Day 37 -- Preparing for Worship: Becoming an Empty Cup

Sometimes the most profound ideas come in the simplist of images. I've always loved Buddhist (Zen) wisdom as well as that of the Toaists. There are times I hear Jesus loudly speak in places where we wouldn't typically expect to find him.

Buddhist addage: In order to fill your cup, you must first empty your cup.

This is the core of what I believe lies behind the idea of preparing our hearts for worship. We are so filled up with the stuff of the world, it's hard if not impossible to receive Christ's alternative vision of the kingdom. We have MSNBC, FoxNews, CNN, the papers, web news, and the radio screaming at us a thousand different reasons that we should be afraid, should act self-protectively, and she either run and cower or take up arms and fight insane wars.

We are anxious and afraid. Perhaps that's the reason Jesus' most frequently invoked command is "Fear not!" The human condition is an anxious one. We are always precariously poised between a past we cannot change and a future we have so little control over. So we live anxiously.

Preparing ourselves for worship is about making space for a different story. It doesn't cause fear. It creates faith. It doesn't incite in us despair. It blossoms forth hope. It doesn't drive us towards death. It creates in us life. It doesn't incite us to act self-protectively. It incites us to live selflessly from the abundance and power of the God that raises the dead.

I'm aware, as a pastor, that all too often I don't do the sort of preparation I need to do to hear the message of worship either. I enter the space of worship harried, concerned, frantic, distracted, and ruffled.

But there is a more excellent way, both for life and for worship (because our whole existences are ultimately supposed to be WORSHIP). It involves intentionally creating space for the story of the Risen Christ to works it way into our DNA, changing our minds, hearts, and lives from the inside out.

Emptying my cup with you to receive the ancient transforming story...

Pastor Nathan