Text: 1 Cor 14:1, 26, Title: God Truly Among Us, Date/Place: NRBC, 2/12/12, AM
Opening illustration:
Background to passage: this chapter covers a number of specific things about prophesy and tongues, but we have dealt with them as spiritual gifts in previous messages, so if you are interested in them specifically, check out the website. This also passage deals with the use of these and other principles of corporate worship. And uses these gifts and the rest of the gifts to talk about them. We also get a glimpse into the early church in Corinth, and how they gathered.
Main thought: So this morning I want us to think about a couple of these principles that we take for granted or that we never think about much...or that many of us think about each time we enter the worship service.
Worship Should Be Intelligible (v. 23-25)
Read verses 3-5, 12, 17, speak about the main purpose of spiritual gifts, and one of the main goals in corporate worship – edification. The service must be understood by saints and aints in order for it to profit them. This shows us that the gatherings of the early church were times of the people of God getting feed, exhorted, strengthened, and taught. All through the first 25 verses of this chapter, he argues that if we are to be built up, we must understand. He culminates with the result of intelligibility is that when unbelievers come they testify that “God is truly among us.” We come to worship to both give and get. There is no shame in coming to “get something” out of the service, as long as the main thing that you are striving to get is God!
Argumentation
Illustration: one of the recommendations from Everett was a sign in the parking lot telling where the nursery was for visiting young families,
There are some simple, practical, almost common sense kinds of things that flow from this. Bulletins: sometimes the target of those that want a less “contained” service, but helpful for people to know what is going on. Words to songs in the book or on the wall. Sound systems and microphones for people to hear clearly. Bibles in the pews. Language that communicates (both the right dialect and level).
But let’s think a little deeper. What do you come here to do? Ease conscience? Please a family member? See friends? Hear a sermon? Sing your favorite songs? What happens in your heart when those ends are not achieved? What things do you come here to get?
I want you to take this home. There are two things in this message that if you forget everything else, remember these: 1) the essence of worship is not about external forms or styles or buildings or places or clothing choices or outward expressions. See quote below. At the core of NT worship, the essence of what we are to do here, the foundation goal, the non-negotiable heart of the NT is inward gladness and satisfaction in God; in seeing and savoring Him; in rejoicing in all that He is and is to you. I made a statement the other night in our worship service about singing all the songs (which I still stand by as an expression of love and worship in that sense), but I want to clarify that although singing is normative in NT and OT worship, guilting you into singing all the songs, and you doing it without an inner gladness and rejoicing is not helpful, nor does it achieve the ultimate goal of worship. MAIN TRUTH: worship is inner, (and even though it might not happen every time) and to do “worship” without this piece is to fail at a personal level.
So, handles: and this is to help you now, and short-circuit you later (because this kills the essence of worship, because you focus on self instead of on God). I must give you handles. Use them, then fling them aside only to be used on occasion. While you are singing, giving, listening to the sermon (because the sermon is worship as much as the songs), ask yourself: am I truly thinking about God? Am I happy in Him when I do? As I said, once you begin to analyze worship, it ceases to be worship. Are you experiencing Him in your heart and emotion and mind? Is there emotion welling up of joy and gladness in you as you sing or hear the word or give? Don’t think that if this never happens you are lost, just know that this is the essence of worship, and most of us haven’t been taught that. And in order to attain it, don’t seek it, but seek God!
Worship Should Be Orderly (v. 33, 40)
Paul says that God is a God of order, and not of confusion. He gives this as a reason for people to make sure that whatever is done in the worship service is done so that people see God, and are not distracted. Our services as a whole are supposed to cause people to see and look to God. All the tongue-speakers and prophets should wait their turn and ensure they have an interpreter. This doesn’t mean that our services have to be completely scripted, or that we always follow the bulletin to the “t.” And it doesn’t mean that we don’t allow the Spirit to lead us, but there is nothing that says the Spirit can’t lead us in preparation. But we should think through our services with a goal in mind.
