While singing a praise song today at church, my heart was convicted about my worship. I was enjoying praising God, but as we began to sing the song "Show Your Glory" by Jonathan Stockstill, I was presented the question, "do you really mean this?" I started to meditate on this question as I sang the song. A congregation of several hundred people singing the words "demonstrate your power" and "show your glory." In song, we petitioned God for a "new anointing" and for a "fresh outpouring."
As I surveyed the congregation and considered my own worship experience, I realized how easy it is for us to sing a song in the presence of the Lord and really want to worship him, but fail to consider the words we sing. It's great to sing praise to our God on Sunday, but can we (I) say that my actions, words, and intentions throughout each week demonstrate the desire expressed in the praise I sing at church? Do I really want to see revival? Am I living life in a way that calls forth a demonstration of the glory of God? Do I open the door in my schedule and my routine for a fresh outpouring of His Holy Spirit? Do we daily invite His holiness into our lives, our minds, and our relationships? These questions are hard to ask, because the Holy Spirit attest to the conviction they bring about in our hearts.
Worship is not just for Sunday mornings or 'that thing you do when you listen to Christian music.' Worship is a lifestyle lived out before a mighty God. Yes, we praise him with song, but we also demonstrate our worship with our choices, our aspirations, our relationships, our words, and our deeds. The word worship is defined as "adoring reverence or regard." The words from Hebrew and Greek that were translated at worship in the Bible, actually hold meanings like To Serve or To demonstrate a posture of submission. The purpose of worship to honor our Father in heaven by acknowledging his power and authority, to commit our lives to his service, to be submitted to his will. When we worship, we are to worship in spirit and in truth. Our lives should be lived according to his spirit. Romans 8:
2 because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you[a] free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh,[b] God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering.[c] And so he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.
We are to walk according to the Spirit of Christ Jesus. To be submitted to his authority, recognizing the majesty of Christ. I made the decision to begin consciously considering the words of the songs I sing to my Lord and Savior, and to make them a declaration of my heart. Afterward, I had the best worship experience that I've had in a long time. I reveled in the greatness of our God as we began to sing "How Great is our God."
During the first verse of the song, I felt the voice of the Lord ask "If I am great, why do you stand in my presence? Am I seated on the throne of your heart? Do you acknowledge my kingship?" I was overcome with his greatness. My legs were weak and all that I could do was to submit to our great and powerful God. I dropped to my knees and bowed my head to our mighty king. I surrendered myself to God in my worship. How often do we sing about the greatness of our God, but fail to acknowledge His kingship? I've never been the bower at church, so I should have felt awkward and out-of-place doing something that I never do (in the Youth section!). But, it wasn't. God's greatness is so much more than my reputation or the thoughts and opinions of others. I was bowing to my king. Submitting to my father. And God richly blessed that decision in the subsequent sermon by Pastor Mike called Overcoming Shame. http://rolcweb.com/go/downloads (I'll tell about this in another blog soon to come - dealing with the absence of my father during my childhood; "Shame - A few bones left in the closet")
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