I’d like to ask you a very personal question, why do you come to worship every Sunday morning? Have you ever really thought about why you get up, get dressed, rush around and come to this retro building? If we polled the room, the responses are as numerous as the people here. The churchie answer is, “I come to worship to connect with God” to which you’re kids, the neighbor down the block or even your friends will say, “Well, I believe God is everywhere and I don’t think you need to go to a church to worship. I feel closer to God in nature or on my boat or golfing or watching a football game. God is everywhere, right?” To which we all stumble and answer the question with a yes but… But if you are in walking in nature, boating, golfing or watching TV, you are not actually worshiping God. You are admiring God while you are doing an activity because you like it. How does that connect you to anything more than your own power, not God’s. That’s the real rub. We have a choice between worshiping ourselves, our desires, our feelings or recognizing God’s role in all of those areas.
Webster’s defines worship as: extravagant respect or admiration for, or devotion to, an object of esteem. I would simplify it by saying worship is, our response to what rules our lives.
We value Christian worship as a cornerstone of our connection together here because it keeps us focused on what is supposed to rule our lives. The sheer act of worship is where the spiritual meets the physical and we connect with God through Jesus and the presence of the Holy Spirit. It is a time when we lose ourselves in Him, for Him so we can better serve Him.
That thought reminds me of an urban legend has it [no this is not a true story but it is a good one] that in 1990 a woman entered a Haagen-Dazs in the Kansas City Plaza for an ice-cream cone. While she was ordering another customer entered the store. She placed her order, turned and found herself staring face to face with Paul Newman. He was in town filming Mr. and Mrs. Bridge. His blue eyes made her knees buckle. She finished paying and quickly walked out of the store with her heart still pounding. Gaining her composure she suddenly realized she didn't have her cone; she turned to go back in. At the door she met Paul Newman who was coming out. He said to her, "Are you looking for your ice-cream cone?" Unable to utter a word she nodded yes. "You put it in your purse with your change."
If it’s been awhile since you really felt the presence of God in a way that made you forget what was going on around you? Made you forget the dishes? Made you forget the ball game? Made you forget the bank account? Made you forget where...you put your ice cream cone?
ChristianGlobe Illustrations, Brett Blair, ChristianGlobe Networks, Inc.
Then today’s scripture just might be for you… It’s one of the best descriptions of worship in all of scripture. Let’s turn to Psalm 95 to answer the question, what does authentic Christian worship look like? Today, we are going a little old school so if you brought a bible, have an app on your phone or want to grab the old technology in the seat back in front of you, just open or click to the psalm 95 and follow along:
1 Come, let us sing for joy to the LORD; let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation. 2 Let us come before him with thanksgiving and extol him with music and song.
Okay, let me point out a three points. First, the word “comes”. It doesn’t say go to your special place. It meant come to the temple where it was though God resided. But today it means come to the place in which you will find those who know me and whose spirit I have connected with. The second point comes from the words “Let Us”- worship and praise is an activity that brings the community together. As Christians, we come together not because we have to, but because we get to and in doing so, we are stronger. The second point the text makes is the groups sang. Since the beginning of time, people sang to the Lord and not in some wimpy voice but in a strong one – SING and SHOUT. Why? Because singing has a visceral reaction within us that confirms what the mind knows but the heart maybe has not accepted. We gain strength for the road ahead when we can share our beliefs – He is the Rock of our Salvation and we are grateful - Thanksgiving and we will share our story or Witness - knowing others are walking this same path.
The next three verses continue to explain why we give Him thanks….
3 For the LORD is the great God, the great King above all gods. 4 In his hand are the depths of the earth,
and the mountain peaks belong to him. 5 The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land.
