Albert
07-07-2007, 01:11 AM
I am a 53 year old believer who was baptized with the Holy Ghost in the Jesus People movement in Edmonton, Alberta, in the early 1970's. This is where I first saw and experienced joyful and exuberant worship with the spirit and with the understanding. I loved it!! Since that time I have loved this kind of worship.
In the late 1980's my wife and I and our two small children moved to the area where we now live. After many moves because of university training for my wife, and three more children, we are back here where we felt God sent us in the late 80's, but have been unable to find a place which worships the way I long for.
Our family worships with all our hearts. We have made worship an important part of our lives, but when we attend churches that once worshipped the way we long for, we find many have moved to performance or concert type worship.
Here's where I'm going to share what has grieved my spirit about worship in the modern western churches I have attended. Worship with the spirit has been eliminated from the public worship service. Some still have it in the preservice prayer room. Many modern songs are too difficult, complicated, and confusing for the congregation to follow, let alone be released in worship. I believe simple is best.
The songs I love best are the ones that are right to Jesus, not about Him, or about us.
Musical interludes interrupt the flow of worship and seem to be performance based rather than giving a chance for individual worship.
Corporate worship with the spirit works best when the musicians play in one chord and allow worshippers to sing their own worship with the spirit and with the understanding, as a love gift to Jesus.
When I look around at the worshippers in many of the churches where we have been, I find the worshippers to be uninvolved. The gifts of the Holy Ghost don't seem to manifest in worship.
Besides our home worship, we have done things to try to encourage worship in our small community. Although we have had some measure of success, we are lonely and weary. When I learned about this site, I thought maybe this would be a good place to share this burden and my desire to see a spirit of worship flood the world of believers creating a place where Jesus, by His Holy Spirit would flow upon and through His church, manifesting Himself to the world.
In the late 1980's my wife and I and our two small children moved to the area where we now live. After many moves because of university training for my wife, and three more children, we are back here where we felt God sent us in the late 80's, but have been unable to find a place which worships the way I long for.
Our family worships with all our hearts. We have made worship an important part of our lives, but when we attend churches that once worshipped the way we long for, we find many have moved to performance or concert type worship.
Here's where I'm going to share what has grieved my spirit about worship in the modern western churches I have attended. Worship with the spirit has been eliminated from the public worship service. Some still have it in the preservice prayer room. Many modern songs are too difficult, complicated, and confusing for the congregation to follow, let alone be released in worship. I believe simple is best.
The songs I love best are the ones that are right to Jesus, not about Him, or about us.
Musical interludes interrupt the flow of worship and seem to be performance based rather than giving a chance for individual worship.
Corporate worship with the spirit works best when the musicians play in one chord and allow worshippers to sing their own worship with the spirit and with the understanding, as a love gift to Jesus.
When I look around at the worshippers in many of the churches where we have been, I find the worshippers to be uninvolved. The gifts of the Holy Ghost don't seem to manifest in worship.
Besides our home worship, we have done things to try to encourage worship in our small community. Although we have had some measure of success, we are lonely and weary. When I learned about this site, I thought maybe this would be a good place to share this burden and my desire to see a spirit of worship flood the world of believers creating a place where Jesus, by His Holy Spirit would flow upon and through His church, manifesting Himself to the world.