Worship Art

Face to the floor, arms stretched out as the worship team starts the third stanza.

See, from his head, his hands, his feet,
sorrow and love flow mingled down.

My left foot begins to shake, so I move it slightly to relieve the gitters so when I stand my knee won’t buckle because my leg is asleep.

Did e'er such love and sorrow meet,
or thorns compose so rich a crown.

I rise up and stand before the cross, remove a black draped cloth and ceremonily replace it with a white cloth symbolic of the resurrection. I take a few steps backwards and kneel hands raised facing the cross as the last chorus is sung.

love so amazing, so divine,
demands my soul, my life, my all.

Again I rise up, turn and walk off the stage.

My prayer that morning in preparation of worhip was heard.

My flesh is rebelling and wants to sit in the pew unmoved. I confess that. This is dying to self in that I worry about what I look like, I want to confess that too. I want the worship to be very beautiful. I ask that you do that and that you help me be graceful because I am very capable of being awkward. I pray people will be moved to a greater sense of submission to your will. For me Lord it is an acceptance of your will for my life.

During the second service after the pastor’s wife had told me the worship time was beautiful, she was very moved by my gesture of worship, as I laid there stretched out before the cross, the Spirit reminded me of my call, to be beautiful. It wasn’t lost on me the meaning of those words.

My preparation for the Easter service began Saturday morning with the scriptures surround the Easter story and after a conversation with Scott. I told him that I was comparing the worship to performance art even though performance art has negative connotations. It isn’t drama and it isn’t dance. So I decided to call it worship art. I reminded him of the night of Thanks where the CR team walked across the stage and held up signs naming their issue. That was very powerful, but it wasn’t drama. A performance artist always has a message they want to get across, usually to shock. I didn’t want to shock, but I thought a woman going forward and prostrating herself before the cross and lingering there might be on the border of uncomfortable for people, I hoped, because I would like the question to arise, could I do that? do I do that? Still that isn’t the point, but I thought that element might be there.

I told Scott that there were three gestures that represented ideas or truths that I wanted to get across. There is the prostrated figure along with the lyrics and the black cloth. The part of the resurrection story I have been reading that God had shown His spot light on is that of Mary Magdalene. She witnessed the crucifixion.

… See, from his head, his hands, his feet,
sorrow and love flow mingled down.
Did e'er such love and sorrow meet,
or thorns compose so rich a crown.

Then there is the undraping and draping of the cross. Mary went to prepare the body.
The next gesture is the praise posture with the white cloth and the lyrics. It is not a stretch that Mary knelt after realizing it was Jesus to whom she was speaking.

…Were the whole realm of nature mine,
that were an offering far too small;
love so amazing, so divine,
demands my soul, my life, my all.

The meditation for me had deeply personal applications for my life. I cannot even begin to express how much this meant to me to enact this scene of worship during the service knowing that the purpose of being asked in part was healing, at least that is what I thought while I was in the midst of it and the Spirit reminded me of my call.