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Month: January 2022

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The Outpouring of Christian Worship

“Oh come, let us sing to the Lord! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving; Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms. For the Lord is the great God, And the great King above all gods. In His hand are the deep places of the earth; The heights of the hills are His also. The sea is His, for He made it; And His hands formed the dry land. Oh come, let us worship and bow down; Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, And the sheep of His hand.” (Psalm 95:1–7, NKJV)

What is worship?

What is worship to you?

Is worship what we do when we come together on Sunday or is it the entirety of what we do as believers? Is worship that part of the service when we sing songs about God together or is worship something we do for God?

The dictionary defines worship as an act of devotion and reverence towards a deity; the Bible identifies the act as the worth-ship of God and the whole duty of man (Eccl.12:13). Worship is an outpouring of love toward Him who has made all things, provided for all things and sustained all things and continues to do so.  We worship God through our giving, through serving others, through songs and hymns and spiritual songs and in listening to and obeying the Word of God preached and taught. It is for worship that we meet every week in church but our worship cannot and must not be limited to only the time we spend in this place. One man said, “worship is the overflow of a believer’s joy because of God – who He is and what He’s done” but in another sense, it is a seeking after something we need.

A few years ago, John Piper writing on the subject of worship suggested that worship should be our coming to God for Him. In the article, John wrote about a small group of believers who went to help a man in the community who was in great need. When the man asked those who had come why they were there their response was “we are here for you.” They were there to perform a service for the man – many, John suggested, come into church with the same mindset towards God in worship. But God needs nothing from us at all – it is we who are in need. John continued, “suppose the day upon which that small group went to serve the man was ridiculously hot and while they were doing the work a truck pulls up offering ice-cold, refreshing water and they run up to the window of the truck saying ‘we’re here for you;’” now we have come to the right mind of worship.

God does not need our worship but we need the God whom we worship. We add nothing to God when we lift up our hands in celebration of who He is; we simply give Him what He deserves because He is God but I think that God is pleased and glorified when those He loves express their love back to Him.

Worship Celebrates God…

[v.1-2] “Oh come, let us sing to the Lord! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving; Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms.”

I recently heard the testimony of a woman who had lost her young toddler in Disney World for an eternity of fifteen minutes. A thousand thoughts must have run through her head – what ifs and self-condemnation but she did not dwell on these; she prayed to God and God returned what she had lost. What was her response?

Tears of joy and praise to God for His mercy. Did she sing to Him? Probably not but did she shout out a heartfelt halleluiah? I imagine she did.

Worship is a many faceted thing and can be expressed in the songs we sing, the words we shout and through the action of our bodies. In life, worship is doing “whatever your hands find to do” (Eccl 9:10) or as the Apostle Paul put it, worship is doing “whatever you do, do all for the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10_31). We worship the Lord when we tithe, when we serve Him and when we serve others. The Book of Psalms bears witness to worship being something sung with or without instrumental accompaniment – in those days the people even worshipped the Lord with dancing (Psalm. 149:3 and 150:4). But the (HB) word used for singing in (v.1) can also be defined as a shout for joy to Him who is “the Rock of our salvation” and our source for help. Worship is coming before God’s face or “presence” and singing or shouting words like these found in [Psalm 96:1,4]:

“Oh, sing to the Lord a new song! Sing to the Lord, all the earth. For the Lord is great and greatly to be praised; He is to be feared above all gods.”

But in order to celebrate God we must reflect upon His goodness.

Worship Requires Reflection…

[v.3-5] “For the Lord is the great God, And the great King above all gods. In His hand are the deep places of the earth; The heights of the hills are His also. The sea is His, for He made it; And His hands formed the dry land.”

Worship requires eyes to recognize the presence of God.

In (Genesis 28:10-17) God had been with Jacob as he fled from his brother into the wilderness between Beersheba and Haran but Jacob did not know it until after he had seen a vision of God; then in [v 16-.17] he declared:

“Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it.” And he was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!”

Likewise, the voice speaking to Moses from the burning bush awakened the prophet to the presence of God when he said [Ex.3:5]:

“Do not draw near this place. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.”

It is God who opens our eyes to God – we cannot recognize or discern the difference between the mundane and the supernatural without His intervention upon our sight. Poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning once wrote: “Earth is crammed with heaven, and every common bush AFIRE with God – but only he who SEES takes off his shoes – the rest sit around it and pick blackberries.”

