This Sunday, September 5th we have the opportunity to host the African Children's Choir (from "music for life") in our 9am service at WBC. I would like to recount what I learned the last time they visited us.
And he called a child to Himself and set him before them, and said, “Truly I say to you, unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 18:2,3)
I accepted an invitation to join the children’s choir for devotions 30 minutes before their performance. With no idea of what to expect I slipped in the door to the back of the room where 25 children gathered with their adult leader. These were 13 boys and 12 girls between the ages of 7 and 10 who had lost one or both of their parents to extreme poverty and disease in Uganda. “Music for Life”, a cross between a Christian music education and an orphanage, had rescued them and given them hope.
As I stood with my back against the wall I heard the leader, a product of the choir himself, ask the children if they “had a song”. Did they ever “have a song”! With eyes closed a little girl began to sing a tune in her native tongue which soon the 24 others joined. The tempo picked up, the language switched to English and they began dancing and singing “Glory Train”. They motioned for me to join them and somewhat clumsily in comparison I danced along with my hands on the shoulders of the child in front of me. After the song they formed a circle and continued to worship in song. With eyes closed we sang “I’ll be somewhere walking for my Lord”. As we continued to worship they quickly began praying individual prayers aloud simultaneously in their own language. Though I could not understand the words I was caught up in the same Spirit of worship, adoration, thankfulness, and necessity towards our God.
At that moment I finally understood what it meant when Jesus said, “Unless you become like a little child”. If Jesus were on earth at that moment I think he would have spent his time in that room with those children, for that is where His Father was being adored. My view of those kids turned from pity to respect, I was of one Spirit with them, even their student. I had everything in common with them in the spiritual sense of rescue. Orphaned and dying I was chosen, adopted and given new life and joy by the Father.
Our worship of God is not to be the pre-packaged, easy to use formula found in most worship “concerts” and Christian radio. We are a kingdom of adopted children and our worship is spontaneous and joyful.
Some of us have forgotten where we came from; what it’s like to be hopeless and then to be gifted hope. Deep gratitude and firm belief is the response to understanding that while we were lifeless we were given life. This is true worship, we are a kingdom of adopted orphans; the children of God. Mark 10:13-16 tells of the story of children being brought before Jesus. The disciples in their “adult” wisdom scolded the parents for bothering Jesus. But the response of Jesus to this is really the main point of the story.
Permit the children to come to Me; do not hinder them; for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all (Mark 10:14-16).
We have grown too adult in our thinking as worshippers and I do not mean wise. Our well-meaning prohibitions and suggested prescriptions for worship have stifled the joyful response we should have as orphans adopted by God our Father. If the gospel of grace can be described as simple, yet glorious, then why can’t our response to it (which is worship) be described in the same manner? Whether we realize it or not we are a kingdom of children and I urge us to humbly realize our former estate and the grace that rescued us from it and come to Christ as we are; His children.
Soli Deo Gloria,
Caleb Widmer
