I want to begin this week’s blog with a question that has always intrigued me—Why do people come to church? Given the lures and distractions of our modern culture, what motivates some people to choose worship over, let’s say, a round of golf, or a couple of hours in the garden, or perhaps just a casual morning, leisurely reading the Sunday paper?

Once upon a time, church bells rang out to summon the entire village to worship. But like it or not, we no longer live in that village. Instead we live in a fragmented, diverse society in which a cacophony of bells are all clanging for our attention. Unlike previous generations, churches now find themselves competing with thousands of rivals—everything from Blockbuster Video to soccer practice.

Of course, on one level, people come to worship for a variety of reasons. Some come from habit, some from gratitude, some from guilt, some from loyalty. Some show up because they have a spouse who coaxes them into coming; others come because they have a child who “needs to be brought up right.” Some come out of a deep conviction, and still others come for reasons that their hearts cannot quite name. But on a deeper level, I think the real reason people come to worship is because of the very basic, human desire to encounter the living God.

This is why I believe the current efforts of some to try and boost church attendance by making worship more appealing to the popular preferences of our ever-changing culture is, at best, misguided. To put it bluntly, we cannot measure the quality of our worship by how relevant, or exciting, or educational, or even how inspirational it is. Obviously, good worship can, and should, be all of those things. However, if we make any of those qualities the primary goal of worship, we have badly missed the point. True worship is what happens when people suddenly become aware that they are in the presence of the living God.

Worship is about awe and adoration; not clever programming designed to entice more people into church. The burning bush was not choreographed to appeal to Moses’ personal preference for worship; it was the manifestation of God’s presence before which Moses could only flee or bow down. When Jesus walked across a storm-tossed sea to his disciples, he wasn’t trying to impress or entertain them—and he certainly wasn’t trying to appeal to their idea of what constitutes a religious experience!

Anytime we attempt to fashion our worship services in order to fit the current tastes and appetites of the public, we run the risk of distorting it almost beyond recognition. Simply put, worship occurs when we encounter the presence of the living God, and what pours out of us because of this encounter is awestruck praise, immeasurable joy, trembling confession, and grateful self-giving. Those are the marks of true worship.