All of God’s creation declares Him and exalts Him. “The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament shows His handiwork” wrote the psalmist in [Psalm 19:1]. Paul, reflecting on our Creator wrote in [Romans 1:20]:

“For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse,”

From Mount Everest to Death Valley and from Niagara Falls to the Mariana Trench – God made it all, God is present there and in control of it all; there is no place where God is not (see Psalm 139:7-18)

Recognizing the power, wisdom, grace, glory, holiness and sovereignty of God in worship leads us to ask with King David – “Who am I, O Lord God? And what is my house that You have brought me this far?” [1 Chron 17:16]

Worship Communicates Thirst…

Worship is an expression of thirst for God

“O God, You are my God; Early will I seek You; My soul thirsts for You; My flesh longs for You In a dry and thirsty land Where there is no water. So, I have looked for You in the sanctuary, to see Your power and Your glory. Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You. Thus, I will bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name. My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness, and my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips.” [Psalm 63:1-5]

When you entered into the church on Sunday (for instance) what was your mindset? Did you come to church or did you come to worship? If you merely came to church you’ll probably be satisfied to leave pretty much as you came but if you came to worship you will not likely be satisfied until you have experienced God through His Word and until you have emptied yourself in praise at His altar.

To be clear, this article isn’t about worship styles and preferences this is about desire – true worshippers desire more God in their lives. What I mean is, they desire a deeper and closer connection with the Creator than they have. Consider this question:

“If you could have a happy marriage, healthy children, a successful career, good friends, fun vacations, a comfortable retirement, a painless death and no hell – would you be satisfied?”[i]

I would expect those who do not know or trust in the Lord to say that they’d be satisfied with such a life but can a true worshipper of God ever be satisfied with anything less than God? “O God, You are my God! Early will I seek You; my soul thirsts for You; my flesh logs for You in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water.”

Can you say, “O God, as long as You are with me it is well no matter what life may bring”?

Worship is an expression of our thirst for God. Thirst for His wisdom, love, guidance, power…

Worship Requires Relationship…

[v.6-7] “Oh come, let us worship and bow down; Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, And the sheep of His hand.”

Finally, worship requires relationship, otherwise it’s like putting the cart in front of the horse. One day, every knee will bow ad every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord (see Phil. 2:11) but that worship is not relational. The worst of men will bow in that day in recognition of the Lord’s sovereignty but believers worship Him not only because He made us but because He is “our God.”

In a general sense, the Lord God provides for all people from His treasury – He gives each of us air to breath, life to live and I think, an opportunity to turn to Him through Jesus Christ. But it is only after we have come to trust in Jesus that we are able to worship in a way that is pleasing to God. John Newtons song comes to mind as I think of it:

“Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me; I once was lost, but now I am found, was blind but now I see.”

It is from the knowledge of God’s love and the application of God’s grace to our lives that we are able to worship the Lord for all He is worth. If worship is an overflow of our joy and delight in God as we reflect on His goodness, mercy and grace towards us then all worship is tied to the relationship we have with God through Jesus Christ.

All of this boils down to how desperate you were for God to intervene in your life in the first place. Those who have truly trusted in Jesus once upon a time realized that they were by nature desperate sinners, desperately wicked and doomed to destruction from birth because of their sin. But in time they learned that God loved them and Jesus died for them – then they called out to Him in their need and received the forgiveness of sin and newness of life through the Spirit by whom they now not only call God “Abba” but they also serve and praise the living God.

But there are those who came to Jesus for the wrong reasons too.

There are some who have said they came to Jesus because they did not want to go to hell. You might be thinking, “what’s wrong with that?” Consider it for a moment from God’s perspective,

“For a person to say that the main reason he or she came to Christ was to escape hell would be like a woman who said that the only reason she married her husband was to get away from her parents or like the man who said that he married his wife because he had a load of debt and she had money – I couldn’t think of any other way out of my debt so I married her.”

If you only came to Christ to have your sin debt paid and to avoid hell – you missed the point of His coming.

He came to give new life to every sinner who would trust in Him. Yes, He gave us a place in heaven. Yes, because of His grace and forgiveness we will not go to hell or taste the wrath of God. Yes, Jesus paid it all. But the new life that He gave is to the praise and glory of the Father – this is the goal, the aim and the chief end of man, to glorify in the flesh and the spirit (1 Cor. 6:20) Him who bought us with the price of Christ’s blood.

[i] Collin Smith

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“And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:15-16

If I could share one piece of advice with every younger person I know it would be this: Every choice no matter how small it may seem to be is serious and significant – this is a principal of life. We live so carelessly….I know I did. I flew by the seat of my pants choosing and never considering the outcome of those choices until after the outcome was upon me and there was no turning back.

Of all the choices I have made….my choice to follow Christ is by far the best choice. While many of my choices early on in my life were bad they ultimately led to an intersection with the Savior.  When you come to THAT fork in the road…..choose Christ.

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The Value of Discipleship

“And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, “Be saved from this perverse generation.” Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.” (Acts 2:40–47, NKJV)

The early church was not the formalized and formatted organism that as time went on it became; in the beginning it was a very organic and “real” collection of believers who met at various places for the purpose of worshipping God.

