I SURVEYED THE CROSS AND RAN OUT OF THAT GRAVE!
Knowledge of how the world works leads to technology that makes life more comfortable, and prospects of a more comfortable life here has led to a shift in focus to the here and now. That shift makes a transcendent God irrelevant and a religion of transcendence useless. Theologians called it “the death of God”.
This shift accelerated exponentially through the 19th and 20th centuries, and evangelical Christianity has adapted by focusing more on aspects of God’s immanence – His presence among us – and less on His transcendence. Focusing on God’s presence among us leads us to see religion as being, not about some larger mission God is accomplishing in the world, but about how we sense God’s relation to us – our personal experience of Him.
Initially, that showed up in our hymns as a deep sense of sin and sinfulness and an appreciation of the forgiveness that we experience because of Christ’s death on the cross. So, for example:
When I survey the wondrous cross on which the Prince of glory died
My richest gain I count but loss and pour contempt on all my pride.
“When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” was penned by the Puritan Isaac Watts in 1707. The entire song is about one’s personal spiritual experience. It is not highly theological. But it’s humbling -- about clearly understanding my sin and my desperate need of grace and forgiveness. It makes me bow and worship.
Now, consider this song that we do – one of my favorites (I can’t wait to play it on Easter Sunday!):
I was buried beneath my shame; who could carry that kind of weight?
It was my tomb – till I met you!
I was breathing but not alive; all my failures I tried to hide.
It was my tomb – till I met you!
You called my name – and I ran out of that grave
Out of the darkness into your glorious day
This, too, is poetry about personal experience. It mentions the negatives (shame and failure) but its focus is the experience of relief and victory that we have because of what Christ has done for us. It isn’t humbling. It’s joyful and exciting and victorious. It does not make me bow sullenly; it makes me want to jump for joy and shout praise!
But that’s the rub for us traditionalists, isn’t it?
Somehow, expressing joy as joy – outwardly, publicly, in church – seems inappropriate to us. Expressing joy and excitement doesn’t seem worshipful.
We imagine that God would find it offensive. But does He? Is God offended by our feeling joyful and expressing it to Him in praise?
Where do we get that idea?
This shift accelerated exponentially through the 19th and 20th centuries, and evangelical Christianity has adapted by focusing more on aspects of God’s immanence – His presence among us – and less on His transcendence. Focusing on God’s presence among us leads us to see religion as being, not about some larger mission God is accomplishing in the world, but about how we sense God’s relation to us – our personal experience of Him.
Initially, that showed up in our hymns as a deep sense of sin and sinfulness and an appreciation of the forgiveness that we experience because of Christ’s death on the cross. So, for example:
When I survey the wondrous cross on which the Prince of glory died
My richest gain I count but loss and pour contempt on all my pride.
“When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” was penned by the Puritan Isaac Watts in 1707. The entire song is about one’s personal spiritual experience. It is not highly theological. But it’s humbling -- about clearly understanding my sin and my desperate need of grace and forgiveness. It makes me bow and worship.
Now, consider this song that we do – one of my favorites (I can’t wait to play it on Easter Sunday!):
I was buried beneath my shame; who could carry that kind of weight?
It was my tomb – till I met you!
I was breathing but not alive; all my failures I tried to hide.
It was my tomb – till I met you!
You called my name – and I ran out of that grave
Out of the darkness into your glorious day
This, too, is poetry about personal experience. It mentions the negatives (shame and failure) but its focus is the experience of relief and victory that we have because of what Christ has done for us. It isn’t humbling. It’s joyful and exciting and victorious. It does not make me bow sullenly; it makes me want to jump for joy and shout praise!
But that’s the rub for us traditionalists, isn’t it?
Somehow, expressing joy as joy – outwardly, publicly, in church – seems inappropriate to us. Expressing joy and excitement doesn’t seem worshipful.
We imagine that God would find it offensive. But does He? Is God offended by our feeling joyful and expressing it to Him in praise?
Where do we get that idea?