Worship

Purpose: Those who hear this message will understand the significance of worship in our daily lives

Subject: What does disciplined worship look like in our lives?

Complement: Making God the most valuable thing in our lives.

Big Idea: Whatever we value the most in our lives is what we worship, it’s up to us to decide if it will be temporal or eternal.

Introduction:

Moses Slide

Everywhere we look today we see people pouring their hearts into some cause or ideology that is usually supported by some celebrity or sports star they idolize. We see more attention and adoration given to pop stars, movie stars, and sports stars than we do the men and women who vowed to give their life to protect our families, freedom, and country.

Fallen Soldiers slide

Just recently President Trump and his administration made a deal to bring back the remains of many of our fallen soldiers from North Korea. It was interesting to me that you didn’t see or hear about that in the news, but we sure did hear a lot about what Lebron James said about President Trump and how President Trump responded.

Now don’t get me wrong here I don’t think we should idolize the military men and women, but we should put more value on someone that chose to serve, protect, and in some cases die for people they have never met than we should on some senseless word exchange between a sports star and the president. Why do we place the most value on temporal things? I think it all comes down to our fallen nature to want to idolize the things that have no value over the things that have true value. We could trace this back to the Garden of Eden where Adam and Eve placed more value on the words of the serpent than on the Word of God.

Worship Slide

No where in the world is this more evident than in how we worship.

Today we’ll continue the series of Spiritual Discipline with the Discipline of Worship.

The Webster Dictionary defines worship as: a : great respect toward a divine being or supernatural power b : the outward showing of such respect.

The word worship derives from the Anglo-Saxon word weorscipe which means “to ascribe worth unto” the essential idea is that whatever you place the highest value or worth on is what you worship.

People all around us live their lives with the sole purpose of gaining wealth, fame, or pleasure, all of which are temporary to this world. That is what they worship and in most cases, with these temporal things, they are trying to fill the void left from the absence of God. It’s not just society though, we as believers tend to value worldly things above the eternal things at times too don’t we?

In fact Jesus in warns us about that, He says: “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul? “

a : great respect toward a divine being or supernatural power b : the outward showing of such respect

Do we view worship as a celebration of things?

I understand that most of you here know that

You see we as believers have the Gospel of Jesus Christ and through that relationship with Him we are removed from our sin and are transformed. Our eyes are opened to the fallacies of this world’s values and given the ability to see the true value in Christ Jesus. Not that we always keep our sights on Christ, but once we are anointed with the Holy Spirit we know that only God is deserving of our worship and we have no excuse for the worship of anything else.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. (2016). (). Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.

Now I could talk about all the aspects of worship like gratitude, celebration, Holy Communion, and Viso Divina (worshipping God in the beauty of created things), but I want to talk about worship as a discipline.

If you have your Bibles turn them to Revelation chapters 4 and 5

I want to point out 3 things about worship

We’ll notice 3 things about worship

Worship is Theological

Worship is Practical

Worship is Extremely Personal

Worship is Theological

In the New Testament worship is described as how we act, or live our lives, in the presence of God. True worship then can only happen once we come into a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. How can we worship Him if we don’t know Him? Those that know Him best worship Him most. You see worship is our response to knowing who God is and the better we know Him the more we worship Him. The more we know God through His word the more we realize just how much he deserves our worship.

Rev 4

Exposition:

Revelation 4:9–11 ESV

9 And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, 10 the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying, 11 “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”

In and 5 John talks about a scene that describes how well 4 creatures and 24 elders know God and how deep their worship is. It tells us that if we want to worship God better we need to know Him better. We do that by being preoccupied with the study of God’s word thus developing a better relationship with Him.

English Standard Version Chapter 4

Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,

who was and is and is to come!”

You see worship is not about some ritual or just something we do on Sunday mornings with music or a choir. It’s about knowing God and having a personal response to that knowledge. Let’s be clear about this, worship is about God, not about what makes us feel warm and fuzzy. Far to many people get upset or bent out of shape because the worship music is something they don’t like and that is precisely the wrong view about worship. The music, instruments, or the people playing them shouldn’t matter, because it’s about God not us.