Interestingly the “public” worship of the Lord took place at the gates of the temple and involved the preaching of the Gospel of Christ where many people flocked to sincerely worship a God they did not really know; in essence casting a Gospel net into a place where they were likely to catch the most fish – a tactic which was daily rewarded (according to v.47) with a daily “catch” of new believers; that doesn’t at all look like “church” as we know it today.

Today we expect the “fish” to come to us instead.

But what are people drawn to today? In many churches it is the small group, the discipleship group and Bible studies at various people’s homes that seem to attract the lost. In those settings they can see the church without her make-up; they see believers interacting, laughing, sharing, crying, praying and learning together – they see the church as it was meant to be.

In the early church discipleship wasn’t mandated and didn’t have to be “sold” to people. Note Luke’s description of the church in [v.42]:

“And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers.”

Believers were hungry for the teaching of the Apostles – they wanted to hear about their experiences with Jesus, about His miracles – they hungered to know what the Lord said and taught.  I believe that in sharing these things the apostles could not help but to also share the character and nature of the Lord with the believers – the Apostles taught about a loving and gentle Savior and suffering Servant who gave up His life for the sake of the lost.

Before we paint too rosy a picture we must remember that the people who formed this new community of faith were still flesh and blood. They had things to overcome in their lives; even as they were coming to Christ they were being awakened by His Spirit to things in their lives that faith in Him would require them to “crucify” from their lives. If I could contemporize that community – some of them would be housewives whose husbands also spent the day away from them at their jobs or perhaps they were professional women of industry themselves; some of those men might be businessmen or blue collar workers; some might be truck drivers or salesmen; some might be soldiers spending months at a time away from all that they knew and loved.

The bottom line is this:  While each and every member of the community of faith (whether of the early church or our churches today) shares a set of core values, beliefs and experiences, each of us also has to figure out how to deal with bumps in the road specific to our individual duties or stations in life as the Word of God instructs.

What do we need when were apart from the community of faith doing that which we do day in and day out to provide for our families and to live our lives? What do we need when we are tempted to lash out in anger or shrink back in fear? What do we need when we cry out in frustration and despair? We need the Word of God and the help of His Spirit – most often that help takes the form of another believer walking with us – encouraging us, challenging us, exhorting us, praying with us; telling us that things we don’t necessarily want to hear but no less need to hear; someone to whom we can be accountable.

The Bible says in [prov. 27:17]:

“As iron sharpens iron, so a man sharpens the countenance of his friend.”

This is a powerful aphorism or maxim identifying the great benefit and value of having someone to walk beside us on our journey of faith and identifies one of the most personal settings for discipleship in the Bible.

Consider the first part of this analogy – how does iron sharpen iron?

I thought at first about the tools of a blacksmith – fire, hammer and anvil. For me the fire represents the trials and various situations of life; the hammer is our brother or sister in Christ which God the Father intends to use in the process of impacting our lives and the anvil is the Word of God – His expectations, commands and expressed will.  In our day to day life sometimes we are superheated by a situation – we are tempted to act or express an attitude that is contrary to God’s plan and our friend sees us or hears us and comes along side. God brings a passage to our friends mind and he begins to challenge our attitude with the word of God – he or she “speaks the truth to us in love;” as God tries to shape us into what He’d have us be or do in that situation.

Another way to see this is the way a knife used to be sharpened to carve the Thanksgiving Turkey (before the advent of electric knives): by file and blade. “It used to be common to see the host at a table sharpening the carving knife by drawing each side of the cutting edge against a hardened steel rod with fine ridges – iron sharpening iron. Sometimes it isn’t a temptation to evil or some other stress in your life but simply a misunderstanding of a particular Biblical principal that has you ‘mis-stepping’ in your Christian walk of faith. In such a situation, the “file”aka your spiritual companion might challenge you from their own understanding of the principal in question and in a sense sharpen your understanding through conversation and even criticism with regard to the subject.  

I personally enjoy talking about the Lord and His Word – I enjoy studying it with others and listening to other preachers and speakers share their understanding of a passage; often I learn something or have my understanding of something enhanced. Sometimes it is just refreshing to know that I’m not alone in my understanding of certain biblical text, principal or doctrine and sometimes I reject the teaching out of hand as errant. In any case it is always good to be able to discuss – not debate but discuss the Word of God. I don’t get much of that these days but when I do I enjoy it.

In my own life as a Christian, over the years, I have grown but let me tell you where I grew most. it wasn’t in the preaching service, it was in the Sunday school, the discipleship and in the seminary classes where we could talk it out. I’m sure you’ll discover the same if you’ll allow yourself to be involved in the opportunities which many churches (not all but many) offer for such growth.

