July 30, 2001

Clemons examines worship at CBF meeting
___By Marv Knox
___Editor
___ATLANTA--Worshipping God "is the most important thing we do," veteran pastor Hardy Clemons insists.
___Unfortunately, Christians often weaken their worship by mistaking the roles of the participants in worship, noted Clemons, retired pastor of First Baptist Church in Asheville, N.C., and former longtime pastor of Second Baptist Church in Lubbock. He cited Soren Kierkegaard, the 19th century Danish Christian thinker.
___ "The common view" is that worship is like a drama, and people in the pews are the audience, he explained. The clergy, choir and musicians are the actors, and God is off stage, "helping the actors do their best."
___ Actually, God is the audience, the people in the pews are the actors and the clergy are the prompters, Clemons said.
___ "This image of worship keeps me honest," he added. "What we offer to God in worship is our ‘worth-ship’--with mind and heart and strength."
___That also points to a redundant phrase, when Baptists speak of the "worship service," he said.
___ "To worship God means to serve God," he said, quoting author Frederick Buechner. "Basically, there are two ways to do it.
___ "One way is to do things for God that God needs to have done--run errands for God, carry messages for God, fight on God’s side, feed God’s lambs and so on.
___ "The other way is to do things for God that you need to do--sing songs for God, create beautiful things for God, give things up for God, tell God what’s on your mind and in your heart, … rejoice in God and make a fool of yourself for God the way lovers have always made fools of themselves for the one they love."
___ Clemons described a variety of reasons why people need to worship God:
___ "Humans need to bow down before God as the supreme value in the universe," he said. People need to "discover and rediscover, commit and recommit our lives to God as that unique personal sovereign value."
___ Although it’s often missing from the Baptist tradition, people need to worship in order to value themselves, he added. "We are created in the image of God and recreated in the work of Jesus and the Spirit of God."
___ People need to value "someone sovereign above ourselves and beyond ourselves."
___ Worship allows people to "rehearse the gospel story" and to adjust their lives accordingly, he said, stressing, "Worship is adjustment."
___ "We need to thank God continually as the generous creator of our giftedness," he said. "All of us have an absolute unique giftedness, given to us by the gracious God who wants to enable us to use that giftedness."
___ Christians must confront their sin and hear a challenge to repent from their own destructiveness so they may pursue holiness and the grace of God.
___ Christians need to "proclaim and celebrate the good news of God" and also "work for justice and mercy in God’s world," Clemons noted.
___ "If worship is worship, it doesn’t all happen in the room where it starts," he said. "Worship moves on out from the stained glass and tall steeple. It gives us the impetus to work for justice and mercy."
___ People need ongoing Christian education and Scripture reading that happens in worship.
___ "We need regular inspiration--in-breathing from God--for our task," he said. "We need to recommit ourselves to live out the biblical truth that every Christian is a minister. …
___ "We’re not the support system for the preacher. When you become a Christian, you become a minister."
___ Worship helps to build the "fellowship of the gathered community" of the church, which is vital for Christians, he said.
___ Worship enables Christians to "hear the voice of God calling us to our individual and corporate niches in ministry and helping us discover and affirm our unique identity," he said.
___ Worship enables Christians to "share, be taught and nourished by the great music of the faith," he said. "Much theology comes from music."
___ Clemons focused on worship during a seminar at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship general assembly this summer.



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