Matt Mings on Lifestyle
Around 5 years or so ago, when I was serving as a youth pastor, I used to throw around a personal motto or mantra: lex orandi, lex credendi. The Latin means “the rule of prayer, is the rule of belief.” My paraphrase became: “the way you worship is the way you live.”
Worship used to be all-encompassing. Not that I always worshiped, but I certainly did my best to direct all attention to the One who is greater. That’s what I taught (and hopefully) modeled for my teens. That in actions, thoughts, and words, God would be recognized and we would be humble.
Since leaving the professional ministry (whatever that is supposed to be), and taking the role of a pariah (unwillingly), worship has become less of what I know it to be. Finding a community to worship with has been a 2-year endeavor. And worship has been relegated to that hour or so each week.
Or so I thought.
After recently hearing a sermon on worship, I took a retrospective. Eventhough my mind has not been geared toward this purpose, my lifestyle (and that of my family) has certainly been one of worship. As I have been teaching in the public school system this year, I realize that I have lived as servant, shown compassion to my students, encouraged them to be more than expected, and asked them to follow my lead and do as I do. And through this all I have tried to reflect the realness of Jesus of Nazareth, the love of the Spirit, and the awesomeness of God the Father.
Then today I remembered the words of one of my teens from 5 years ago. After months of living the idea of “the way you worship is the way you live,” my friend Zach, who was only about 16 at the time, said, “This is God as a lifestyle.”
Zach had nailed it. The whole of life is for God to be our lifestyle. I take encouragement knowing that even with inner doubt, anger, frustration, and fatigue, the lifestyle has been centered on the same thing.
And as I’m typing this, my wife sends me a text that reads in part: “the LORD delights in those who put their hope in his unfailing love.” Feeling unlovable and questioning so much was not enough to dissuade God’s unfailing love.
That is more than enough cause to make worship a lifestyle.
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Category: Faith, Sacramental Living, Serving Others | Tags: doubt, Faith, lifestyle, Sacramental Living, worship One comment »
December 8th, 2010 at 12:52 pm
As someone who was torn apart by a church, and being a pariah myself (I believe God formed the Earth through evolution, and I don’t hate gays or illegal aliens) I can relate a bit. I returned to college late in life, and see God through other people, and every day is worship. My life is no longer relegated to church. I am not judged by how many hours I put in to church programs. I live God everyday in the real world, and I am grateful and humbled by the experience.