Boring Worship

If you've ever gotten bored in church, you're not alone. God has too. I couldn't believe it when I read it but its right there in the Bible in Isaiah chapter 1, verse 10. God says, "I have more than enough of burnt offerings, I have no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs. Stop bringing meaningless offerings. Your festivals my soul hates. They have become a burden to me. I am weary of bearing them." Boy was I relieved to hear that. I could have said those words myself many times. Sometimes church is meaningless and I find little pleasure in it. And sometimes God feels the same.

But wait a minute. God is the one who told the Israelites to bring sacrifices and to have festivals in the first place. But if it loses it meaning, God tells us to stop. We don't still offer up animal sacrifices in the church today. Many of the Old Testament festivals are no longer celebrated at least in many churches in America. It’s hard for us to get excited about what God did for the Israelites when they were in slavery in Egypt 2000 years ago. We've never been to Egypt. Maybe we need to start to celebrate what God is doing in our lives today. Maybe its time we change some of the rituals in our churches. Many of the traditions in our worship services today haven't changed in 500 years. Its no wonder that they've lost meaning and become a burden for many today. It’s no wonder that less and less people are in church.

I know that God intended for church to be exciting and relevant. If church has become boring then let’s change it. I'm not talking about the saving grace of God. That never changes, but it finds ever new ways to be revealed to us. God is rescuing people out of slavery in new ways today. He rescues us from the monotony of our jobs, the busyness of our lives, our obsession with money, the neglect and abuse of people that plagues our world. God is real, and when he touches our lives we need to praise him for it.

I remember as a kid being bored silly in church, and yet I became a pastor, because I found that church became much more exciting when I put my life into it. I guess church will always be boring if its someone else's story, but when it becomes our story then it becomes something we can get excited about. Only by letting God tell His story through us can we make it timely and relevant to our world today.

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