Liturgy Shaping Life

I love our liturgy.  I do.  I just wished it shaped our lives more.

What do I mean?  Ponder this - what are the main points, the themes, of the liturgy?  It's a continual cycle of repentance, an asking for mercy - which is then followed by forgiveness, the pronouncement of absolution, of peace, of forgiveness.

It's confession and absolution in sung form, with a sermon (which is primarily a forgiveness thing) and the Supper (which is primarily a forgiveness, life, and salvation thing) standing out as the peak moments of absolution.

It's all about confessing sin and forgiving sin.

Now, ponder this.  Is that how your life the rest of the week is shaped?

Is your week filled with more confession of your own sins or self justification and self-elevation?

Is your week filled with more forgiveness or more disdain toward the neighbor because of something they have done... or even *had* done long ago?

The liturgy isn't merely supposed to be pretty Jesus time, or praise-joy-joy time.  It is also to be training for life - the pattern that extends through the Benediction on into the week.  Our lives are to be ones that are ones of constant repentance and also constant forgiveness.

Yet how often our lives become a matter of how we are better than that person, how often we focus on the remembering of sins rather than the forgiving of sins.

Would that we loved the liturgy, not for it's outward beauty, not for it's artistic value, not for finery, nor for it's trendiness or hipness or dynamic outreach, or whatever other types of things people talk about with Worship.

Would that we loved the liturgy for Confession and Absolution - and would that this pattern stay with us the whole week!