The goal of chapter one was to highlightthe importance of awe in the life of the believer. Understanding that a sense of wonder is vitalto a right relationship with God, the problem for a believer that has lost thatwonder is how to recover it. As with anyissue involving God the best place to turn to is His Word. Hence, the purpose of chapter two was simplyto establish that the Book of Job is the perfect guide for a study of theimportance of awe. Now, it is time toexplore what it means to loss your awe.
Mark Buchanan in his book "Your God is Too Safe" describes a typical Christian that is in his terms "stuck" as a believer. This believer can't seem to cross over the boarder into a full relationship with Christ. His picture of such a person is very much like someone who has lost or never found their awe of God. As he puts it:
We go to church, we sing, we pray, we listen to the Word read and preached. Maybe we take notes. Maybe we even lead some of it. And maybe our slow hearts burn within us. But walking away—just strolling to our car in the church parking lot, fifty-seven steps away—the conviction, "He's alive!" dribbles down like water held in the hand. Monday morning, it's still hard to get out of bed.
Awe is something that exists beyond the boundaries of the church building, beyond an hour or two on a Sunday morning. Yet, Buchanan's "stuck" Christians have nothing to take with them when they leave, nothing to sustain them while in the world. In part this is what it means to lose your awe. It means that you can not move beyond a Sunday morning experience of God to a full relationship with Him that knows no boundaries. If your life fits Buchanan's description then you have lost your awe.
Consider the lives of three fictitious believers;call them Bob, Sally, and Jim. All threeattend the same church on a regular basis. All three believe that Christ died for their sins. But each has a slightly different view of thelife of a Christian. Take Bob, forexample, his life does not seem to be all it could be. He does not seem to be able to advance in hisjob. He always seems to have moneyproblems. His health is not very goodbut he seems to manage. On Sundays, whenthe pastor asks for prayer requests, Bob almost always stands up and asks forhelp in some area of his life. Yet, whenit comes to church activities, Bob is always the first to volunteer. He is the first to arrive and the last toleave church functions. He always has anopinion on how things should be done. The only thing that appears to get Bob upset is when he is not includedin some church event. If he is notinvolved he tries to get involved. If heis left out, he gets angry.
On the other hand, Sally does not get too involved in church activities. She will attend a few but she has a busy social life outside of church. Her life appears to be perfect. In fact, she never has a prayer request and she feels quite blessed. She is a little tired of Bob's constant request for prayer. She even finds herself rolling her eyes every time Bob raises his hand to share a problem in his life. Sally is convinced that Bob's life could be as perfect as hers if he would only trust the Lord.
Jim's life is quieter than either Sally or Bob's. He is satisfied with his life and feels at peace with God. He is knows that God is love and that specifically, God loves him. As a result, Jim is content to go to church, thank God for His love, sing the hymns, listen to the message and leave assured that God's love is real. He is somewhat bothered when something unexpected happens at church. Like last Sunday when the youth took over the worship service and presented some new songs. But the thing that gets him most upset is when the pastor's message somehow minimizes the love of God. As far as Jim is concerned, every message should end with a statement of God's infinite love and a call for those who don't know His love to come forward.
What is the common characteristic between Bob, Sally, and Jim? I think that all three have lost their sense of awe of God. God is not a mystery to any of them. Each, in their own way, feel like they have the concept of God down pat. Bob appears to think that he is indispensable to the church. Without his contribution, God's Work could not get done. Sally appears to feel that if you are right with God then your life will be blessed like hers. Therefore anyone with problems in their life be it financial, health, or relationship must have some hidden sin. Jim appears to have a limited view of God. God, to Jim, is love and everything about God can be described in terms of love. As part of this limited view of God, Jim is also stuck in a ritual of worship. All three display one or more of the warning signs of a loss of awe. That loss may be evident in their behavior but it is only detectable in their hearts. So your job is not to go out and find the Bob, Sally or Jim in your church and try to set them right. Your job is to recognize the Bob, Sally or Jim in yourself. This chapter will examine these warning signs and help you identify those problem areas in your life that might lead to a loss of awe.
