Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Posture of the Heart

The church I attend recently moved in to a beautiful, new facility. What a great day to celebrate God's faithfulness to provide after 14 years of waiting for a permanent home. This is my first time to experience such a move and it is delightful to watch God's fingerprints all over the details.

One feature I particularly like is the kneelers on the chairs. As our pastor mentioned, sometimes the position of the body can reflect our spiritual posture. It is interesting to me how the physical and spiritual are intertwined. I think of the Psalms where I like to camp out for encouragement on how to pour out my heart.

On a number of occasions the Psalmist talks about his physical posture as he seeks God. For instance, he bows down toward God's holy temple (Ps 138), and he lifts his hands (Ps 141) to the Lord. I think of David who danced before the Lord (II Samuel 6). It seems that a natural part of worshipping the Lord is found in physical expression.

The kneelers remind me of this. I think sometimes I don't feel like my heart is in the posture of humility or reverence whether I'm alone or in public. However, by faith at times I want to move toward a physical expression, asking God to help my heart catch up. A popular Bible teacher once commented that sometimes, "We get to the next place [in our realtionship with God], by coming before the Lord on our face."

Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. Psalm 95:6