person’s house. It almost seems too big. But is the house of God ever on our level? Now these majestic buildings were (and still are) accompanied by equally majestic music. The organs, the beautiful horns, the soaring melodies, the strong voices of the choir, these were old hymns. It was a big song for a big God.It would actually be really good to listen to a few of them.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNcYbrTgscc ß note the big building they’re inhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BuvWSbJBJKY&feature=related ß same hereWhen you listen to these songs, when you feel the bigness, the immenseness that fills those buildings, you can only think….wow. Wow…wow…. After listening to the two songs above…God seems amazing…right?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfZhXz69xYQ
Oh goodness, the only thought that crosses my mind is ‘God is our Buddy.’ This is what CCM is trying to tell you. God is your buddy. He loves yaThis is another example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_DbnBCVGPcWell…After that….Does God seem big?Does God seem mighty?Does He seem like the kind of person who can make mountains stand on their head and fling lightning across the sky? God is not given his due glory. God shouldn’t ever ever have to be reduced to going to the movies with us, or being our ‘best friend.’ (in the most casual sense)Intentional or not, these songs can only bring these thoughts into our head. Maybe it came from the idea of Abba (daddy) Father. Maybe, but the truth is, God is holy.I love this passage in Isaiah 6 :In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. 3 And they were calling to one another: "Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory."4 At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.5 "Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty."6 Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7 With it he touched my mouth and said, "See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for."8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?" And I said, "Here am I. Send me!"If, when you heard about Isaiah, or continue to hear and read about him, do any of us view Isaiah the prophet as sinful, Satanist or worldy? Not really, yet even he feels the burden of his sin, his blackness, his punyness in the presence of such a mighty and powerful being. This is one of the issues that can come up when worshiping God. The words might sound nice, but not when it brings God down to nothing (our level). That’s a possibility, but not unavoidable. Anyone who says all Christian worship songs are like “I am a Friend of God’ has never heard Delirious?, virtually any of Hillsong’s songs, etc. etc. If you feed your brain constantly with this, the mindset and the thinking get's forced in too. It becomes easy and natural to think of God as casual. Even if we don't know it. I'm not saying that we should only listen to hymns. Strap ourselves to a pair of headphones and blast organ into our ears for ever. Certainly not. In fact, God is immanent and transcendent. He isn't just transcendent, what I'm saying is that there is a potential hazard in only dwelling on God-punyizing worship. You might want to ask yourself the following questions about a song you are doubting:
Does this song promote a ‘warm and fuzzy feeling’ about God?
Does this song refer to God as a friend/buddy/in a very casual way?
Is this song by Philips, Craig and Dean?
(by the way, that last one was a joke…sort of)
I would encourage you to look at a couple of songs (as examples of God-bigifying songs):http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sy9CGymYvuAhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSZdflfRTNAhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_G7AKpKayac
http://youtube.com/watch?v=BbW4xwkQOLQ (not necessarily a worship song, but you get the idea)
Oh goodness, the only thought that crosses my mind is ‘God is our Buddy.’ This is what CCM is trying to tell you. God is your buddy. He loves yaThis is another example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_DbnBCVGPcWell…After that….Does God seem big?Does God seem mighty?Does He seem like the kind of person who can make mountains stand on their head and fling lightning across the sky? God is not given his due glory. God shouldn’t ever ever have to be reduced to going to the movies with us, or being our ‘best friend.’ (in the most casual sense)Intentional or not, these songs can only bring these thoughts into our head. Maybe it came from the idea of Abba (daddy) Father. Maybe, but the truth is, God is holy.I love this passage in Isaiah 6 :In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. 3 And they were calling to one another: "Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory."4 At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.5 "Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty."6 Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7 With it he touched my mouth and said, "See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for."8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?" And I said, "Here am I. Send me!"If, when you heard about Isaiah, or continue to hear and read about him, do any of us view Isaiah the prophet as sinful, Satanist or worldy? Not really, yet even he feels the burden of his sin, his blackness, his punyness in the presence of such a mighty and powerful being. This is one of the issues that can come up when worshiping God. The words might sound nice, but not when it brings God down to nothing (our level). That’s a possibility, but not unavoidable. Anyone who says all Christian worship songs are like “I am a Friend of God’ has never heard Delirious?, virtually any of Hillsong’s songs, etc. etc. If you feed your brain constantly with this, the mindset and the thinking get's forced in too. It becomes easy and natural to think of God as casual. Even if we don't know it. I'm not saying that we should only listen to hymns. Strap ourselves to a pair of headphones and blast organ into our ears for ever. Certainly not. In fact, God is immanent and transcendent. He isn't just transcendent, what I'm saying is that there is a potential hazard in only dwelling on God-punyizing worship. You might want to ask yourself the following questions about a song you are doubting:
Does this song promote a ‘warm and fuzzy feeling’ about God?
Does this song refer to God as a friend/buddy/in a very casual way?
Is this song by Philips, Craig and Dean?
(by the way, that last one was a joke…sort of)
I would encourage you to look at a couple of songs (as examples of God-bigifying songs):http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sy9CGymYvuAhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSZdflfRTNAhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_G7AKpKayac
http://youtube.com/watch?v=BbW4xwkQOLQ (not necessarily a worship song, but you get the idea)
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