Job, on the other hand, is not a fictionalcharacter. He is real and his story isreal. So, while Bob, Sally, and Jim can beused to illustrate ways in which awe is compromised, remember that Job providesthe ultimate picture of the loss of awe. Based on the six obvious clues outlined in chapter two (I can saythat they are obvious now but it took me a while to find them), it is clearthat Job, though a righteous man, either never experienced or had lost a senseof awe of God. He knew who God was. He knew what God demanded of him. There was no mystery to God. He tried to live a life of service to Godbased on his certain knowledge of what God wanted from him. In every respect except one, Job appeared tobe a righteous person. For the mostpart, Job was right, after all, God singled him out describing him as " . .. there is no one like him on the earth,a blameless and upright man, fearing God and turning away from evil. . ." Apparently, Job did have the fear componentof awe but his sense of awe was not complete. His fear of God drove him to try to protect himself and his familyrather than to rest in the grace of God. Even Satan recognized Job's problem when he challenged God in Job 1:9"...Does Job fear God for nothing?" Thekey to the book of Job is the reason for Job's fear. His sense of fear did not lead to a sense ofwonder and awe in God. Instead, Jobexpected something from God in return for his "fear." Job's thought that his respect of God shouldprotect him and his children from the wrath of God. As Elihu described Job in chapter 32 verse 2"...he justified himself before God", Job felt like his behavior insured a goodand peaceful life. In some sense Jobdisplayed some of the same attitude as Sally. The point is that just fearing God or even being righteous is not enoughto ensure a sense of awe in God. We needmore.
The purpose of this chapter then is to begin to explore some of the issues raised in chapter one about the loss of awe. How do you know when you lack awe? What are the effects of a loss of awe? How do you recover awe? (This last question is really the core of the book and every chapter will deal with it to some extent).
How do you know when you lack awe?
It may seem like this is a silly question to ask. After all, if you don't have a sense of wonder, fear or reverence towards God, if God is not mysterious, then you clearly do not hold Him in awe. Hence, the quick answer is: if you don't feel a sense of wonder then start to feel that way (end of book). But, clearly, this is not a simple problem. It is not easy to recognize when you have lost your sense of awe and it is not easy to regain it once you discover that it is missing. The way the conversation on the movie The Great Outdoors was written it was obvious that John Candy's character was in awe of the forest and lake while Dan Ackrody's character was not. But usually with believers, the difference is not so easy to pin down. Part of the problem is that the issue of awe does not seem to come up often with believers. We don't sit down with each other and have conversations like the one in the movie. Even if we did, it may not be obvious to either individual that anything was wrong. We may be completely unaware of any problems with awe. Since we don't talk about it and we don't miss it, we don't notice that it is no longer part of our lives.
Job certainly didn't notice that he lacked awe. God acknowledged that Job was the most righteous man on earth. Job was doing a lot that was right and he knew it. Job clearly believed that he was in touch with God, that he was God's trusted servant. Otherwise, Job would not have put up such a fight with God over his perceived injustice. But being righteous was not enough for Job. Righteousness does not guarantee awe and awe does not guarantee righteousness (here I use the concept of righteousness from Job's standpoint not from God's so in a sense it should really be "perceived righteousness"). Evidently, we must possess both qualities in order to serve God. Perhaps this is what Christ was getting at when He was asked what is the greatest commandment? His answer is found in Matthew 22:37-39 "Jesus replied: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment." Serving God is not enough; a love that encompasses ALL you heart, soul and mind is a love that comes from awe. Without awe how could you ever love God like that?
