oh darn. i thought this would be a blog about how cool i am!
just kidding.

good thoughts, though. they are very nicely put together. when you first brought this up to me a few weeks ago, you were still putting your thoughts together so it was a little confusing, but you explained it fully here and very well. i particularly liked the insert "In addition"... you used it twice i think. you sounded a little like mark driscoll there (haha). maybe we should name our first son mark.
...kidding again!

okay... so what's the 1st best worship album?
 

its a tie between Charlie Halls "flying into daybreak" and Passion "Our love is Loud"
 

You look into things too much. Haha. Good thoughts though!


BTW, David Crowder's "Can You Hear Us?" and anything Shane & Shane puts out is the best. You FAIL. Hahaha. Miss you dude!
 

mike you are just a LAME-O!! <33333333333333333
 

Jimmy, Jimmy, Jimmy... whatever are we going to do with you?

Scripture is full of phrases like "i have been crucified to the world, and the world to me" or "Put off the things of this world", etc.
To say that it is sin to say this world has nothing for you can go against scripture as well. All of creation glorifies God, true; even the stuff we've messed up (sex, money, power, the environment...). That being so, It does not mean we are supposed to embrace the things of the world. When people sing that lyric, they mean (or at least should mean) that they are putting off the ideals of the world (the quest for money and power, and the perversion of sex, drunkeness [which can be fun], etc.) not that they are putting of creation.

I think you've misquoted Isaiah 6:3, to be brutally honest. You say that it HAS God's glory is a mistatement; it is FULL OF God's glory, which means that it SHOWS His glory, it does not "hold" it or "have" it, only God HAS it.
1 Peter 2:9 as well, God called us out of darkness (the world) and into His marvelous light (HIM, not the world...). See where I'm coming from here?

Even Derek Webb, great calvinist that he is, sings "this world has nothing for me, and this world has everything." This world has nothing for you because the 'things of this world' don't have God. That is not to say that God is not in the world, but the world offers other things to pursue other than God, and if we pursue those, we are seeking the things of the world rather than God Himself, which in the end will give us NOTHING.

I think these lyrics are very strong, as weak as the music may be. And to say that our prayer time is to be private... most of the praying done in the NT was communal. We need to bring back communal prayer... Spurgeon wrote a book about communal prayer... I'll see if I can't find the name again, and if I do, I'll post it here.

Anyway, I love you bro... you need to come visit us.
 

See the thing is I always start from the ground up. In the way I speak I always start in genesis 1 and tie the begging into what I have to say. I understand that the author could have been talking about "This world" being the sinful world, he was in before he found Christ, but it does not say that in the song. It would have been alot better to say, "This world HAD nothing for me" OR "because of my sin, this world has nothing for me" or "This world of darkness has nothing for me, I will follow your light". To just talk about the "World" without describing what kind of world your talking about like: Sinful world? Or the world we live in? or our community world. Because, it wouldn’t make since for an already Christian, seeing the light of the Gospel and saying "Still this world (the place of which we live) has nothing for me", how are we to read the world if we don’t want any part of it?

I am coming from the standpoint of the author saying that "The world" means the REAL literal world, not the sinful world. If it is in reference to the Sinful world, the worship leader NEEDS to be a leader and share scripture why and how this (sinful) world has nothing for us and how this isn’t in reference to the literal world. And because our worship is supposed to Gospel (God) centered, it should not hold only half the gospel, but the full gospel. And I think the Chorus does hold the gospel in it, but it needs to be explained way better and it needs to answer the question, "what do we need rescuing from?"


About the misquotations, you are telling me I am being too critical? I only used have God's glory twice and its in reference to how and why we can see God's glory in the world. And I meant the 1 Peter verse the way you described it. About the Isaiah verse, I did quote it the right way, I did say FULL OF his glory, My words might have said has Gods glory, but I meant it as if it Has Gods glory available to be seen.


About the communal prayer, I totally agree! I am talking about Corporate Worship, and some prayer. There needs to be a difference between your prayer and worship in your own life (solitary) and your prayer and worship in your church (communal). Do not come to church looking for solitary worship just stuff for and between you and God, you go to church for community (200 people and God). So the worship in church needs to be in a community mindset, so we drop the I's and Me's and put in We's and Our's. Because it is not about me, it is now about the 200 people in the Church service. Communal prayer is so important. So is communal Worship. Nevertheless, there is a difference between your own prayer and Communal prayer, just like a difference between corporate prayer and corporate worship.

And I do need to come up and visit you. Lou and me should fly up or something hahaha. I am going to Driscoll's church for a worship conference in 2 weeks. I am STOKED!
 

I think Hollywood Jon is right.

And not to beat a dead horse, but here's another verse you may have overlooked.

Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 1 John 2:15.

While I understand where you are coming from in that we should not judge the world (i.e. your Sodom and Gomorah comment), we have to remember that God wants to put the world back to rights. It's not fixed yet. There will be a time in which the world is the place God had originally intended it to be. But until then as long as there are those with sin (us) in the world it will be corrupted. Granted our sin has been paid for by God, we will still sin until we our marriage with Him is complete. It's true, we as Christians should care about the world. As we see the horrible things that go on in Africa and we see how this is not the way God intended it to be, or we see murder, violence, ethnic cleansing and all the evil we dream up; we should see the world and desire to see it made right and that is through the blood of Jesus.

Good blog.
 

1st- Song is better then all those worship songs cuz it came out way before, yrs ago, by Caedmons Call.

2nd- i think this is a touchy little thing. because i think He's talking about what the World itself can offer. The world isnt offering us God's glory. God is greater then the world, therefor His glory is still available to those on the earth. The verse says the whole "Earth" is filled with His glory. not the whole World is filled with His glory. I think you are taking it a bit out of context. Nowhere in the song does it say not to care for the World. We are supposed to love the world but not be of it.
1 john 2:15-17" Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions—is not from the Father but is from the world.And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever."
Therefor, He is saying this world has nothing beneficial to offer. Since the World itself is not what offers Gods glory. God is greater then the world, hence why His glory can still fill the earth.