Wave Offerings

As I describe in Reviving Old Scratch, Freedom Fellowship, the mission church I attend, has a charismatic worship style. Hands are raised and waved.

We also have praise flags, made of colorful fabrics with "Jesus" written on them. When the Spirit moves them, worshipers at Freedom will go pick up a flag and wave it during our praise service.

Charismatic worship, all the hand and flag waving, isn't my comfort zone. But I embrace how my friends worship.

And in reading through the book of Leviticus recently I found a bit of biblical warrant for all the waving. As a part of the sacrificial system there were what are called "wave offerings," where grain or a part of an animal sacrifice was literally waved before YHWH.

Admittedly, there is some distance between the Levitical wave offerings and our Jesus praise flags, but the whole notion of waving to God as a sacrifice of praise is rooted in the Bible.

And while I'm not keen to wave a praise flag myself, I'm happy to help my church family with any biblical justification they might need to lift those praise flags high.

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