Authentic Worship

From a good book edited by D.A. Carson:

"We worship our Creator-God precisely because he is worthy, delightfully so. What ought to make worship delightful to us is not, in the first instance, its novelty or aesthetic beauty [or its technical sophistication], but its object: God himself is delightfully wonderful, and we learn to delight in him.

"In an age increasingly suspicious of (linear) thought, there is much more respect for the 'feeling' of things -- whether a film or a church service. It is disturbingly easy to plot surveys of people, especially young people, drifting from a church with excellent preaching and teaching to one with excellent music because, it is alleged, there is 'better worship' there. But we need to think carefully about this matter.... Although there are things that can be done to enhance corporate worship, there is a profound sense in which excellent worship cannot be attained merely by pursuing excellent worship.

"In the same way that, according to Jesus, you cannot find yourself until you lose yourself, so also you cannot find excellent worship until you stop trying to find excellent worship and pursue God himself.

"Despite the protestations, one sometimes wonders if we are beginning to worship worship rather than worship God." ("Worship by the Book" pp.30-31)