By WACHITEMBO MUKUKA
what first hits your mind when you hear the term “worship”??
If you’re anything like me it’s that allocated portion of time in between you catching up with your friends, and the sermon, where you sing a number of songs, shake off the sleep and bad vibes and chances are you’re most likely going to hear phrases such as, “Are you glad to be in the house of the Lord?”, “Come on just lift your hands”, “with a shout of praise”, “just the vocals” and “let’s give the Lord a clap offering” (Shout out to all worship leaders, we love you) . But what if I told you that worship in itself transcends above the allocated time at your church campus or a genre of music. While these can be classified as external expressions of worship and they have an irrefutable role in aiding in our worship of God they most definitely aren’t the epitome of worship. Let’s get to defining what worship is then.
Romans 12:1 New Living Translation (NLT)
A Living Sacrifice to God
12 And so, dear brothers and sisters, [a] I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. [b]
Webster’s 1828 dictionary lists one of the definitions of worship as an “Excellence of character; dignity; worth; worthiness.” Both the Apostle Paul and Mr Noah Webster allude to an important aspect of worship, it’s a verb, and that means it constitutes an action\actions. Sacrifices in the Old Testament would usually be killed and placed before the alter and perhaps Paul knew that things that aren’t living aren’t really in the habit of doing much so he urges us to present our bodies as “living sacrifices”, and if we define “life” as a present state of existence and “sacrifice” as to surrender or suffer to be lost for the sake of obtaining something, to be a living sacrifice to God simply means that in every moment of my existence I have surrendered myself to the will and Word of God in order to obtain what he has in store for me and an excellence of character. It means in all that I endeavor to do and perhaps most importantly in my heart I have made a conscious resolve to submit myself to God and be obedient to his every word, laying aside my own desires to follow him and putting all that I have at his disposal, this is our true worship. God places a particular importance on obedience from the heart
1 Samuel 15:22 New Living Translation (NLT)
22 But Samuel replied,
“What is more pleasing to the Lord:
your burnt offerings and sacrifices
or your obedience to his voice?
Listen! Obedience is better than sacrifice,
and submission is better than offering the fat of rams.
In a nutshell, “The posture of your heart matters more than the posture of your hands”. It may seem like a long stretch to submit to God in all that you do, it’s not easy in the beginning, but it’s definitely worth pushing for, and over time it becomes ingrained in your character i.e. it becomes part of you, your nature and habitual.
John 4:24 New Living Translation (NLT)
24 For God is Spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.”
This is another aspect of worship and the last one I’ll be pointing out. I guess the first question that would instinctively come up is how do I worship in spirit and truth? This in essence is worshipping God in light of who He really is, the truth of His being. Worshipping in spirit can be grasped as our spirits communing with God’s spirit, a state that is achieved with little or no help from our physical state or in physical action, it is more of the Heart and the Head where our emotion and intellect succumb to the majesty of God. A true surrender of heart and intellect can only exist in a mind that has the right perception of God, and that’s where TRUTH comes in. The truth is the word of God :2 Samuel 7:28
"Now, O Lord GOD, You are God, and Your words are truth, and You have promised this good thing to Your servant.
And this truth exists as the Bible for us and it is where God, by His Spirit reveals to us who He really is and understanding this truth gives us a platform to worship Him in spirit and in truth, knowing whom and how we worship. It is the understanding and grasping of this truth that helps us build a deep affection for God and recognise him as a Good, Loving and Caring father no matter the circumstances and therein enabling us to succumb our emotion and intellect to Him.
Another facet of truth that exists in worship is knowing the truth of who you are and worshipping God in the truth of who you are and who He has made you to be, a truth which can also be obtained from the Bible. A lot of times we get caught up in trying to worship God in an “acceptable” norm, be that the Sunday service, or listening to certain\specific genre of music and we forsake what God placed in us for fear of not “fitting in” and we limit His move in our lives and what that does in essence is rob God of the worship he deserves from you, rob you of the joy and satisfaction that comes with worshipping God from your true character and lastly it robs the community of believers around you from seeing God’s glory in more ways than one. So, I challenge you to ask God “In what ways have I been holding back in my worship” and let Him minister to you.
If you wanted to summarise this entire article on Worship it would probably sound something like: True worship is more an inward than an outward experience, it stems from our spirits and is more about the posture of your heart, head and emotions, whether worship as a life lived or worship services on Sunday, they don’t exist as separate entities, it isn’t either worshipping him in my life actions or during worship service on Sunday it’s both, and.
GOD BLESS YOU
תגובות