Worship Thoughts - Part 2

The #2 purpose of worship is for us to learn to always respond to God with worship. 

The overflow of the Christian heart should be one of worship towards God in all things. 

Luke 6:45 

A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.

That’s a state that has to be cultivated. Humans are designed for worship, but without focus and devotion to God, we will be wooed away to worshiping any matter of small 'g' substitute. God doesn’t need our praise or our efforts, he wants us to want to love him wholeheartedly in excessive adoration or exultation.

Luke 19:37-40 

When he came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen: “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!”
“Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”
Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!”
“I tell you,” he replied, “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”

Christians need to be prepared in and out of season for worship. Christians should be spontaneously worshipful, responding from their core person to the holiness of God. This is what made David a man after God’s own heart. He constantly returned and worshiped. He lamented or cried out or cursed his enemies, and then he worshiped. He was a regular, emotional person that messed up and learned to always respond to God through worship.
Psalms 57:11

Be exalted, O God, above the heavens;

    let your glory be over all the earth.

Nehemiah 8:6

Ezra praised the Lord, the great God; and all the people lifted their hands and responded, “Amen! Amen!” Then they bowed down and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground.

So in the work of worship, we practice so that it pops out of us without prompting or force. The discipline of worship is to cause a song of praise to be in our minds when we first wake up in the morning. It is practice, so we overflow with bible verses just surfacing and filling our meditating mind while at work. Through the discipline of worship, we train ourselves to organically respond back to God with worship in the car or at the end of the day. 

Colossians 3:16

Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.

A place to start in cultivating a worship response is the cross. Study the cross and what it means to Christians. It changes “color,” as you grow and mature. What I thought about the cross and the story as a kid was a 180 from my now-perspective. It shifts as your position changes. The cross deepens and never ends. The work began when Jesus was born, was completed when Jesus died and rose again, and is still at vibrant play in our lives. Remember the cross, reevaluate the cross. It will make you grateful, draw deeper, and fall in love with the God who ordered his Son’s ultimate expression of love towards you. It’ll be a never-ending pursuit.

Hebrews 12;28-29

Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our “God is a consuming fire.”