“God said to the people of Israel: “I am the Lord your God …Do not worship any god except me. Do not make idols…….Don’t bow down and worship idols. I am the Lord your God, and I demand all your love” Exodus 20: 1-5
There are certainly seasons of life when you just don’t know for sure what God wants you to do in the big picture of life but one thing is for sure when we worship God we are always in His will. Jesus told the woman at the well, “But the time is coming-indeed it’s here now-when true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The Father is looking for those who will worship him that way” (John 4:23). The intriguing message of this verse is that the God in heaven is looking throughout the earth for people to worship Him. Worship is the passion of God and He is actively searching for worshippers.
Worship causes the presence of God to be experienced and felt by His people. Whether by singing, praying, praising, or meditating on His word, His Spirit envelopes you and draws you closer to Him. C.S. Lewis wrote, “it is in the process of being worshipped that God communicates His presence to men…even in Judaism the essence of the sacrifice was not really that men gave bulls and goats to God, but that by their doing so God gave Himself to men.” King David said, “One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.” (Psalm 27:4). King David’s greatest yearning was to worship the Lord because he knew in this one thing all other things are found. David Jeremiah teaches that “worship needs to be in the center of all that we do. It cannot be peripheral. It cannot be an addendum. It has to be the center of all that we do. Yes, we need to witness and we need to work, but until worship is central, all those other things will be a struggle and will not flow as they ought from our worship of the Lord.”
I have had the opportunity to experience some incredible times of corporate worship. The scriptures teach us to sing to the Lord with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs (Eph 5:18-19, Col 3:16). There is great controversy in the church today over what style of music we use in worship but these verses clearly show that even in the early church there was no one particular style. I have worshipped on the Southern steps of the temple in Jerusalem with familiar hymns and soothing praise songs and felt the presence of God. And just this weekend, I raised my hands in worship to the songs of the contemporary Christian pop/rock duo, For King and Country, as their electrifying, music in an outdoor arena reverberated off the mountains of the beautiful Shenandoah Valley. Two very different styles of music with one very common thread, God was there, in the midst of the worship. He found His worshippers. Will He find you worshipping today? And that’s your Tuesday Tidbit.
Pictures are of worship on the Southern steps of temple in Jerusalem and For King and Country concert in Woodstock, VA