Argumentation
Illustration: “undistracting excellence,”
Worship should be thoughtful, should have a certain flow to it, and should be intentional and purposeful, SO THAT people may see and experience God. It should take us somewhere. Do you see God (or expect to see Him) in the worship service? Everything that we do in service should be done to the best of our abilities and with excellence so that people are able to worship God; BUT not with so much emphasis on excellence that we make the service and things that go on in the service a performance (applause), or that those leading worship feel pressure to perform well to the end that they are hindered from worship. But we don’t want to do what we do so well that people’s eyes are focused on the tool rather than the Master. George Whitefield and Ben Franklin.
Worship Should Be Participatory (v. 26)
This is the in the talk about order, but it gives us an interesting insight. I want you to see the early church worship. Each person who attended the worship service had something to contribute. Since the purpose of the service is to upbuild, each person comes with something to offer to God and the church. They come to see and experience God, and one of the main ways that happens is in the expression of spiritual gifts.
Argumentation
Illustration: If the choir is not with me in the battle for souls and for truth and for spreading a passion for the supremacy of God in all things for all people, I feel betrayed by the shimmering robes.
This is the second thing that I want you to cement in your brain and your heart. 2) Your role in worship at New River is biblically clear: participation. When you come to corporate worship services, you should come prepared to participate. This means that you go to bed early enough on Sunday to get a good night’s sleep, and set your alarm for early enough that you are not rushed. Iron your clothes on Sat night if necessary. It means that you come having studied your bible during the week. It means that you come having worked for Christ witnessing and serving, so that you are hungry to be fed. If we come exhausted, rushed, and spiritually lethargic to worship, don’t expect to be sensitive enough and spiritually in tune enough to see Him. This also means that to know your gift and know how to use it. It also means that you are praying during the week, and asking God, “what word, gesture, encouragement, song, comment, etc. can I bring that will help my NR family.” Just your physical presence is not usually enough. Coming and sitting is not enough. But it can be helpful, Mr. Bass and Piper’s singing buddies. It is a powerful encouragement to worship for others if you worship. When a hand slips up, tears fall down, emotions rise, or ‘amen’s spring forth, others are compelled to worship too. Just like we are not the performers, you are not the audience. Did you participate today? If you didn’t the church lost out.
Closing illustration:
We need you, God wants you, you should want Him. And all those things should come together in a cascading waterfall vertically and horizontally of praise, and confession, and gladness, and sorrow, and joy, and brokenness, where a holy visitation of God takes place and He satisfies the longings of His people, and they are refreshed, fed, changed, and edified!
Invitation to commitment
Additional Notes
What Jesus is doing here is stripping proskuneo of its last vestiges of localized and outward connotation. Not that it will be wrong for worship to be in a place or that it will be wrong for it to use outward forms; but, rather, he is making explicit and central that this is not what makes worship worship… the whole tendency of the early church was to deal with worship as primarily inward and spiritual rather than outward and bodily; primarily pervasive rather than localized… The whole thrust is being taken off of ceremony and seasons and places and forms and is being shifted to what is happening in the heart – not just on Sunday, but every day and all the time in all of life… His burden is to call for a radical, inward authenticity of worship and an all-encompassing pervasiveness of worship in all of life. Place and form are not of the essence… there is (in the NT) at the same time a radical intensification of worship as an inward, spiritual experience that has no bounds and pervades all of life… The essential, vital, i
Indispensable, defining heart of worship is the experience of being satisfied with God. This satisfaction in God magnifies God in the heart...The impulse for singing a hymn and the impulse for visiting a prisoner is the same: a thirst for God – a desire to experience as much satisfaction in God as we can…God is glorified not only by His glory’s being seen, but by its being rejoiced in… Genuine affections for God are an end in themselves. I cannot say to my wife: “I feel a strong delight in you so that you will make me a nice meal.” That is not the way delight works. It terminates on her. It does not have a nice meal in view.