When we look at the four creatures and how they worship God we find that theology in several things they say. First off in verse 8 “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God...” they are talking about God’s holiness. they are saying He is different, set apart, and perfect without sin. They are saying eternal truths about God that comes from their knowledge of who He is. That is theology, knowing the nature of God and eternal truths. He is above our humanity and He is perfect.

First off in verse 8 “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God...” they are talking about God’s holiness. they are saying He is different, set apart, and perfect without sin. They are saying eternal truths about God that comes from their knowledge of who He is. This is theology, knowing the nature of God and eternal truths. He is above our humanity and perfect.

they are talking about God’s holiness. they are saying He is different, set apart, and perfect without sin. They are saying eternal truths about God that comes from their knowledge of who He is. This is theology, knowing the nature of God and eternal truths. He is above our humanity and perfect.

He is sovereign. “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.” As the four creatures sing praise they submit to God’s sovereignty over all creation. They recognize Him for who He is Lord of Lord and King of Kings. They know there is nothing outside His dominion and no one will escape His judgement.

English Standard Version Chapter 4

Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,

who was and is and is to come!”

I want to note here that John wrote this book at a time when the Roman Emperor was idolized and even elevated to deity status, money and power were idolized along with Roman philosophical ideology. Christians were under intense persecution and were being killed for their faith in Jesus, but we see here a sovereign truth about our God. He is almighty God, ruler of all creation, and He is for us.

Let’s look at the next part of that verse:

English Standard Version Chapter 4

Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,

who was and is and is to come!”

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!”

Now they are telling the truth of God’s eternal nature. There has never been a time when He did not exist. He has always been, and He does not change. God is as He was and He will always be as He is and was. What we should remember about God as we worship Him is the theological truth that He is Holy, He is Almighty, and He is eternal. God is Holy, set apart from creation, God is Almighty and reigns over all creation. God’s Holiness and reign are an eternal nature that never changes.

Let’s jump down to the last verse of chapter 4:

Revelation 4:11 ESV

11 “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”

Rev

The theological nature of worship continues here. Note how well the elders know God and recognize that He alone is worthy of worship because He is creator of all things. The reason everything exists is because of His will. We are not here by accident and we are not the result of billions of years of evolution. We are here by the specific design of the Holy, Almighty, Eternal Creator. He created us in His image and for a specific purpose.

As we study God’s word and build our personal relationship with Him we begin to understand that He is someone we can entrust our entire life and soul to. He is not some lesser god effected by human opinions, nor is He a demi-god who is controlled by the whims of his creations. He is Holy, Almighty, and Eternal. He is the creator and we are His creations. These are deep theological truths about God. Too much of Christianity today is superficial and centered on man instead of being centered on God. Just a quick search of the social media sites will show you a Gospel that promises temporal things instead of eternal things. We must reject those Gospels they are not scriptural nor do they have anything to do with the nature of God.

Colossians 3:1–2 ESV

1 If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.

As we read through Revelation 4 and 5 we see the 4 creatures not only worship God for who He is, they also worship Him for what He has done. In Chapter 5 verse 9 they worship Jesus.

“Worthy are you to take the scroll and open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation,”

Jesus is worthy of our praise, not just because He is God, and He is God, but because of what He has done, because He shed his blood that paid the price for our sins and offered us eternal life. You see theology isn’t just knowing about the Character of God, but also knowing the work of God. True worship celebrates and praises both the nature and work of God and gives us a clear understanding of who God is and why we worship Him.

To be disciplined in worship you have to constantly be seeking to know God, who He is and what He has done. This isn’t based on your feelings or what someone else may tell you about God, it only comes from the revelation of God through scripture. The more you know God the more you will devote yourself to worshipping Him. Those who know Him best worship Him most.

That leads us to:

Worship is Practical

That means worship is something we do, something we say, something we give. It is action, it is something we practice.