In fact, sometimes our perception of our own righteousness gets in the way of awe. The more righteous we feel, the less we seem to need God. The Pharisees are a good example. They knew the law backwards and forwards. They went to great lengths to insure that they did not violate even the smallest command in the law. Yet, it is clear from their behavior as described throughout the New Testament, that they did not have a true sense of awe or wonder towards God. Their pride and their perceived righteousness got in the way of their awe. Perhaps this is the meaning of the concept "...don't let your right hand know what your left hand is doing..." In other words, be righteous but don't dwell on it or it will reduce your sense of wonder about God. In a broader sense, I think there are at least four warning signs to the loss of awe. There certainly are more, but these four are easy ones to spot within us. Let me emphasize that, these are warning signs to look for within yourself not in others. They involve what is in your heart as much as what is displayed by your behavior. Since only God and you can know what is in your heart (and God is certainly better at it then even you are), these warning signs can only be used to evaluate your life not the life of anyone else.
Do you have expectations of God?
The first warning that you may have problems with awe centers on your expectations of God. This seems to be Sally's primary problem. She, like Job, expects that God will bless her life if she just follows the rules. Hence, her view of Bob is that Bob must not be following the rules correctly or his life would be better.
Having expectations runs counter to the expression of awe. We should really expect only one thing from God, that He will keep His Word. What He says, He will do. What He predicts, will happen. What He promises, will be fulfilled. Other than that we should expect nothing else from God. That is not to say that we will never receive anything from God. We will and we do, because God is a God of grace. But the essence of grace is that it is undeserved and hence should not be expected.
This is at the core of Job's problem with awe. Even Satan saw it which is why he asked God if Job feared God for nothing. Both God and Satan knew the answer and Job proved them both right. Job feared God alright but Job also expected something from God in return. Job was not in awe of the wonderful things God did in his life because Job expected God to provide him with a happy peaceful life. As far as Job was concerned, as long as he continued to do his part, then God would continue to bless him. There was no mystery to God. Job lived by the if-then rule that if he was righteous then God would reward him with a prosperous life. So, you can imagine Job's confusion when everything was taken from him. It didn't make sense. It violated his expectations. He said as much in Job 30:26 "When I expected good, then evil came; when I waited for light, then darkness came."
If you expect something from God and He provides it, there is no wonder at the grace God. After all, His action and provision was expected. You deserved it because of your behavior, your faith, your sacrifice, or your "righteousness". You earned God's reward much like a hard worker earns a weekly paycheck. On the other hand, if you expect something from God and He does not provide it, then, like Job, you become confused and even angry because God did not meet your expectations. You did your part but God failed to recognize it and reward you as He should. In either case, there is no awe – your relationship with God is strictly business.
Now, consider the other side of this issue. If you do not expect anything from God then there is no disappointment if you do not receive anything from God. More to the point, if you do not expect anything from God then you are free to recognize and be in awe of what you do receive from God. The point is that your expectations interfere with your perceptions. You become focused on what you expect and anything less is a disappointment. While you are waiting for what you expect from God you may very well miss what God really does for you. In one sense we are kind of like children at Christmas. If as a child you were sure that your parents were going to get you that bike you really wanted but come Christmas morning the bike is not under the tree your disappointment could lead you to fail to appreciate the other gifts you received. On the other hand, if you do not expect anything from God and yet in His grace He provides it, then you are grateful. Being grateful and thankful for the grace of God is part of awe. The writer of Hebrews knew this when he observed in Hebrews 12:28-29 "Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our "God is a consuming fire."
Thankfulness, worship, reverence and awe – all in one verse, all expressing what should be our response to the gift of eternal life that is given to us through Jesus Christ.
This is a source of wonder and awe – that a great and powerful God loves you. The reality is that you have nothing to offer God in return for that love but He still works in your life. You may not always like what He does, but His concern is always to make you a better person. Being grateful is understanding that anything you receive from God is undeserved. Being grateful is an important part of awe. Being grateful means that you don't have any expectations.
