By Robert Webber
Many of you know that I have been struggling with the issue of me-oriented worship. Those of you who have walked this path with me—some agreeing, others disagreeing—are probably saying, “Oh no, not another article on the same subject.” Well, yes, but with a 
completely different question for you to explore. The issue is this: In your worship planning do you view God as the object or the subject of worship?
The Right Question
It has been said that we don’t have answers to our problems because we do not ask the right questions. In my years of struggle with narcissistic worship, the question of God as the object or the subject of worship has never surfaced until recently. Maybe it has been articulated in your mind and you have settled the question. But for me the surfacing of the issue has clarified the fundamental dis-ease I’ve had with “I-Me-My” worship.
God as the Object of Worship
I grew up with a three-layered understanding of the universe. God is “out there” or “up there,” the Earth is here and below it all is hell. Most Christians probably function with a visual worldview with God seated on the throne in God’s heavens and down below is the Earth where people dwell. In the center of the Earth, or somewhere below, there is a raging fire where those who refuse to believe in God are consigned to eternal death and separation from God.
The three-tiered view of the world is not only a spatial configuration in our minds, it is also a visual picture expressed in countless works of art. This view of God results in a human language that expresses worship to God as the object of praise. I am the subject who worships God. God is the recipient of my efforts on His behalf.
God as the Subject of Worship
The concept of God as an object, an essence who, so to speak, “sits out there” is a Greek idea, not a biblical understanding of God.
The biblical God is the God who acts. He creates, becomes involved with His creation, calls Israel into existence to be His own people, makes Himself known to them in the Law, is present to them in the Tabernacle and leads them into the future. In their history, He gives types and shadows of His forthcoming involvement in history to redeem the world. He becomes incarnate in Jesus, dies for us, is resurrected for us, ascends into heaven where He intercedes for us, will return to complete His redemption of the world in the new heaven and the new earth.
If we are going to use the subject/object distinction, the scenario of God’s story clearly envisions God as the subject and the world as the object. God creates the world, loves the world, cherishes the world and saves the world with His own “two hands”—Jesus and the Holy Spirit. The incredible and radical story of God is that He loves the world so much that He enters into the suffering of the world so that through His death, sin is defeated, death is overcome, hell is conquered. And in His resurrection, life—the true life of the Spirit—is recovered; man and the world are made new. In all these actions, God is not an object, but the subject who is at work in the world, redeeming it and restoring it to Himself.
What Is Worship?
If God is the subject of worship, how then should we worship? Several things are clear: 1) We do not enthrone God or seat Him in the heavenly places. He is not an object who needs us to add anything to His glory. He is most glorious in Himself. 2) Worship remembers, enacts and lives out the story of God. We sing, preach and enact at the communion table the wonders of the God who, as subject, creates, redeems and makes all things new. This worship involves the mind, evokes the emotions, engages the body and all the senses. 3) Doing God’s story impacts us, the objects of God’s actions. Our true worship is to tell and enact how God the subject rescues the world, the object of His love. In worship, God, the subject, shapes us, the object, into the image of His Son so that we offer our lives to God by living into His death (dying to sin) and living into His resurrection (rising to the new life in the Spirit).
Conclusion
Now, for the question: How would your worship change if we once again saw God as the subject and ourselves as the objects of His love? Plan a worship service like this and let me know the difference it makes.
Thank you for this article. I was looking for some teaching tools on worship to address a mentor group in our Children’s Ministry and this was a huge help. Worship is so foreign in the area where we serve and I desperately want to lead people to a relationship with Christ through the gift of music that God has blessed us with. Music in our society is so entertainment oriented that unless it is a hymn, some people have a hard time viewing it as anything else. Music (Praise and Worship) is a beautiful and liberating way to get lost in His presence when done with a heart of worship.
God is the subject of worship, forever presant.
Sabrena, you are so right. Our worship team pianist, a Doctoral student in classical piano, said to me after he’d worked with us for a few weeks “I now understand that this music (praise music) is really more about the words than the exact notes – and it is quite liberating.” If we were to print the lyrics for many “good” praise and worship songs – those who don’t like “that rock and roll” in church would be hard-pressed to know that it wasn’t (isn’t?) a hymn. That’s why I like the words projected BIG in front of the congregation. It’s a lot harder to miss the words and their meaning/impact that way.
Robert, we often get caught in that thing that worship is what we are doing “for” God. Like He actually needs anything we can give. All that we have is His – so all we can hope to do with His help is not mess it up too badly before returning it to Him. Then also knowing that all He will see in our feeble attempt to properly worship Him is the perfection of His Son, which we were given on that cross, we feel uplifted and closer to Him. That’s worship, at least to me. Thanks for the insight and thoughts you provoked!
Dear Robert: I AM so glad I read your article. I have been saying something very similar for a couple of years, but have been using a different example. We have been on stage, worshiping and blessing the Creator as though He is sitting in the audience, watching us as “an audience of One.” However, the total opposite is the true picture. The Creator of the Universe is on the stage of the universe and we are the audience, watching Him do HIS wonders by the millions. WE, the audience, rise spontaneouly from time to time, as we see HIs power, loveliness, wisdom, provision, brilliance, Presence, gentleness, etc. That response is our worship, but to be authentic, it requires that we actually see God’s acts and Presence and love and forgiveness. SEEing must preceed our response.
Worship is not really about what we do, it is all about what God is doing. In order to express the worth of someone, we need to perceive it first! THEN the expression will not be self-conscious, but rather authentic and self-less, kind of like a child dancing and spinning around at a birthday party.