How many churches do you know that build their services around something that will attract the most people, that will give people that warm fuzzy feeling, or a good show? It’s man centered and about how they can make people feel good, but it should never be that way. Worship should never be about us feeling good, its about us being intentional in what we say, what we do in our actions that are directed toward God.

Because of the abundance of things in these two chapters I am going to narrow it down to just four points in the practical sense.

a. True worship involves purity

Let me point out that John’s vision here is in Heaven where sin doesn’t exist. The elders are robed in white which represents their purity in Heaven. This gives us the truth that worship in heaven is perfect because of the absence of sin, but purity in our lives is not perfectly pure.

While we are here in this world, while we may be pure of sin in God’s eyes, our lives in general are not always what they should be. As long as we are here we will have to deal with the temptation of sin. That means it takes work to keep our lives and our hearts pure and the more pure our hearts and lives the more powerful our worship will be.

When we come before God to worship Him we should ask Him to search our hearts and allow the Holy Spirit to make us aware of anything that would diminish our worship. We should examine ourselves and ask ourselves questions like...

Is there an attitude or sin I haven’t dealt with? Do I have something against a brother or sister? Have I done something that would cause them to have something against me? If we don’t deal with these things our worship will be severely diminished.

We shouldn’t go through the motions if it isn’t going to be real. We need to let God show us any hidden sins, let Him show us things in our hearts that are keeping us from knowing Him like He wants us to know Him.

b. True worship involves humility

In verses 4:10, 5:8, and 5:14 the elders fall down worshipping God.

Let me point out that these 24 elders are themselves sitting on thrones around the throne of God. These 24 elders are themselves exalted to the level of having thrones in God’s throne room. Oh and I shouldn’t forget to mention they are all given golden crowns that signify reward for lives well lived. These elders are elevated above all other people and yet they fall down and worship God.

We talked about what worship means earlier, but one of the other principles in the Bible translated as “worship” literally means to lay prostrate, laying flat face down.

You see we seem to have lost the awe factor of worship. Far too many Christians in the western world have bought into the ideology of this casual relationship with God, He is “our friend”, “our buddy”, sure He is powerful, but He is my friend. Those that know God best have removed the “buddy” goggles and see Him for who He truly is and they fall down and worship Him.

If we don’t come before God humbly we cannot worship Him the way we should. God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Until we can let go of ourselves and come to the realization that we are worthless without Jesus, we will never experience true worship.

That leads to the next point. Not only do we need purity and humility in our worship

c. worship involves surrender

Revelation 4:10 ESV

10 the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying,

In the last part of this verse they cast their crowns before the throne. To understand the significance here those crowns were given to them as rewards. Their thrones and crowns would be the most prestigious thing, yet they abandon their thrones and cast their crowns at the feet of God. That is everything they have their exalted position and their possessions are surrendered to God.

We cannot come to worship God with pride or greed in our hearts. Unless we are willing to surrender everything we are and everything we have to God there is no true worship.

There are many people that have never experienced true authentic worship because they aren’t willing to let everything go. They hold some things back from God that belong to Him. I’m not just talking about material things, we have to surrender our agenda, our future, our hopes, and our reputation to God. We have to trust Him with our children, our business, our time.

As I said in last weeks message without God we would have nothing and we would be nothing. Everything we have and everything we are is because of Him. We can’t be authentic in our worship if we don’t trust Him and are not willing to surrender everything to Him.

d. Worship involves praise

Praise is truly speaking about the excellence of God.

Revelation 19:4–5 ESV

4 And the twenty-four elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshiped God who was seated on the throne, saying, “Amen. Hallelujah!” 5 And from the throne came a voice saying, “Praise our God, all you his servants, you who fear him, small and great.”

-5

The first stanza of the Old Hymn Praise Him! Praise Him! Jesus, Our Blessed Redeemer. I think pretty much says it all.