Consider the moment when you were first saved. What finally brought you to Christ, what brings anyone to Christ, is the realization that you are a sinner without hope. Only through Christ can you gain salvation. How can you go from "I am a sinner that deserves nothing from God but by His grace am saved through Christ" to "I am a good person so I expect and deserve some reward from God?" The two attitudes are inconsistent, yet many believers seem to hold on to both of them. They just never voice them both at the same time. The psychological process that allows us to hold two inconsistent attitudes at the same time is called compartmentalization. Each attitude is filed away in its own little box to be opened at different times. So, when believers talk about their salvation, they open the worthless sinner box and acknowledge the fact that they have nothing to offer God and are grateful for God's grace. On the other hand, when they talk about their role in the church, they open their box of expectations, add up their service to God, and wait for their blessing. You have lost your awe of God if you have a box of expectations.
In fact, segments of today's church actually teach both concepts at the same time. They encourage believers to compartmentalize these two opposing attitudes and to draw upon them as needed. Such teaching is usually labeled as the prosperity gospel. The whole point of the prosperity gospel is that God wants to reward you with all the trappings of success in this world. He wants to give you a better job, a new home, a long life. The only reason He doesn't give them to you is that you lack the faith to claim them in His name. The principle is if you step out in faith, then God will reward you. Usually, the way to display your faith is to give money to a church, pastor or organization. Then and only then is God free to give you all you desire in return. You go from a sinner that has nothing to offer God, a lost soul whose only hope is the grace of God through Christ to someone who gives money to earn (or as the teachers of this gospel put it prove your faith) the favor of God. All the awe and wonder of a God of grace is replaced by a greedy attempt to buy favors from God. However, the process of compartmentalization in this teaching is so clever that it can catch us by surprise. After all, the "giving" is sacrificial and that appears to be sound Biblical teaching. It requires faith to give away what you need and to trust God to supply your needs instead. Yet, the difference between what is really taught and the issue of faith in God to provide your needs is subtle. What is really taught is that you should give sacrificially and trust God to supply what you want not what God really thinks you need. You give with specific expectations.
The tragedy of this gospel is that those who come to God only in the expectation of prosperity are quickly disillusioned when life gets tough (I will take up this issue in greater detail in later chapters especially chapter six). When their expectations are not met, they leave God as quickly as they came.
I get so angry when I hear the prosperity gospel taught on TV. I recently came across one of the worst cases I had ever heard. While channel surfing I paused at a channel that was broadcasting a sermon. As I listened for a few seconds I was shocked and angered by what I heard. The preacher was asking for donations and was promising great blessings from God in return, when he said something totally outrageous. "Don't expect something for nothing from God," he said. What a distortion of the truth! The whole concept of God's grace is precisely something for nothing. We have nothing to offer God yet by His grace we are saved. We should be in awe of God because He gives us the single most important gift of all, eternal life, in return for nothing. That in itself is the great mystery of God.
So, if you have expectations of God then no matter how much you love God, no matter how much you desire to serve Him, no matter how much your behavior appears to be righteous, you have the same problem as Job. You lack awe.
Do you reduce God to a concept?
Another warning sign of the lack of awe is your view of God. How you answer the question, who is and what is God reveals a lot about your sense of wonder about God. Do you reduce God to a set of concepts? This appeared to be one of Jim's problems. In his approach to God Jim adopted one of the most common concepts applied to God: "God is Love". Of course, in one sense that is true, but the reality is that God is so much more than love. God is not any one thing. God is not the sum of several concepts. He is not love + justice + grace + . . . He is much more complex than we can ever imagine. However, by reducing God to a concept, we gain control over Him. We feel like we understand Him because we understand the concept. We begin to react to God as if He were nothing more than that concept. All the mystery of God is gone. Take the example of love, since we understand (or at least we think we do) the concept of love, then God, being love, becomes predictable. Once we can predict His actions, we can control His actions. Jim was much more comfortable with a God he could understand – a God of love – then he was with a God that could not be labeled. You may think that Jim is only a fictional character – no real believer would limit God to a single concept such as love. Actually, it happens all the time and it has an impact on the teaching of the Word. For example, one nationally recognized pastor described the process by which he came to his teaching philosophy. He asked believers what they most wanted to here about God. Since the overwhelming response was God's love, he committed to emphasize that characteristic of God in all that he taught. If all you hear about God is that He is love, then that is all you know about Him.
