74. The Church - Worship Series

IN GOD'S IMAGE 74 - THE CHURCH - WORSHIP

This message is part of a series of 90 sermons based on the title, “In God’s Image – God’s Purpose for humanity.” This series of free sermons or the equivalent free book format is designed to take the reader through an amazing process beginning with God in prehistory and finishing with humanity joining God in eternity as His loving sons and daughters. It is at times, a painful yet fascinating story, not only for humanity, but also for God. As the sermons follow a chronological view of the story of salvation, it is highly recommend they be presented in numerical order rather than jumping to the more “interesting” or “controversial” subjects as the material builds on what is presented earlier. We also recommend reading the introduction prior to using the material. The free book version along with any graphics or figures mentioned in this series can be downloaded at www.ingodsimage.site - Gary Regazzoli

Our focus has shifted to the role and function of the church.

• We are looking at the role of the church through five virtues, faith, hope and love, worship and service.

• The church as the body of Christ needs to be people of faith, people of hope, people of love, people of worship, and people of service.

Last time we looked at the subject of love, this time our focus is on the subject of worship.

• The first question we need to ask is, “Why worship God?”

• It seems about the only thing that is worshiped these days is “money.”

• It seems everyone is willing to bow down to the god of avarice.

• Even movies tell us, “Greed is good!”

• Running a close second to greed is celebrity worship. We have reality show stars, rock stars, movie stars and American Idol stars.

• Much of the change we have experienced in our western societies over the last couple of centuries is the shift that has occurred with the introduction of the enlightenment and secular humanism.

• Although there have been many positive aspects associated with these developments, there has been one major negative and that is, as the term humanism implies, the emphasis has shifted from worship of God to worship of humans.

• This is not a new development in human history as the apostle Paul spoke about this trend in Romans 1.

• Romans 1:25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

• Instead of humanity striving to grow into the image of God, we now strive to make God in our image.

• God of course warned against this trend by making this His first and second, “Thou shalt not’s!” (Exodus 20:3-6).

• In this session we are going to look at the first of three questions regarding worship and that is, “Why should we worship God?”

So why should we worship God?

• The first thing we need to acknowledge is, God is vastly different from us, hence the use of the word “transcendent” in relation to God.

• As Jesus told the Samaritan woman, God is spirit, meaning He is outside the four dimensional restrictions of time and space and transcends both dimensions (John 4:24).

• So while God is infinite and transcendent, humans are finite and inferior.

• Not only is He vastly superior to us and worthy of worship, but also it is He alone who can also handle the adulation. associated with worship unlike the human celebrities we just mentioned (gossip magazines existence depend on celebrities’ failings).

• In contrast, God is deserving of worship because of the following reasons.

• Revelation 4:11 “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being.”

• In our earlier session on “faith” we talked about three comprehensive claims God has on human beings. He is our Creator or Maker, He is our Father, and now after Jesus Christ’s saving work on the cross, He is our Savior.

• These three titles reveal why God is worthy of praise and worship.

• Before time and space existed, God decided to share his existence with others and so began this amazing process of creating human beings with the potential of sharing in the life and love of God Himself.

• The gift of life from God should not be underestimated, as science to its consternation is unable to create the life that exists in the smallest seed.

• The title of “Creator” or “Maker” denotes ownership, and as God is the one who has given us life, He deserves the glory, honour and power this verse implies.