All tagged Worship
Did you wake up happy today? Did you enter into your prayer closet with joy, or do you feel like you should be eternally solemn before God? On Sundays do we enter into the sanctuary with a stern disposition, and worship God with a pompous air? Do the circumstances in our lives seek to crush our spirit? God gives us many things but of them He most certainly wants us to receive His joy, and yes, happiness!
Yesterday was Palm Sunday, and via a live broadcast, my pastor spoke of our Holy Week expectations this year in the face of the Coronavirus Pandemic. Then he went on to lay out our church’s online services this week, and how we would go about celebratIng each of them from our homes given the quarantine we find ourselves under. This is not to be a year like any other we have experienced, but though we are separated from one another, we are not separated from Jesus. This is the year we hit the reset button on our spirituality, and sift it, seeing it for what it should have always been... a deeply personal relationship.
Are you in the midst of spiritual study, prayer, and contemplation with your spouse, your family, or a small group of friends? Perhaps you are taking a break at your place of work to quickly read a few verses of scripture, or this devotional message, while the daily grind goes on around you. Every moment that we find to spend with God is precious, and to be cherished, but none more so than when we are completely alone with Him..
Do we give God honor, worship, and glory for all that is our life? The opportunities that come to us, the food on our table, the children we beget, and the loves we experience in all of their splendor? It is so easy to say “I did this!”, or to accept the glory when someone says of us “Here is a man who has done amazing things!” We do this every day, and if you listen to yourself as you speak you will be led to acknowledge that “I” is your favorite word... it is the most used word of all mankind.
When you worship are you joyous, and lifted up, or do you approach the throne off God in tears, and sadness? When you sing hymns are they morose, or do they reflect the immense pleasure, and majesty you find in God? Being humble before God does not imply a lack of joy, it actually frees us to rejoice in Him, because we realize who He is, and that we are His children... His minions.
Are you afraid to leave home and travel with Jesus? When He calls out to you how do you react? If you were standing on the street corner and Jesus walked by saying “Follow me!” What would you do? Would you pretend you didn’t know Him? What if He only wanted you to go downtown, and serve a meal at the local soup kitchen? Answering the call of Christ means leaving our comfort zone... it also means changing something about ourselves so that we become more like Him.
Perhaps you say that you once believed in Jesus Christ, but not any longer, or you say that you are a Christian and yet there is no outward flourishing to indicate that this is true. In both cases, what is the problem with your faith, what stifled it and kept I from prospering? You are like a plant, but without a healthy root it can’t continue to grow, and will eventually die.
Do you regularly go to church, and if you do, how do you worship God? More to the point is this... do you worship God together as a church body? Do you lift up your praise, worship, and prayers as one, and then wait on Him? Congregations that don’t worship together might contain specks of brilliant faith scattered within the pews, but never really meet God as He desires.
Where does my help come from? Understanding the nature of God is more than important, and we can see it best in those things for which we praise and thank Him. The Psalms are a wonderful place to turn as we look for God, and search out His impact in our lives. Do you praise Him enough? Do you see Him in every corner of your life?
What songs do you sing when you are with your friends? Do you sing popular songs of today, old favorites from the past, folk songs, holiday songs, campfire songs, or perhaps drinking songs? Well, we are told in Ephesians that as believers we are to remain sober, greet one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs as we sing to the Lord, and to be filled with the Spirit. How should we interpret this? Is singing anything other than hymns taboo?
Is there something in your life that keeps getting in the way of your faith in God? Is there something that distracts you during your day when you are trying to pray without ceasing, or which keeps you from studying God’s Word? Does your love for money stop you from donating to a food pantry, or perhaps occupies all of your time and prohibits you from burying the dead, or visiting the sick? Jesus asks us to identify these distractions that are coming before God, and remove them, just as he did with the wealthy ruler.
Are you enjoying being in the temple of God today? Are the floors sparkling clean, the windows washed, and the altar shiny and bright? Are all the candles lit, and the scent of incense fresh and pleasing? Can you hear chanting, and feel the presence of the Holy Spirit there with you? Well, it sounds like I am talking about a building, but in reality I am alluding to your own body.
Reading and remembering the Word of God is very important, but unless we actually do those things we have read then we have gathered nothing but useless knowledge. To be enamored by the words contained in the Bible without putting them to good use by doing God’s will in them is sheer foolishness. Do you live the life you read? Do you not only hear God’s voice, but obey it?
It is one thing to know what a life of prayer is, but something altogether different to actually live one. Being called to prayer and answering that call are two entirely separate things. Every Christian receives the call to prayer, but so many cripple themselves by either refusing that call, or not knowing how to answer it. Are you fully engaged in a life of prayer, or limping into it without understanding what it actually is, or involves?
Are you unsatisfied in your prayer life? Do you ask in prayer, and yet feel unfulfilled when you rise from your knees? Do you recite scripture in your prayers and cry out, yet leave your prayer closet feeling as though God might not have heard you? Well, perhaps you are missing a key lesson that was taught by Jesus. Maybe you need to listen as he teaches us to pray in spirit and truth.