Your God Is Too Small

While reading J.B. Phillips (1906-1982) booklet Your God Is Too Small (originally published in 1953) I continue to discover, that for the most part, churches don't really wrestle with anything new. (maybe a few exceptions related to technology, but the core issues seem to span time.) When I read a biography of historical preachers I discover them expressing similar struggles that I experience, answering the same complaints from the body, and the timeless battle over music (hear both sarcasm and lament.)

The following statements by Phillips is among many profound observations on what we tend to do with God. (Keep in mind that these observations were made in 1953, the 'glory' days of our denomination.) What and who is the object of our worship?

Our hymns, with some notable exceptions, often express a Victorian and very rarely a "big enough" idea of God.  To appreciate their true value they should be read aloud in cold blood and dissociated from the well loved tunes. At baptism, matrimony, and burial, we continue to use language which ordinary people can hardly understand, but which they feel vaguely is old-fashioned and out of touch with their actual lives. They respect the Grand Old Man and His peculiarities, but they feel no inclination to worship Him as the living God.  (page 12 & 13)

I need to constantly be teaching the people in my church to fix their eyes on God and not their idea of a god. Does the average church member worship the same God as did Abraham, Moses, and David? I must use extreme caution how I present worship and who I place as the object of worship.

Phillips continues to address many misapplications of man that we place upon God but the one that I'm often guilty of doing is what he explains here.

There are, for example, those who are considerably worried by the thought of God simultaneously hearing and answering the prayers and aspirations of people all over the world. That may be because their mental picture is of a harassed telephone operator answering callers at a switchboard of superhuman size.  It is really better to say frankly, "I can't imagine how it can be done" (which is the literal truth), than to confuse the mind with the picture of an enlarged man performing the impossible. 

...Similarly it is natural and right, of course, that the worship we offer to God in public should be of the highest possible quality.  But that must not lead us to conceive a musically "Third-Programme" god who prefers the exquisite rendering of a cynical professional choir to the ragged bawling of sincere but untutored hearts. (page 28 & 29)

Have I made God small (in my mind and others) by trying to explain what I can't explain? I know I have done so and I'm thankful for the insightful observation of Phillips in relationship to how small I tend to present God.

This causes me to bring to question if I have any ability apart from God to know quickly, or even at all, how to answer the (over marketed) question What Would Jesus Do? I closely walk next to idolatry if I decide what Jesus would do in a particular situation. I might be better to ask 'what did Jesus do?' and base my reasoning on what I know about God (the blessing of the Bible) rather than what I think about God (based on philosophy).

My Prayer: God, Help! In your bigness you have chosen me, I am undone before you.