What is the problem of focusing in on God as love? On one level, it distorts our view of God, which can have a detrimental impact on our faith. For example, how often do you run across the argument that a loving God would never allow the suffering that we see all around us? Therefore, since suffering exists, there must be no God. By reducing God to a concept and then arguing that the concept is not active in the world, the world rejects His very existence. Or worst, among some believers the argument is raised that since God is love and a loving God could never condemn anyone to hell, there must be no hell. The theological position of universal salvation is based on the reduction of God to a single concept that being love. It doesn't seem to make any difference that God tells us that He will judge the world and condemn the world, since this does not match our conception of love; we abandon His Word in favor of our limited concept of God. Reducing God to a concept can lead us to either reject God or reject His Word when it does not conform to our selected concept. It also has another effect – by reducing God to a concept, we lose our awe of God.
When confronted by something unknown it is not unusual to try to understand it by comparing it to something we do know. In this process, we begin to use what we know to help us understand the nature of the unknown. So, it is natural that in our attempt to understand God, we would apply this same procedure. The problem is that once we begin to do this, we lose touch with the infinite nature of God. That which we understand we cannot hold in awe. Instead, we need to remember that God is much more than anything the human mind can imagine. God is more than love. God is more than justice. God is more than a king. God is more than our father.
We can not categorize God or understand Him in the context of some limited concept or even set of concepts. Nowhere is this more evident than in the name God chose for Himself. Consider how often names are used to categorize people. Some names identify our race. Sometimes names are selected for children based on some personality trait or characteristic. Sometimes names influence our first impression of a person. Have you ever heard someone say, "You don't look like a Steve?" Or, "I hate the name Irene because there was an Irene in the fourth grade that hurt my feelings." We often times name our pets to reflect their personality or appearance. The name we give to something can be a powerful indicator of our feelings towards that thing. This was certainly true of pagan gods. Often their names told a story or identified their source of power or specified their range of authority.
Given all this, the name of God could become an important way in which He is characterized or categorized. He could easily be limited in our minds by His name. So, what is the name of God? A search of the Bible quickly reveals that God has many titles, He is the Lord God, He is the Almighty, but these are titles not names. God's chosen people, the Jews, used an unpronounceable word for the name of God, I believe in part to avoid categorizing God by His name. But what is the real name of God? This is the question that Moses asked of the burning bush when God announced His plans for Moses. As described in Exodus 3:13, Moses asked God, ". . . If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is His name?' what shall I say to them?" I don't know if you ever really stopped to think about God's answer to this question. I didn't until just recently and now I find it to be amazing. Of all the possible answers, of all the possible names, God tells Moses to tell them that "I AM" sent him.
God's chosen name is "I AM". What does that mean? Well, this has been interpreted in several different ways. Some feel it is a statement of God's creative power. Others find it to be an acknowledgement of God's existence. I think that it is both simpler and broader than those concepts. It is a statement of reality – God is the only reality, the only true existence. Everything else exists only in the mind of God. What God thinks, is. As God put it to Moses "I AM WHO I AM" or in other words, God is what is. I know it is poor English, but just think about what that might mean. God is what is. There is no single concept or set of concepts that can capture who God is, He just IS. Thinking about the nature of God's name, I AM, the depth of meaning contained in that simple phase should inspire awe.
For myself, I am constantly thinking about God's name. What a simple statement of vast power. This is the same name that Christ claimed in John 8:58-59 "I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "before Abraham was born, I am!" At this, they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds." The response of the crowd indicates that they understood that the name I AM is a direct reference to God and His authority. In my office at school I have a poster I made that says: "God's imagination is the ONLY reality". I don't know if the students who see it even understand what it means. In a way I don't fully understand it either but that simple sentence on that poster is a constant reminder of my awe of God.
