Skip to main content

How We Prepare For Worship

I was reading Exodus recently and realized just how different things are for us nowadays than they were for Moses and the Israelites.

Let me start with the Israelites...

We see God commanding the people to consecrate their firstborn children. Here were their requirements:
  • Make bread without yeast.
  • Get rid of all yeast. All of it. 
It was like when your mom would say she didn't want to see any mess in your room. God wanted all things yeasty to be gone. But we're not done yet.

All firstborn males had to be redeemed. This was done by sacrificing the firstborn sheep and goats. If you had a donkey, you could switch it for a sheep. But if you didn't, God wanted you snapping the neck of your donkey. I have to wonder if that would cause the other donkeys to lose trust in you. Perhaps they would be a little nervous when they saw you come around again.

Nevertheless, this is how the Israelites prepared for worship.

A typical Sunday morning for my family looks nothing like this. The most preparation came when they were younger. This involved us throwing them in the bath, whether they needed it or not. (I'll let you in on a little secret; they needed it.)

There are the cries of having nothing to wear that's nice. There are searches for dress shoes, since they've disappeared since the previous Sunday. There are attempts (and failures) at sneaking out of the house in less-than-expected dress. There's breakfast being eaten and those little eye-boogers being removed. Then smiles are demanded, so that it looks like we haven't fought before going to worship Jesus.

Sometimes we are as prepared as we look, sometimes not.

But here's the catch. When God set this up for the Israelites, He also was looking forward.

“And in the future, your children will ask you, ‘What does all this mean?’ Then you will tell them, ‘With the power of his mighty hand, the Lord brought us out of Egypt, the place of our slavery." ~Exodus 13:14

Have you ever had your kids (or maybe your spouse) ask you why we have to go to church every week? I think I have a new answer for my family. ‘With the power of his mighty hand, the Lord brought us out of Egypt, the place of our slavery."
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Accountable

I recently officiated a wedding. The ceremony was simple, lovely, and ended with another couple professing to keep the covenant of marriage. But it all started with a clarification...from me. At our first premarital counseling session, as I have done with every couple I have agreed to marry, I clarified a couple of matters. First, I officiate Christian weddings, where both spouses-to-be are professing Christians. I firmly believe that marriage is difficult enough, without adding disagreements about God into the mix. Second, as a minister of Jesus Christ, I believe the pastor’s role in a wedding is to represent the blessing of God on that union. So we have several sessions of premarital counseling where we discuss married life. It’s not that I have this imaginary card in my head, with a picture of me on the front and my stats on the back. (You know, like a baseball card.) Ok, I do picture cards. Pastor cards! And being a competitive guy, I want my stats to look good. The number of coupl
Post a Comment
Read more

Patience

I am more than halfway through the last year of dropping one of my children off at school. It's my eighth grade daughter, for anyone keeping track of my family.  See, next year she will be at the high school, and her brother will drive her. He says that it's not cool for seniors to drive their freshman sister to school, but I bet it's cooler than being dropped off by your mom in a minivan.  So rather than groan about this daily responsibility, I've been reminiscing about what the drop-off line used to look like, way back in elementary school. Once our children were about halfway through their elementary years, the drop-off line became a test of patience.  Do you know which group you do not want to get caught behind in the parent drop-off line at an elementary school? The kindergartners. These little ones are barely able to walk, but now we put them in the high-pressure situation of trying to unbuckle their seat-belt, grab their backpack (which might be as tall as they a
Post a Comment
Read more

Jury Duty

I was recently summoned to jury duty. I know, groan. Except I didn't. I had never experienced it before and was curious to see what it was like.   When the day to report arrives, they separate you into groups, asking various questions to decide if you will be selected to serve. Do you know the accused? Do you have conflicts that would keep you from serving? Can you stay focused?  I wanted to answer well, if only because my kids kept wishing me luck the day before, telling me they hoped I made the team. After all, who wants to be rejected? It occurred to me that there are things you probably shouldn’t say right away if you’re wanting to serve on a jury. I know, I know, people don’t typically want to serve on a jury. But that list didn’t seem nearly as humorous to me. Here are the things you probably shouldn’t say if you want to be selected for jury. I hold myself in contempt. You can’t handle the truth. We find the defendant guilty. I believe the judge looks pretty in his robe. I’d
Post a Comment
Read more