Worship service on Sunday morning: the sense that pew sitters come as spectators, ready to view and be interested in what is served up to them. But this is mistaken, the quality of what comes out depends on those who put something in. In this perhaps a church potluck meal is a better visual image to hold when attending the public worship: each brings something to share and the combined total is impressive indeed! In other words "going to see the worship" actually is going to see oneself and one's peers, not any sort of high falutin, other-worldly performer who promises to wow you.
The two laws and the heart of the matter- Be Big Hearted
The many teachings, examples, and string of events told in the OT and NT all connect to the two commandments: Love God and Love your neighbor as yourself. And these in turn come from the ultimate matter, which is connection (relationship) with God and his/her creation. In practice this very often has not to do with one's thinking part, but one's feeling part: one's intention and emotional responses, thus one's heart: what is in one's heart also will be evident in what one expresses by word and by deed. By this reasoning, the practice/rehearsal of Christianity (a process rather than a final destination) is "heart work." The goal is to become "big hearted" enough to care for other's hearts; not just one's own felt needs.
God in the wild vs Tame God
The measure of one's grasp of God is whether that imagined god is manageable and finite, reliable and predictable on the one hand, or altogether likely to surprise and upturn one's tidy and tame world of routines and relationships. And yet the OT and NT show us the nature of God and how we should develop in our relationship with God and his/her creation. Those instructions and teachings do not change or feel unexpected; the Word as codified as a single bound volume with chapters, verses and more recently, too, subheadings in *not* changeable. Although life experience and changing circumstances of society and the world may affect what is visible and salient in one's own eyes: no matter how many times the hymn is sung, the psalm is chanted or the liturgy is read, still we may be surprised when a long buried inflection or suddenly literal or ironic meaning springs from the page to challenge us or reveal new meanings to our hearts. No, what is liable to surprise us is not the Word and the instructions of how we related to our God. Instead the infinite God will surprise us in our world and individual lives; that part will carry unexpected turns and twists that we then must respond to.
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