Whatever you think God's chosen name means it does make one important point. God can not be categorized. He can not be reduced to a concept. God does not say "I AM love" or "I AM justice" or "I AM king". God is just "I AM". Of course, throughout the Bible, God does refer to Himself in more specific terms such as: "I am God Almighty . . ."; "I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac"; "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians."; "I am the first and I am the last; apart from me there is no God. . ."; and "'I am merciful,' declares the LORD, 'I will not be angry forever." The list goes on and it makes an interesting Bible study to explore how God refers to Himself throughout the Word. The point is that in specific circumstances, God does describe Himself in part but He is never limited to just those parts. God is I AM.
If you see God as a concept then you lack awe. You need to expand you view of who God is. You need to accept the reality that God is more than anything you can imagine. God is infinite but what does that mean? Mathematicians work with the concept of infinity all the time. How they picture infinity might be helpful. For example, from grade school on we have all worked with integers. One of the earliest experiences many of us had with counting was to write the integers from 1 to 100. At the time, that seemed like quite an accomplishment. After all, to a grade school child, 100 is such a large number, there can't be very many more after it. One of the most difficult things for young children to visualize is the concept that there are in fact an infinite number of integers. As we grew up and took more math classes we began to accept the concept of an endless supply of integers. But, did you ever ask yourself, how we know there are an infinite number of integers? Nobody ever tried to write them all out in order and then decided that this task had no end. So how can we be sure? Well, the proof that there are an infinite number of integers is very simple, very intuitive, and perhaps very instructive. It goes like this. Let's say that there is not an infinite supply of integers. At some point, the list of numbers stops. Assume that this largest of all integers is called N. No matter what N is I can always construct an integer that is larger than N – try N + 1. Hence the assumption that there is a largest integer must be false, so the integers have no end. What does this have to do with our image of an infinite God? Well, assume you fully understand God. Yet, no matter how much you understand about the nature and person of God, He can always do something or reveal something about Himself that you never imagined. As soon as you think you understand God along comes God + 1. You can put God in one category or you can put Him in hundreds of categories, but there is always one more category that you have left out. Your image of God is always infinitely less that the reality of God. This is true awe.
Does God need you?
Remember Bob at the beginning of this chapter. Bob was a faithful servant in his church. In fact, Bob felt like it was necessary that he participate in most of the work of the church. After all, he had good ideas, he was a willing worker, and he could get things done. As far as his behavior, Bob was an ideal member of his church. But in his heart, Bob had a problem. What had began as a deep desire to serve the Lord had become a sense that God needed him to get things done at church. Bob had lost some of his awe of God.
The third warning that you may have problems with awe centers on your perception of your status before God. Most believers when directly asked if they thought that God needed them would answer correctly no. Yet, like Bob, we may end up in a situation where we feel indispensable to God. When that happens, consider the message of Paul in Romans11:35: "Who has ever given to God, that God should repay Him?" For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever! Amen." Paul is clear, there is nothing that we can give to God that God does not already own. He does not need us, we need Him.
Sometimes the message that God needs us is actually taught in church. We are told that we need to behave a certain way before God can be released to perform His work in our lives (that pesky prosperity gospel again). I am especially appalled by the message of certain television preachers who teach that God wants to work in your life but He can't until you "release His power" by sending them a certain amount of money. The message is clear; they claim that God needs you to take the first step before He can accomplish His plan for your life. Of course this is pure garbage. Our actions or lack of actions can never stand in the way of God achieving His purpose in anyone's life. To believe otherwise is to put yourself ahead of God which is certainly not a position that generates awe in God.
But a more subtle and hence more destructive view is the one taken by some believers, like Bob, who feel they are indispensable to the church. Somehow God's work could not be done if they didn't take the initiative. Certainly it is true that we all have a role to play in His church and that we are all given a special spiritual gift when we accept Christ. But, if we choose not to exercise that gift, the loss is ours, not God's. How could you experience awe in watching God work if all along you felt that you were an essential part of that work? That it would not have been accomplished if you had not contributed to help out God. This is not to say that we should all sit back and do nothing because God will see to it that His will is accomplished with or without us. Rather, we should serve God not with a sense that God needs us but with a sense of the blessing we receive when God chooses to work through us. God gives us the privilege to serve Him but He does not need our service.
