An Expose’ On Worship

If you look in any dictionary the general definition of worship is the expression of reverence and adoration toward God. Some say that worship is exaltation and magnification. There are others who propose that worship is exploration that is peppered with enjoyment. Some others would probably concur that worship is obligatory, monotonous, religion, insight along with many other strands and streams of contemporary thought. To be sure, worship is exaltation! We exalt our Lord through the Person of Jesus Christ for the express purpose of lifting the name of Christ above and beyond human conjectures and mortal speculations. John 12:32 clearly shows us that when Jesus Christ is lifted up He will draw all men unto Himself. The church for centuries on end have endeavored to use evangelism as the antithesis for lifting Christ up. While evangelism is important, if personal worship is not right from within and without, the absence of true worship in the lives and hearts of God’s people becomes an eraser on the sheets of what we call evangelism. Why do I make this claim? Very simply, evangelism may get a person to come to our churches, but it is not proven that it will keep them there. Worship becomes the barometer by which the presence of God and the response of the people are gauged. He must be exalted. Quite naturally, magnification is also worship. In a nutshell, magnification is simply the idea of enlarging, broadening or widening. Most of us would agree that God is big! There are many professed atheists who deny and refute the existence of God. But even the atheist would agree that ‘if’ there was a God, much like the One whom Christians preach, he would be big! That is an arresting and amazing truth. Because it helps us to peer into the attributes of God on a broadening scale. What many fail to miss is that the larger the triune God is made real to us, the smaller we become. That is where a service, worship, giving, gratitude and appreciation becomes reasonable. Because in our attempts to enlarge our view of God, it calls self to realize the he or she is not worthy. Romans 12:1 says, “I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God that you present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” The passage in Romans chapter 12 reveals to you and me that when we look at God for Who He is; and we look at ourselves for who and what we are not, we are ignited with a holy fire from within, to magnify Him for all that He is and what He is about.

One of my favorite passages is Joshua 24 where Joshua gathers all the tribes of Israel to Shechem, and called for the elders of Israel and their head and for their judges and leaders and officers; and there they presented themselves before God. It is there that Joshua begins to give an excerpt of all that God had saved them from, delivered them through, redeemed them from and brought them TO. And yet they, time and time again, stray away from the purposes of Yahweh and Joshua says them from the Lord, “I have given you a land from which you did not labor, you dwell in cities that you did not build, you eat food and fruit from vineyards that you did not plant. Now therefore serve the Lord with sincerity and in truth and put away the gods of your fathers. And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom you will serve.” And it is in the same verse where Joshua says, “But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord!”

Same God…Same Struggles…Same Bondage…Same Tears…Same Pain…Same Loss…Same Red Sea…Same Pharoah being drowned…Same Giants in the Land…Same ushering into a Land flowing with milk and honey…same Pressures…same deliverance. Different Choice!!!

I Kings 18:21 “How long shall ye halt between two opinions?”

James 1:8 “A double-minded mind is unstable in all his ways”

Whether you are going to enjoy your own splendor and resplendence on the sidelines of pretensious worship as wimps or whether you are going to break the huddle, call the play and roll with the big boys with real worship.

Warren Wiersbe says that real worship is not a playground, showground but a battleground. But moreover it is Holy Ground!

Daniel 5:25 “Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin…you are weighed in the balance”.

• Here is God….and here is you – picture the pendulum (it makes no sense that you have made yourself equal with God on the scale of your own self-aggrandisement and honest scrutiny.

• Let’s weigh in – You vs. God

- You are limited/God’s unlimited