Years ago when I still lived in Canada, I sat down with our pastor at the time, and we were discussing our family’s potential move from Canada to the US, and how it would be for us. We were coming from a Pentecostal church, and potentially moving to a Reformed church with Baptist roots in Indiana. We were talking about different worship and he described to me a true worshiper as a bird with two wings. A wing of SPIRIT and a wing of TRUTH. He shared how without both wings equally at work, it’s a hopeless affair!
It’s hard to believe that conversation is now thirteen years old, and that we have lived in Indiana for 12 years now! Since then, I have kept that conversation close and often have the picture of that bird in my mind. It’s been somewhat prophetic for me.
I think the metaphor works well. It’s what I long for in my own life and in the life of my church…to worship God rightly for who He is and to treasure Him duly with passion, humility, and wonder-filled awe! Sounds simple enough right? You would think so, but in our churches it so often seems to break down in practice around “Holy Spirit churches” and “Bible churches”…as if the two were ever designed to be mutually exclusive! Why is this? Why all the single-wing flapping? I think in part, it’s because we are people who are easily prone to live in ditches.
It is easy to find churches and individuals who sincerely desire to worship in SPIRIT with a passion to experience the presence and power of the Holy Spirit. Their worship is passionate, expressive and filled with longing for God to move. However, those churches can sometimes do so at the expense of a good understanding of who the Holy Spirit has revealed God to actually be through His word. As a result, their “truth wing” can atrophy. They can end up being really excited but really ungrounded.
Conversely, it is also easy to find churches and individuals who are strong at worshiping in TRUTH. Those who hold in very high regard, the words of scripture and good doctrine. They are concerned (and rightly so) about good teaching, right understanding, and knowing God through His word. However, those churches can sometimes do so at the expense of love, graciousness and vibrancy in their gatherings and lives. Emotion can end up being an enemy and as a result their “spirit wing” can atrophy. They can end up being “right” with truth but ultimately stuffy and dry in spirit.
Why are so many of our churches segregated along these lines? I’m guessing that if you go to the gym you don’t just work out one arm or one leg, so why do we see this in the Christian faith? Why is it that we love living in the ditch on either side, instead of walking in the center of the road? Could it be that we all are bent to one side or the other and instead of shoring up our weaknesses, we prefer in our sinfulness, to think we are more right than the “other side”? Thus the bird…the body, is pulled apart.
In John chapter 4, we read the story of Jesus’ interaction with a Samaritan woman. During the course of the interaction, the woman is trying to steer the conversation away from her own sin and to bring up an old worship disagreement between Jews and Samaritans about where real worship can happen. Jesus then says this…
“23 But an hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and in truth. Yes, the Father wants such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in Spirit and in truth.”
For those of us who call ourselves worshipers of Jesus, this passage should be really important for us! I don’t know about you, but if this is the worshiper that God is looking for, I want to be all about discovering what that looks like in my own life and in the life of our churches! I love how John Piper speaks of SPIRIT and TRUTH in his 1984 message entitled, “God Seeks People to Worship Him in Spirit and Truth”. He says…
“Together the words “spirit and truth” mean that real worship comes from the spirit within and is based on true views of God. Worship must have heart and worship must have head. Worship must engage your emotions and worship must engage your thoughts. Truth without emotion produces dead orthodoxy and a church full of unspiritual fighters. Emotion without truth produces empty frenzy and cultivates flaky people who reject the discipline of rigorous thought. True worship comes from people who are deeply emotional and who love deep and sound doctrine.”
Jesus said that The Father is looking for worshipers who worship in spirit AND truth, not spirit OR truth. We must be people and churches that strive to find the balance and give equal weight to each wing. It is crucial that we worship the God of scripture, rightly with understanding. We don’t get a pass on having good theology and good doctrine. It does matter! It is also crucial though, that we respond rightly to who God is and what he is like. If good doctrine doesn’t produce hearts enflamed by the Spirit, overflowing with humility, and awe-filled wonder then we are missing the point! We must have Holy Spirit-empowered, passionate, full-of-life response to truth. Each “wing” needs the other desperately! As Piper says, “Worship must have heart and worship must have head!” There is no true worship when one wing is strong at the expense of the other.
At the end of the day the goal is not to be right and it is not to have a moving experience…the end goal is God himself and we worship Him on His terms….in SPIRT and in TRUTH. If we commit to the balance, the result will be that we will have lives of worship that are meaningfully true and good, producing in us awe, wonder and a treasuring of Christ. We have fought for this at Calvary over the years and it is bearing beautiful fruit! We are seeing truth-filled and Spirit-empowered times of worship shape us when we gather together.
So yes, let’s seek to know Him rightly and to dive into truth, and yes, let’s let the Holy Spirit make that truth fan a flame of wonder, awe and passion in our hearts! Both wings, working together…same body. Let’s fight for that in our lives and in our churches!
