Have I mentioned how much I love Saturday night church?! Well I do!
We showed up to church exhausted. Though I have every reason to rejoice, I was just physically and emotionally exhausted today and wanted to crawl into bed around 6pm. Right before walking out the door to church Dutch hit his head so hard it scared me, he was crying and shaking so bad I thought maybe we should stay home. But we went. Oh I’m so glad.
Worshipping our Lord through song, of course, brought me back to the feet of Jesus. But as we sang “I’m falling on my knees, offering all of me…” I thought to myself, “I’m not actually on my knees, I’m standing.” I’m always convicted when I sing things that aren’t true. I mean I might figuratively be on my knees in my heart, but I’m not really on my knees. Anyway, no one else was on their knees…I kept worshipping standing up.
Pastor Joel’s message was on humility. It was a great take on the topic, an unexpected one. He taught on the journey of Peter through the gospels, and on his declarations to never forsake the Lord, followed just hours later by his outright denial of even knowing the Lord. Joel specifically addressed how those of us who are most spiritual, most mature, nearest to Christ perhaps, are those who should take heed lest we fall. It is we who are most susceptible, we who think we are strong who are apt to fall because of pride, because of thinking we’re sailing along just fine.
ANd then as he closed he talked about expressing humility on our knees. My heart lept within me because I had just been thinking about that–the physical act of kneeling. And as we closed in prayer, the entire congregation got down on their knees, humbling ourselves physically before God in an act of dependence.
And it got me thinking how the act of kneeling is sadly missing from Christianity today. I know that I seldom kneel when I pray. I do when I’m really seriously pleading for something, but even that, kind of seems more like begging, huh? But do I ritually get on my knees when I pray? No. I like the couch, thank you very much. But tonight I realized how much our physical posture affects our spiritual posture. When I lean back in my sofa, kick up my feet and talk to God (which is fine, there is a season for that too), what is my posture saying? “Hey God, wasup?!” But when I get on my knees, physically, and pray, it’s a little harder to complain, whine, or ask for ridiculously frivolous things. Somehow physically getting on my knees brings perspective before a word comes out of my mouth.
So tonight Jeff and I made a goal to kneel every night together as we pray. Just once a day. I’ll still pray while I’m driving, sitting, walking … but once a day we kneel, we bow, we recognize our dependence on our creator, and ask Him to keep us in the right posture before Him. How much our attitudes would change perhaps if we really would just kneel before Him more often.
Another idea? Read God’s word on your knees. What a reminder that we don’t stand above the word of God, picking and choosing what to apply, but we humbly kneel before HIs word, embracing what He says, placing it above our own judgement and preferences. My goal and purpose is to spend more time on my knees, really physically on my knees. If I can get myself down, God can take over from there.
“Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the LORD our Maker. ” Psalm 95:6