“Praise Him! praise Him! Jesus, our blessed Redeemer! Sing, ye saints! His wonderful love proclaim! Hail Him! hail Him! mightiest angels in glory; Strength and honor give to His holy name! Like a shepherd, Jesus will feed His people, In His arms He carries them all day long; O ye saints that live in the light of His presence, Praise Him! praise Him! ever in joyful song!”

That’s the first stanza of the Old Hymn Praise Him! Praise Him! Jesus, Our Blessed Redeemer. I think that pretty much says it all.

Revelation 5:9 ESV

9 And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation,

says, They sang a new song. Praise involves lifting our God up with authentic enthusiasm. We enthusiastically praise the wonders and excellence of our God, and not just in church on Sunday mornings where it’s safe to do so. True praise means wherever we are, whatever we are doing, we give praise to God. In front of believers and especially in front of non-believers we Give God the glory that only He deserves.

It is our responsibility as believers to bring Christ to those that don’t believe ad one of the ways we can effectively do that is by praising Him. Praise is a lifestyle not just some event we attend.

That leads me to how personal worship is:

Worship is personal

Worship isn’t just something we do, it is who we are and how we live. Worship involves our everyday lives, especially in the sense of personal discipline. Worship is something each of us must do as individuals.

The elders and living creatures in are singing:

“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!”

When I read this verse I had to put a lot of prayer into what is was saying. You see Jesus is God so He is omnipotent or all powerful, omniscient or all knowing, and omnipresent or present at all times in all places. Just thinking about that made my head spin, but if Jesus is all those things, then why is He worthy to receive that which He already has?

Well it’s not about giving Jesus power that He already has. It’s about our lives and how He is worthy of the entirety of our lives. When we say He is worthy to receive all these things we are saying, with everything we are, we are going to work to give Him the honor, glory, and blessings He is due.

Rom

The apostle Paul says just that in:

Romans 12:1–2 ESV

1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Worship is the way we live our lives. Our personal worship is defined by who we are before God, both publicly and privately, externally and especially internally, spiritually and physically.

You may have noticed a recurring theme in the spiritual discipline series. That is every one of the spiritual disciplines is defined by who we are and how we act not just on Sunday morning but in every moment of our lives. We must be authentic in our devotion to knowing scripture, prayer, stewardship, and now we are talking about worship.

With that being said how is our worship? Are we just going through the motions or is there an authentic connection between us and God as we come before His throne? What are we worshipping? We can answer that question by looking at what preoccupies most of our time. Whatever most of our time and thoughts are devoted to, that is what we are placing the most value on in our lives. Worship is whatever we place the most value on in our lives, it’s up to us to decide if we want to make that temporal or eternal.

Prayer

Heavenly father as we stand here before your throne today search our hearts. For those here that have a relationship with you, show us the hidden things in our hearts that hinder our relationship and worship of you. For those here that may not know you Lord, place the desire in their hearts to have a relationship with you. As each and everyone of us seek you I ask that you will show us who you are that we will know how much more you are worth than anything in this world. Give us a passion in our hearts to see you in all things that no matter where we are or what we do you will be seen and glorified. In the mighty name of Jesus Christ Amen.

Benediction

I would like to leave you with some words from Matt Redman’s song The Heart of Worship:

When the music fades All is stripped away And I simply come Longing just to bring Something that's of worth That will bless Your heart I'll bring You more than a song For a song in itself Is not what You have required You search much deeper within Through the way things appear You're looking into my heart I'm coming back to the heart of worship And it's all about You, it's all about You, Jesus I'm sorry, Lord, for the thing I've made it When it's all about You, it's all about You, Jesus

[Pre-Chorus] I'll bring You more than a song For a song in itself Is not what You have required You search much deeper within Through the way things appear You're looking into my heart

[Chorus] I'm coming back to the heart of worship And it's all about You, it's all about You, Jesus I'm sorry, Lord, for the thing I've made it When it's all about You, it's all about You, Jesus

May the Lord bless and fill your week folks and join us next week with our new Pastor Jeremy Woodhouse.