Lifting Up Your Hands During Worship

[21st Century Calvinist]

by the way, I always mispronounce and then crack up laughing at that hymn "Crown him LOrd of all..." because when they sing "let angels prostrate fall.." I always say "angel's prostates..." I guess that is a lot more distracting than some high on the Spirit fella swaying to the music in front of me.


Pergy,
You're such a nurse!
BTW, The words come from the 2nd line of the hymn, "All Hail the Power of Jesus Name" This is actually one of my favorite hymns.

 

[Spinningplates2]

First they came for those who would not raise their hands, and I said nothing. Then they came for those who would not clap their hands to the music, and I said nothing. Finally they came for those who would not give a "hand clap offering of praise" to God, and it was to late to do anything. Just kidding, but not really, kinda maybe

 

[JBaldwin]

I am very late to this thread, but I'll add my

There was a time when raising of the hands was an offense to me. Then one day when I was worshipping in church, I was so overwhelmed by the greatness of God while we were singing, I wanted to raise my hands, but I kept them down for fear of what others were thinking or that it might be a distraction.

A few weeks later, it happened again, and I kept my hands glued to my side, but to be honest, I felt a little guilty about keeping my hands down. Another time, I was alone singing and praying, and I didn't feel one bit self conscious and up went my hands.

Then one Sunday while we were singing a particularly worshipful song, I spied the pastor raising his hands in praise to God. He was so caught up in the worship of God that I don't think he could have kept his hands down if he wanted to. I have only seen him do it once or twice since. This was no programmed response and it was not a distraction to me at all. In fact, it made me realize that discreet hand raising as an wholehearted worshipful response to God is not wrong.

I would venture to say that if we feel compelled to raise our hands in worship now and again and don't because we are afraid, we might be sinning against our conscience as I was doing.

 

[SueS]

But just as honestly, I expect the majority of JohnQPublics who do that will never visit us again, "Because they are frozen-chosen, they don't emote the way I do, therefore their spirituality is defective."

I'm not saying any of you would think that, but I'm pretty confident that the average charismatic type (the worshipers typically with their hands up, waving them, etc) would think that about the average Reformed pew-sitter.

Oy vey!!! Boy, did you ever hit that nail right on the head!!!

My charismatic son-in-law is so hung up on the fact that we don't raise our hands and especially that we don't clap, that it pretty much escapes him that at our church he's actually able to hear the Word of God exposited in contrast with the man-centred moralism that passes for preaching at our former church where he still goes. It's frustrating!!!

 

[steven-nemes]

I go to a pentecostal church and I have had discussions regarding raising hands, swaying left and right, etc., with my friends; some of them seem to believe that true worship brings about some kind of physical response, like crying, or raising your hand, or breaking into loud prayer, etc., so long as it is something. I think I can interpret them as having said that not doing these things is not real worship. I seem to be sort of an extremist in the other direction--I don't like loud prayer, I can't remember the last time a song made me feel like raising my hands, or praying out loud, or crying, etc., nor do I associate worship with any of those things; in fact I have felt "closer to God" to use that kind of language when I have studied scripture, understood it, realized its implications in my life or in some issue I have been dealing with, and I thought about that for a while or felt good about being able to understand. My friends might feel closer to God or stronger in their faith when they have gone to a prayer meeting and have prayed and sung for a while, but I seem to feel stronger in my faith when I have a better intellectual grasp of Christianity... Am I wrong here, or am I looking at it wrongly?