Experiencing Worship

During a session at the college fellowship day back in February we were asked to reflect on the last time we had a significant 'spiritual experience.' On the way out of the session a colleague asked whether I had been thinking of the same event as he was – it didn’t take place in a church, but in a concert hall. On the previous Thursday we had both heard the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra play Sibelius’ 5th symphony. The power and grandeur of the third movement never fails to send shivers down my spine and I experience something akin to worship; not of Jean Sibelius, and not of the very talented BBC SSO, but perhaps of the power of music to move and to stir the soul.

Just a couple of weeks ago I was back at the City Halls, enjoying more from the BBC SSO as they presented some music inspired by pictures (Mussorgsky’s wonderful Pictures from an Exhibition being the final piece that evening). They also played Respighi’s Trittico Botticelliano, a piece of music inspired by three works by Botticelli, including the Adoration of the Magi. In the middle of that second movement comes glimpses of Veni Emmanuel, and as I sat and listened, picturing the Adoration of the Magi, the words rang through my mind “Rejoice! Rejoice! Immanuel shall come to thee O Israel” – it was another experience of worship.

Clearly both these experiences of music moved me, but I wonder if both can be considered worship. Obviously the second one has a focus in Christian imagery, and although the music and the painting are someone’s interpretation of the Christian story they still take my focus to God. But what of the first one, is being stirred and moved an expression of worship when there is no direct imperative to focus that worship on God? I believe it is. Being a Christian and focusing on God is so much part of me that I sometimes (often!) find inspiration to worship outside of church and without a blatantly Christian imperative. I doubt that Sibelius intended his 5th symphony to lead someone to worship God, but in the power and might of the last movement, I can’t fail to think about the most powerful and mighty being of my experience, that of God crucified and resurrected.