Psalm 29.2 Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name;
worship the Lord in the splendor of his* holiness.
*Or, Lord with the
splendor of
Holiness is a
special term – simply said, it means, otherness.
Holy (or holiness) occurs in the NIV (on Bible Gateway®) 551 times. Personally, I
have trained myself to insert ‘other’ every time I read the word, holy. (I also
insert the word favor every time I
read the word, grace).
The Psalms are third in their usage of holy or holiness (Leviticus being first and Isaiah second). So, it is no
wonder that holy is found in Psalm
29. Ascribe (assign, credit, attribute, declare) to the Lord the glory due His
name; worship the Lord in the
splendor of His holiness… or with the
splendor of holiness.
Worshiping God is as much holy as God’s holiness is holy.
Alright Pablo, make your point.
Well, my point is this: other. Other, in that worship of God is common to this world. Worship
is in this world, because His people are. But the world – in the sense that all
that is not of God, is not in the custom of worshiping God; His way. The world
worships other things but certainly not in holiness – the world only knows
sameness. All that is of this world
is all that we know. But holiness is other than we know and only the children
of God are invited into His realm of otherness.
And though worship of God is directional to Him, worship
of God is as different in this world as God is different in this world. Other
is other. It is not normal. It is not garden variety. Our worship of God is
unworldly, or better, other-worldly.
That is one reason why the Church is so confusing to some,
they just can’t comprehend the otherness
of it all. Yes, there are different kinds of words and rituals and all of that,
but the true Church is as other as the Bible itself is other. And it takes an ‘other’
mindset to deal with it; the worldly cannot understand it.
Worship, according to Jesus, is spirit and truth. What in
the world does that mean!? It means simply this: God only accepts other worship – worship that is true, and
of the spirit. Spiritual worship is the worship that connects with the Spirit
of God by the Spirit-indwelt spirit of man. It’s the only way it can happen.
Our minds and our bodies may participate, but the spirit, connected to God, is
the only way true worship can happen – and brother, if you’ve ever experienced
it, it’s other…
It’s other in the sense that in God, by Christ, and through the Holy Spirit, darkness becomes light. Death becomes life. What isn’t becomes what is. The realm of Heaven connects with the hearts of mankind. The miraculous becomes normative. Up is down. In is out. And the love for God is expressed in doing what He commands of us here on this earth, indwelt, and directed by Him. Period. That’s an ‘other’ experience.
Father as You are
not just another god, so may we, Your people be other in how we connect with
You, worship You, and do, on this earth, what You command us to do – amen
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