Worship's Mysterious Inner Urge: Two Views

The Simplicity of Silence

It will probably horrify teachers of small children in religious schools when I express my doubts as to the validity of the thesis that God is easily discovered in the beauties of nature. In my visits to parts of the country noted for scenery, I have seldom been impressed by the depth of religious devotion of the inhabitants.

On the other hand, trips to the sandy plains of West Texas have sent me home pondering the religious dedication of so many people in those areas. Great numbers of crowded churches are located in country which would not be considered beautiful by many. I am sometimes tempted to claim there is an inverse ratio of religious devotion to natural beauty.

A good proportion of the great religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, either came into existence or were nurtured in the silent sands of the desert. Here it was that Moses saw the burning bush, Jesus overcame temptation, Muhammad had his vision, and Paul thought out the implications of his new-found faith.

Void of distraction, the desert provided the silent environment within which a man could clearly hear the voice of deity.

I sometimes smile when I hear ministers state the assumption that a new type of building will create a worship atmosphere. In my late adolescence I occasionally worshiped with the Plymouth Brethren. Meeting in the barest halls, adorned only with inartistic signs carrying Scripture verses, they had the most worshipful services I have ever attended.

Silence was the key to it all. No organist in whispered conferences, pushing or pulling stops, beamed smiling messages. Greeting, giggling, whispering, shuffling were all outlawed. Coughing was hushed by the miracle drug, reverence. Children were quieted. People tiptoed to their places in the circle to sit with bowed heads or read their Bibles. The keen anticipation of the movement of the Spirit of God in leading one of the assembled laymen to announce a hymn, read the Scripture, or offer prayer was sensed in these moments of deep reverence which contrasts sharply with the hubbub of many Protestant services. Their secret was the use of silence.

-John W. Drakeford

The Offering of Beauty

When I toured with a choir and orchestra performing Handel’s Messiah, we stopped in one small farming community. I expected only to bore the crowd of hog ranchers, who would surely date music history to the birth of Hank Williams and would care nothing for baroque counterpoint. But during the concert my snobbery became shame as I watched tears come to the eyes of one person after another. Afterwards, one hefty farmer told me, “I’ve never heard anything like that. It put me in mind of heaven.”

Beauty in art and nature have often been used to direct our thoughts to God. Of course, while Scripture proclaims that “the heavens declare the glory of God,” it also points out that people have exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worship the creature rather than the Creator.

Yet despite our fallen state, it seems apparent that God values beauty, not only in his own creation but in our creative efforts. God commanded art forms to be made for the tabernacle (Exod. 25). He decreed that priestly garments be made “for glory and for beauty” (Exod. 28:2). He appointed certain men and gave them abilities “to devise artistic designs” (Exod. 31:3-4), and David appointed musicians “to raise sounds of joy” (1 Chron. 15:16). Solomon’s temple was adorned with gold and precious stones (2 Chron. 3:5-7). None of these seems to have a pragmatic function outside of aesthetic beauty.

Why is so much of Scripture in poetic form? Certainly not for journalistic clarity. Revelation 21 describes the ornate beauty of the New Jerusalem, the beauty of the creation reflecting the Creator.

Of course, people do not always demonstrate a correlation of beauty and godliness. Brahms was no saint, and Saint Peter was no artist, if his epistles are any indication. The same “beellions of stars” that are but scientific phenomena to Carl Sagan caused Saint Francis to write, “Ye lights of evening, find a voice! O praise Him!”

Beauty neither promotes or distracts worship. Worship is not the end; it is the activity. We offer God beauty not merely to cause others to worship, but to offer him our best as an act of worship itself. I can seldom worship “in spirit and truth” when the leaders of the service are obviously trying to make me worship. But when those up front have given their best in preparation, and are themselves worshiping, I can scarcely help but do likewise.

-David Shelley