That in itself is a heavy statement. Yeah, I know I've been doing that for something over a year now, but it still astounds me that worship was a gift God chose to give me.
I'll never forget the weeks following the time that God chose to give me the gift of worship. I would sit in my room and just sing to Him. It was so clear to me, this is something He gave me to give back. Without His help, I'd have nothing worth giving. I was an overflowing fountain of gratitude, and I prayed that I'd never keep this gift to myself, but rather that I'd remember that it was never something I could have claimed if not for God's benevolent choice to bless me with it.
People had always told me that I had a gift for public speaking. I had been told I had a gift for teaching. I had been repeatedly told that I was a natural leader.
Leading worship didn't seem to be what that all added up to.
I had been learning increasingly that "worship" was not literally singing written songs for the introduction to a church service, but it is a way of life. It's an outpouring of gratitude. It's obedience and love. It's huge and important.
For the sake of "Christianese", however, "worship" comes to mean a few rounds of "Blessed Be Your Name" before the 11am service, or a call-and-response with some claps that we're all too stoic to handle.
My first year at Davis College taught me a lot about how to worship God with my life. My thoughts, my actions, my words, my prayers... and finally, He challenged me to lay down my pride and do something I had sworn I could not do. In five years of playing the guitar, I had never been able to sing and play at the same time, much less did I ever want anyone to hear my voice. In two or three days, God showed me over and over that He was giving me something that I could give back to Him. Nothing to be ashamed of, nothing to hide away. It wasn't for me. It wasn't for anyone but Him. He knew as well as I did that I couldn't give Him anything worth having of my own accord. I accepted this holy re-gift and I really hope that I never forget the reason that it was given.
With that said...let's go back to the beginning.
A few months ago, I led worship at my church.
I was singing the song "Come Thou Fount", and came across this line:
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
hither by thy help I'm come;
and I hope, by thy good pleasure,
safely to arrive at home.
I didn't really understand what that meant, but I didn't think much of it.
Much to my disdain, someone in the congregation actually called me out on it. Bob Herring, nonetheless. If you know him, this won't surprise you.
After the service, he approached me and asked me what that line meant. I told him I wasn't sure but I planned on figuring it out. He laughed and told me not to sing it if I don't know what I'm talking about.
I asked him if he knew.He didn't. That's why he asked me. Come to find out, that's often how questions work.
In between the first and second service, I did a little bit of research and came upon 1 Samuel 7.
...in which the Israelites have repetitively had their butts kicked and Samuel tells them to turn from their idols and return to the Lord with all of their hearts; to truly promise to serve ONLY GOD. They all got together and repented before God, Samuel prayed on their behalf, and they all promised to be faithful. While they were doing this, the Philistines approached to kick some more butt.
1 Samuel 7:10 Now as Samuel was offering up the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to battle against Israel. But the LORD thundered with a loud thunder upon the Philistines that day, and so confused them that they were overcome before Israel.
God protected them. They knew that if it wasn't for His help, they would have been done for.12Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen, and called its name Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far the LORD has helped us.”Suddenly the song made sense.
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
hither by thy help I'm come;
As I sang the song for the next service, I knew what I was saying. Right this very second, I recognize that this far, God has helped me. The only way I've gotten this far is by His hand. I wanted to cry when I realized how closely this related to the very gift I was using to sing it.
and I hope, by thy good pleasure,
safely to arrive at home.
The only way I'll get any farther is the same way that I got to where I am today; the will and help of Jesus Christ.
I proudly presented my research to Bob before singing for the next service, and shared what I had learned with the church after singing the song, so that they could truthfully sing those words as well.
Fast forward to the present, NREEAAAAAOWWWWWW!!! (racecar sound?)
I'm doing this weird project for my Life Science class... it involves cockroaches.
Believe it or not, I am actually about to tie this blog together.
Anyhow, one of the things involved in this project was a quick study on the origin of "Roach" as a last name.
(Roach is my last name. For those in the dark on that one.)
I looked at this research inquisitively, as it may only pertain lightly to the project at hand but is still a piece of who I am.
Apparently, the Roach family used to live in a rocky area. The name actually comes from the French word roche, which means "rock". The family motto is "Mon Dieu est ma roche."This translates to My God is my rock. I had found so much significance to my life in the words of Come Thou Fount, professing that God was my help, and that here I raise my Ebenezer- declaring publicly that He has helped me.
And today, I learned that my name means my God is my rock!
Mind. Blown.
[I have no idea what is going on with the fonts in this post. I tried to fix it. Oh well.]