Robert: Thank you for the article, but if I understand your point correctly, then I have to respectfully disagree. You seem to assert that it is somehow preferable to envision worship with God as the subject, and man as the objects upon which He acts. This is good and has purpose. We should all remember and recount the things God has done for us. But if our worship consists solely in remembering and recounting His acts (telling His stories), but stops short of responding directly to Him, then we are actually keeping ourselves at a greater distance from Him. God sacrificed His son to draw us closer to Him; to establish relationship with Him. Relationships are built upon communication and interaction between the parties involved. When God acts toward us with love, He is indeed the subject, and we the objects. When we respond to His love with worship, and tell Him “I love You” or “Thank you” or “You are great”, we are the subjects, offering direct response to God, the object of our worship. We should not be self-focused, but let’s not forget so many of the psalms, where David retells the works of God, which stir him then to offer thanks, praise, concern, confession, etc., directly to God – the object of his action of worship.
I want to go back to the original question, “In your worship planning do you view God as the object or the subject of worship?” My answer is ‘BOTH’!!! I see what you are saying, God is the subject. I’d phrase it this way…it’s ALL about Him!!! The Bible even says so, “yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live…” (I Cor. 8:6). We would not exist, except by God!!! However, why can’t God also be the object of our worship? The very word ‘worship’ means ‘to ascribe worth’. I believe God is worthy of being ascribed worth…don’t you? This now makes Him the object of our worship; that thing in which we can focus towards & give worth, or value to in our lives. An example of this would be, “God we worship You, because without You we would have no purpose, man would not exist.” It’s still giving God His due praise, because we’re attributing (or ascribing) worth to Him. Now, I see what you’re saying that God is not just ‘out there’ somewhere, by rather He’s involved in our everyday lives…but He is still God, something to revere, to fear (not in afraid-like way). That in itself makes me want to worship Him, both reverently & in a personal, intimate way! Another way to state all this, God is the object of our worship because He’s what we worship…He’s also the subject of our worship because He’s why we worship! Well, those are my thoughts anyway. Great article though. Thank you.
Just so everyone knows, Robert Webber died in 2007, so he can’t respond back to your comments, so personally addressing him is not necessary.
I’ve heard his thoughts on this topic before and I’ve really appreciated how it has changed my perspective. I don’t think that taking on Webber’s perspective shift, from object to subject, necessarily means that personal interaction and response with God disappears as one commenter suggested. At least it hasn’t in my relationship with God nor in my worship leading. The point is that worship should remember and respond to what God has done, worship isn’t about what we do to give Him His worth or entertain Him. I’ve heard so many songs that have language like “we’re lifting you high, higher and higher” and it just isn’t right to think of worshiping Him as accomplishing that. We shouldn’t be trying to prop God up, that’s what idol worshipers have to do, but not those of us who worship the living God. He’s the one that lifts us up. Webber is trying to help us consider where our emphasis and perspective are in what worship is and does, trying to get us away from focusing on what we’re doing to worship God, and instead focus on what He has done to be worthy of worship (at least that’s my take). Consider Psalm 136, Psalm 145, Phillipians 4:5-11, etc. These all emphasize what God has done, and then invite a response based on that. Compare this with a song that is totally focused on what “I” do for God to worship Him. I won’t name the singer, but some of you might know it though he isn’t super famous.
“I come to lift my voice, I come to make a joyful noise,
I lift my hands and sing, you are my God you are my King,
My heart is now your home, I worship you and you alone,
I give you all my praise, I will live for you all my days”
Only a piece of the song talks about what God has done, and even then it is focused on the individual.
“You turn my mourning into dancing, you my sorrows into joy.
You’re so good (repeat many times)……to me”
Interestingly, God as the subject and us as the object means that worship is actually for us too, not solely for God. Not that the worship is directed at us, but if the content and focus are good, then we will benefit from the effect of what we’ve participated in, namely Christ being formed in us. With that in mind, we need more emphasis on what our response to what God has done (and is doing) should really look like. Webber mentioned dying to sin and living in His resurrection power by the Spirit. Imagine if we put more focus on that, reminding people that it’s great to sing our hearts out, lift our hands, dance, give, etc, but apart from a life of obedience and justice, the rest is a noise and a stench to God (Amos 5). We can tell Him we love Him all we want, but “This is love for God, to obey His commands.” (1 John 5:3). Sadly it’s easy for us to feel satisfied with how worship went if there were a lot of people there and they were getting into it. I’m personally challenged to strive for a deeper result than that, but then again, it’s still the Holy Spirit’s job to work in people’s hearts, but I think we can be a help or a hindrance to that in our roles as worship leaders and pastors. Alright, sorry that was a little bit of a rant and might not have seemed relevant to this discussion even though I thought it was
A big amen to this. And maybe on the flipside of things. I have discovered it is hard to encourage the congregation when 97 % of them are still stuck on the idea that God is just there sitting aloof waiting for us to worship Him. So thankful that you posted this and that there is someone that God has given clarity on what it is to worship God in spirit and in truth. This is a message that many worship leaders, choir, and congregations need to grasp. Thank you.
Might we suppose that God is the Subject and Object of our praise? That all things come from God (Subject) and return to Him (Object)? That such is the circle pattern that marks the rhythm of Life? Can we consider God as the Object of our affection without recognizing Him as the Author of all things? Can we consider God as the Subject who creates all things to return to Him without considering Him as the Object receiving all things? God: The Subject and Object of Worship?
While I am not a worship leader, I have noticed the need for a new paradigm in our worship. I thank God for this article because it is a witness to what God has been stirring in me. I blogged about worship that emphasizes a revelation of the love of God to us, rather than a worship that emphasizes our love for HIM. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!! AND Reformation Come, In Jesus Name!!!
Worship that Comes from Revelation: http://victoryempowerment.blogspot.com/2011/08/worship-that-comes-from-revelation.html
God says, “Me First”!: http://victoryempowerment.blogspot.com/2011/08/god-says-me-first.html