What's with all the hand raising in church?

Lifting my hands in worship is one of those weird things I started doing in church but never in a million years thought I would do.





 

Before I knew Jesus, I would see people lifting their hands in church and judgmentally thought it was all some big show, like the stories I'd heard in mass on Ash Wednesday year after year about the Pharisees who made a big deal out of fasting and tithing, making sure everybody saw.

Then, one day, I just felt it.

Hard to explain, but I felt the need to lift my hands high, reaching out to worship this expansive, forever loving Savior whom I loved so much in that moment I thought my heart would burst and wanted more than I wanted anything in my life.

I didn't really care, in that moment, what anyone thought.

I didn't really feel my arm aching after a few minutes of worship passed by.

I was amazed that I was doing it, amazed that I had specifically said to  myself one day, "Psh, I'll never do that," but in knowing the Lord more deeply and intimately, I found myself raising my hands purely out of worship in the fully joyous experience of being int he presence of a Savior. 

And as I try day after day to truly figure out what it means to make every step, every breath, every movement of my life and act of worship, I find funny metaphors in the hand raising phenomenon I'm still getting used to:

Maybe worship is getting out of your comfort zone because you adore a Savior just that much, not giving a moment's thought to what anyone else thinks.

Maybe worship is reaching for God, not even noticing the earthly pain because His presence is that wonderful.

Maybe worship is doing exactly what you thought you'd never do, amazed at what following Jesus holds for you beyond your wildest plans or dreams.

And it was crazy to me, once I actually consulted the One with all the answers about this phenomenon, how this hand-lifting worship-- it's quite Biblical (see Psalm 63:4, Psalm 134:2, Lamentations 3:41).

Lamentations 3:41 is the one that really draws the line between what I thought this hand-lifting worship was and what it really is meant to be:

"Let us lift up our hearts and hands to God in heaven;"
-Lamentations 3:41 (emphasis added by me)

Hearts and hands.
Hands and hearts.

The heart is meant to be tied up in, inseparable from, these acts of worship.
Because Jesus didn't want people to honor with their lips but have hearts far from Him (check out Matthew 15).
Because Jesus doesn't want this outward motion professing devotion,
He wants a heart smitten and devoted, a life that follows in loving abandonment.