Seeing and Savoring God
SEEING AND SAVORING GOD There are always two parts to true worship. There is SEEING God and there is SAVORING God. You can’t separate these. You must see him to savor him. And if you don’t savor him when you see him, you insult him. In true worship, there is always UNDERSTANDING with the mind and there is always FEELING in the heart. Understanding must always be the foundation of feeling, or all we have is baseless emotionalism. But understanding of God that doesn’t give rise to feeling for God becomes mere intellectualism and deadness. This is why the Bible continually calls us to think and consider and meditate, on the one hand, and to rejoice and fear and mourn and delight and hope and be glad, on the other hand. Both are essential for worship. . . . May the preaching of our churches more and more show the truth of Christ and savor the glory of Christ, May the pulpits of the land ring with exposition of the Word of God and exultation in the God of the Word. — John Piper, in THE SUPREMACY OF GOD IN PREACHING, Revised Edition. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2004, pp. 10-11. ISBN 0-8010-6504-6 [Here are a few quotes from the WQOTW archives that say sort of the same thing.] (John Stott, Word and Worship) www.wqotw.org/wq/quote.php?date=2000-03-28 (John Stott, Theology and Worship) www.wqotw.org/wq/quote.php?date=1996-03-25 (John Stott, Knowledge of God leads to Worship) www.wqotw.org/wq/quote.php?date=2003-10-21 Have a great week, Chip Stam Director, Institute for Christian Worship School of Church Music and Worship Southern Baptist Theological Seminary Louisville, Kentucky carlstam@aol.com www.carlstam.org www.sbts.edu =========================== WORSHIP QUOTE OF THE WEEK: To subscribe, unsubscribe, or view a complete index of worship quotes, please visit http://www.wqotw.org =========================== |