How Big is Your Mirror?

Those people who spend time with me in the day-to-day know that I won't be lining up to buy the newest praise and worship cd anytime soon. It's no secret that I'm not a big fan of most contemporary Christian music. There are a lot of reasons that go into that, not the least of them being that I struggle with the small themes and religious (and musical) cliches often represented in commercialized Christian culture. It's not that I have a distaste for contemporary music or that I am out of touch with a modern culture; being a musician and student on the jazz and soul scene keeps me fairly rooted in blending the old with the new and certainly keeps me acquainted with the fine art of coloring outside the lines. No, this is about beauty and bigness.

I am confident that we would all agree that worship is about God - not so much about us. Granted, our encounters with the Divine accumulate throughout our lives to be the kindling beneath that fire, and yet we are all working inside a cultural system that teaches that worship is about our experience of God. Worship is our affirmation of and blessing on the breath of God blowing through our lives and our world, but I've beat that drum so often, I'll spare you the soapbox right now. So here's the big idea: I can tell an awful lot about who your God is by how you worship. It's not that I have some kind of powers of divination or magical expert insight; invite anyone to tell you about your God by being part of your worship and I think we'd probably be shocked, maybe pleasantly surprised, maybe thoughtful at their response.

The danger in this assessment is that we believe that if our worship is cutting edge (i.e. guitars, loud drums, "new" sound, music-video-style media, and "passionate" expression) than people will think our God is a relevant and rebellious Lover, bucking old ways and ritual...which is what we need him to be. It's so easy to fall into the ditch of style over content or even style over intention, not just in our presentation to the rest of the world, but inside of our own heads and experiences.

So here's the question, if you had to sit down and write a list of adjectives describing how you actively worship, or perhaps what you think worship is or should be, it will reveal quite a bit about who your God is. Even more revealing, make a list of the most memorable Divine encounters from the last week or month. How many of them take place inside the church? inside a Christian culture environment? inside something blatantly spiritual? My question is: why have we limited the revelation and experience of God for ourselves and for the people we serve?

Denver hosts a parade of light-filled floats the first weekend of December to kick off our Christmas season. It's a rather time-honored tradition and crowds are packed onto the curbs of the parade route every year. This December, I took my three year old son to his first Parade of Lights. We stood opposite the historic clock-tower with it's red-light lined peaks and every window glowing. His eyes and mouth were fixed in a look of perpetual astonishment; but when Santa came around the corner, with the dancing gifts and snowflakes, the animated penguins, and his genuine spirit of joy, every person jammed onto that curbside came to life. Regardless of age, life-journey, class, race, religion, social group, for a few moments everybody believed in something bigger, something beautiful. Everybody could foresee a time of peace, of togetherness, of mystery and magic. And I wept. Not because of Santa or Christmas or my baby boy's sweet reaction - but because of the overwhelming presence of God. The kingdom was there, quiet and hidden, but seeping into every pore and sound and scent on that street.

I think I also cried because it was not too long ago that this kind of experience would never have made it onto my radar as a sacred encounter. My categories were so entrenched - God looks, smells, sounds like this and he was usually glorified by an acoustic-guitar-playing angel with a soul patch under his lip. I might have even "prayed for" those lonely, hurting people who were confusing God with the experience of Christmas. Because, of course, I knew what they were really looking for. Ouch.

I wondered how many times I still miss God-Who-Is-Bigger or settle for God-Who-Makes-Me-Feel-Okay. One thing I've learned is that the God-Who-Is-Bigger isn't really in the business of making me feel better or reconciling the situations of my life, but often meets me in ways that are subtle, disturbing, and gently lifts my chin from gazing at myself and my ideas of what it means to be "spiritual" to a vision of all that could be out there. There's an invitation by the God-Who-Is-Bigger to genuine self-discovery and Divine-discovery and world-discovery and love-discovery that simply can't happen when we play it safe or "culturally relevant."

I certainly came from a Christian culture that said my God is big enough to heal my wounds (both literal and metaphorical), to come through when everything else is failing, to "defeat my enemies" (whomever and however I interpreted that), to legislate morality (as defined by Christian culture not necessarily Scripture), or to act in the blatantly-Christian supernatural. But my God was still only big enough to fit into my world - instead of inviting me to get lost inside of God's world. This was never more evident than in all of my favorite worship songs and defined worship experiences. It was never more evident than in the lack of profound creative revelation and thematic grandeur. And yet, how cool did I think I was with my anti-tradition, pop-Christian music and my normalizing appreciation for Pink Floyd!!

We have had so many conversations about what our lives say about worship, what our music says about worship, what media says about worship - but it's time for more conversations about what our worship says about our God.

I have no doubt that a large part of our worship crisis in America is due to the smallness of the God we profess and reflect on Sunday's. That's a pretty big accusation, I understand, but wrestle with that thought. I'm not asking you to agree with me, I'm simply asking you to think about it.

Throughout this Advent week, how do you see God-Among-Us? How open are you to encountering the God-Who-Is-Bigger, even if that God doesn't fit into our spiritual or pre-defined categories? And are you willing to worship there?

May the God of Surprises, the Deep Well of Mystery, the Divine Spark enlarge your world and your experiences this week. May we all mirror that bigness to those we serve. Through Christ Jesus.


Jodi Adams is a teacher, author, and visionary for community worship. She serves as a teaching pastor and worship pastor at an urban church.

Passionate about empowering artists and leaders to take their congregations beyond the culture box, Jodi is a contributor to CTI's FaithVisuals.com and GiftedforLeadership.com and speaks regularly on the convergence of cultural issues and worship.

Jodi is currently completing her M.Div. at Denver Seminary and finishing her first book, which is due out next year. She and her jazzy husband, Justin, live in Denver with their three children: Sara, Anna-Michelle, and Leo, along with Karma the Wonder Dog.