This was evidently a problem with Job because it is an issue that Elihu raises as he explains to Job what is going on. In Job 35, verses 6 to 8, Elihu tells Job:
If you have sinned, what do you accomplish against Him?
And if your transgressions are many, what do you do to Him? If you
are righteous, what do you give to Him? Or what does He receive from
your hand? Your wickedness is for a man like yourself, and your
righteousness is for a son of man.
In other words, Elihu reminds Job that our sins have no impact on God. True, we know that God is saddened by our sinful behavior but He is not in the least bit controlled by that behavior. More importantly for the believer, Elihu tells Job that our righteousness has no direct impact on God. Certainly God is pleased by those who are righteous, but His behavior is not determined by our righteousness.
So, what are the effects of sin and righteousness? Well, Elihu makes it clear to Job.
Our wickedness impacts us. Our righteousness influences others. The cost of wickedness and the benefits of righteousness fall directly on ourselves and those with whom we interact.
The truth is that we only hurt ourselves when we sin and that others are blessed by our righteousness. It is a blessing to be able to serve God. If you believe that in any way God needs you then you lack awe.
Isworship a habit?
Jim had two problems. One was his focus on God as love. The other was his limited view of worship. As far as Jim was concerned, worship was singing about God's love. Any other approach to worship bothered Jim. He would be perfectly content to always spend the first half-hour of church worshipping God in the same old way. While there is nothing wrong with worshipping God in song and praising His love, Jim had fallen into a rut as far as worship is concerned. He had not only categorized and hence limited God as the embodiment of love; he had also limited his ability to worship God. This is the fourth warning sign of a lack of awe. Are you caught up in a tradition of worship the repeats itself Sunday after Sunday until it almost become automatic? Then you need to be concerned about the state of your sense of awe. Given that worship is the emotional expression of your awe, your ability to worship should not be limited. The words you sing, the way you sing should express your feelings about God. They are not just words on a page that go from the eye to the mouth. Worship songs should go from the eye - to the mind - to the heart - to the lungs - to the feet - to the voice.
If you find that your worship is limited to a few songs on a Sunday morning; if your worship time does not move you emotionally; if you do not have an opportunity to release and express your awe of God, then maybe you need to stop and assess the nature of your awe of God. Maybe you have lost some of that awe and need to rediscover it in order to make your times of worship more meaningful to you and God.
Let me emphasize at this point that worship is more than just songs on Sunday morning, or at least it should be. Worship may be singing to God during the week; praying during the week; or praising God during the week. Any opportunity to express your awe of God is worship and if you don't take those opportunities then you lack awe.
Summary
It seems that sometimes as with Job a lack of awe within ourselves can be hard to recognize. Certainly if your worship of God is limited and stifled or if you never experience a sense of wonder about God, then you are clearly in trouble. But for some the issue of a lack of awe is more subtle. In those cases, look for one or more of the warning signs. If you have expectations of God, if you keep God boxed in a limited category, if you feel that God needs you, or if your worship is no more than a Sunday morning habit then you lack awe.
Then next question is, how do you find that awe. Well the simple answer is to start feeling that way. Perhaps you could begin by giving up your expectations of God or letting Him out of the box you placed Him in, or realize that you are not indispensable to God or by seeking opportunities to worship. But in the end awe is not something that you turn on or off. You need a reason to feel awe. If Job had been told outright what his problem was there was probably nothing he could do about it himself. God had to get his full attention and give him reasons for awe. And God gave him plenty. The remaining chapters in this book will follow the reasons for awe advanced to Job by both Elihu and God. If you lack awe or simply need a boost, you will find it in the Word of God.