He is the sole ruler and creator of the universe. Without Him, the world in which we live, and even our very existence, is suspect. If you have trouble grasping this concept of creation, ask yourself what role you played in being born? Did you choose to be born here and now? Did your coming into this world revolve around your choices? Of course not, God, who creates, created you for a time just as this. This is what praise is all about. We come before God to recognize His role in our creation. He created us – uniquely, powerfully, in his image. It is in our praise we acknowledge how amazing this is – not for him but for us. It’s a declaration of our understanding of his power. He has provided all we need (I didn’t say want) and asks only one thing from us, to return the only thing He does not already have: our will. How do we do this? How do we return our will to Him? I am so glad you asked. Let’s jump to the next two verses.
6 Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the LORD our Maker;
7 for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care.
I came from a catholic upbringing. I can remember what I call the stand up, sit down, kneel down, stand up, fight, fight, fight of every Saturday night worship service. I really don’t think I understood any of the reasoning behind the kneeling. I thought it was just another way to help keep us awake. However, today I have a different understanding. The act of bowing down symbolizes a reverence or respect. I worked for a Japanese company for years and the sheer act of bowing to a superior was a considered appropriate. So why wouldn’t I want to show respect to God in this way. I can show even more vulnerability through the act of kneeling. A person on their knees is not be able to respond quickly to any threat. It does not allow one the opportunity to withdrawal quickly should the situation require it. It was common in the days of kings for a person to come before the Ruler’s throne and kneel with your head down between your knees or to lay prostrate on the floor. Each demonstrates more and more submission. A person is totally at the mercy of the person before them. No escape. No withdrawal. It is a position of total surrender. This is the idea of presenting ourselves as wholly and living sacrifices to Him. By bowing and kneeling we are saying, “all respect and honor is yours and our trust is in you.” Is this how you understand your moment of worship?
Today, if only you would hear his voice, 8 “Do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah, (means quarrelling)as you did that day at Massah (means testing) in the wilderness, 9 where your ancestors tested me; they tried me, though they had seen what I did. 10 For forty years I was angry with that generation; I said, ‘They are a people whose hearts go astray, and they have not known my ways.’ 11 So I declared on oath in my anger, ‘They shall never enter my rest.’”
When we come to worship the Lord, we need to realize the way we approach our time together is extremely important. We worship together to praise the Lord, to show our respect for Him, to offer our will to Him and to revive our trust in Him. If we come to Him with a quarreling or testing spirit, we ought to be careful. Now, some of you are saying, “well, I never would.” And I would like to challenge you on that. The Israelites had seen God free them from slavery, walk across the Red Sea, feed them in the desert, give them water from a rock and provide them a hope for the future. Their response was, but where’s the beef? Have you ever come to church in a bad mood because after a week in which you ate multiple times each day, you had plenty of clean water, you bought some clothes, you drove your car, you lived in a place with a roof and you had time to sit down to relax for more than a 15 minutes but you showed up at church or rolled out of bed and wondered what God was doing for you? If so, you have been to Meribah and Massah. The difference is Jesus went there with us and God looks upon us with loving eyes – not because what we have done but what He has done for us. God sees Him and as such His promise remains for us: WE WILL HAVE REST. This last line seals the deal of why we come to worship. We come to worship together to witness to the Lord, to witness to one another and to witness to the world of what he has done, is doing and will do in our lives. He has given us the freedom to know that no matter what we have done or not done, God the father will give us eternal rest.
Over the past 6 weeks, we have been walking through this message series entitled Ethos. It has been an interesting journey as we have reflected upon our character as a church and what we value. The idea has been that if we strive to live out the mission of the church: LOVE GOD, LOVE OTHERS AND CHANGE THE WORLD then we will naturally want to get more devoted, connected and generous in the areas we as Christians hold sacred: relationships (God and each other), next generations, personal transformation, mission and worship. Our goal has been to encourage us to live in his likeness.
We believe it is the core. Christ is the center of the Christian message. It is the symbol of real freedom. And today, we gaze upon the cross in recognition of our need for Him, His power and His Glory in our willingness to submit ourselves to the work He died for.
Let’s take a moment to reflect on this as the worship team plays and before we stand to worship Him.
https://communitycenter.life/rev-robert-butler-info