Max Lucado reminds his readers in a book titled “On the Anvil” what one translation of [2 Tim. 2:21 ] says; there we read, that God intends for each of us to be

“An instrument for noble purposes, made holy, useful to the Master and prepared to do any good work.”

Lucado added the following thought:

“Ah to be your instrument O God, like Paul to the Gentiles, like Philip to the eunuch, like Jesus to the world, to be your instrument. To be like a scalpel in the gentle hands of a surgeon, healing and mending. To be like the plow in the weathered hands of the farmer, sowing and tending. To be like a scythe in the sweeping hands of the reaper, gathering and using. To be an instrument for noble purposes. To be honed and tuned, in sync with your will, to be sensitive to your touch. This my God is my prayer, draw me from the fire, form me on your anvil, shape me with your hands, let me be your tool..”

To be discipled in the larger setting of the church, the intimacy of a mentoring relationships or in a small group of believers all have one goal and purpose – so that each of us would become a useful tool in the Master’s hands.

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Alive or Just Here – How Will You Live in 2022?

Jack London once wrote, “the proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.”

Think about those words for a moment.

What great thing was ever accomplished by those for whom the priority was to save their own skin? Consider for instance, Madame Currie who among other things, discovered radium and was a pioneer in the study of radioactive isotopes. Her efforts led ultimately to an illness which took her life but her discovery is still used today in the fight against cancer as an ingredient of Radon gas. Hers is one example if a life which was not wasted.

She epitomizes the phrase, “nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

As I write, I have another person in mind about whom it can be said that he lived and the life that he lived was not wasted. I read something about him yesterday on a marquee while travelling back from a day on the coast; the marquee read: “We use duct tape to fix everything – God used nails.” Of course the “man” the sign was referring to was Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God and points at the life of the God – man. Jesus has ALWAYS existed but not as a divine couch potato or otherwise uninvolved deity. He was born into the human race but existed before His birth; more than that He was born to die and He lived to set men free from their bondage to sin and eternal separation from God. He expended His 33 years of life for the sake of every human being. His life was not wasted and the life He lived, He lived unto God His Father. His life made an eternal difference.

London’s quote rings remarkably similar to something Jesus once said:

“If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.  For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?” (Matthew 16:24–26)

Jesus’ words here call us to a constant dying out to a way of life characterized by self-preservation at all costs and a coming alive to the will and purposes of God. In other words, He does not merely call those who follow Him to exist as Christians, He is calling them to live the life of a Christian. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs is full of what living like that can look like in the extreme. But even in the torment of the flames as some of those martyrs were burned for their faith in Jesus Christ, they looked, as Jesus did, to the joy that was set before them. As Jesus concluded His thoughts in that short passage He did so with a reminder that today’s choices carry eternal consequences.

As we enter into a New Year, it is important for each one of us to ask ourselves, “am I alive or just here?” Staring at our phones into the world of social media or watching the plethora of reality TV shows available on Netflix, YouTube, Prime or HGTV etc; are you spending more time watching others live their lives than you are living your own? Your answer will also cast light on the greater question of your life’s purpose. We have not been given life to merely be consumers of everything we see – we have been given life and especially spiritual life CHRISTIAN, to make a difference just like Jesus. Consider the words of Paul in light of his life in Christ:

“I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20)

The new life that believers have is to be lived in a new way and for a new reason. Through His Holy Spirit, Jesus indwells every believer and sits on the throne of control that we once occupied and now our purpose is His plan and the accomplishing of His will. Did Paul occasionally deviate from the plan or attempt to retake control of his life? Any time we sin in essence, we are attempting to retake control of our lives and thus the need of a constant or of a daily dying out to our self-will is necessary.

Looking back on 2021, how did you do? Did you draw nearer to God or drift away a little or a lot? Much like a leaf driven by the wind on a pond’s surface is always moving, you and I are never stationary in our life of faith, we are always either drawing nearer to or moving further away from God. Has your faith become stronger in the wake of all that this last year has thrown your way or has it faltered. I ask because before we move forward we ought to take stock of where we’ve been and the lessons we learned or still need to learn for tomorrow. I have learned some hard lessons this year and still have some things to learn – God is patient. Once more, Paul offers us something to think about even as we enter into 2022, we find them in (Philippians 3:12-15):

“Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Therefore let us, as many as are mature, have this mind; and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you.”

Pressing on is the mindset which Paul expects every Christ follower to have as they set their faces to what lay ahead of them. But I invite you even now while keeping your eternal hope set firmly in your minds eye, that is the hope (or confidence) of seeing and dwelling with Jesus for eternity to live each day, one at a time for the purposes of God. Each day is as clean a slate as a New Year is and just as unknowable nevertheless press on – the prize is yet before us and the souls of friends, family, coworkers, and strangers hang in the balance. Draw nearer, press on and press into Him who has made abundant life available to you.

Happy New Year!

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