Worshipping God as We Ought
(Overcomer Wu)

"Ascribe to the Lord the glory due His name. Bring an offering and come before Him; worship the Lord in the splendor of His holiness. ” 1 Chronicles 16:29

As Christians, our primary objective and directive is to worship God. It is interesting and sometimes amusing to see what Christians choose to fight about? We fuss and argue with each other over church structure, the role of women, the Holy Spirit, the practice of the church life, the pre-post-or-mid tribulational rapture, the Second Coming, etc. I guess it should surprise no one that Christians today are also fighting over worship. Hymns, choruses, praise songs, guitars, drums, raised hands, dancing…all have become the new battlefield for many a congregation. It’s time we moved beyond personal preference and doctrinal watch-dogging and begin to find out what God expects of us in worship. The only place to go is God’s Word. As we study together, we will first determine what worship is. Next, we will examine the Lord’s perfect plan for worship.

In order to understand worship, let us first consider what does the Bible say about worship? For those desiring to please God and walk according to His will, worship is perhaps first of all a command. God says that we are to worship Him. Psalm 96:9 is one of hundreds of verses that give the command to worship: “Worship the Lord in the splendor of His Holiness; tremble before Him, all the earth.” Over and over the command is given to worship God. These commands are not put forth because God is having a problem with keeping His ego in check. Far from it! It is the common sense command of the Creator to His creation, helping us to understand our place in His plan. Worship helps us to acknowledge God’s rule in our life and puts us in our proper place before our Creator, our God and Father. “Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker” (Psa 95:6).

Worship is ultimately then, more than a command…it is our response to a holy God. It is young Isaiah seeing God revealed in the Temple and experiencing awe in His presence. It is the children of Israel seeing God destroy the armies of Pharaoh in the Red Sea and worshiping him in song and dance. It is the Apostle John seeing the resurrected and ascended Christ Jesus on the island of Patmos and falling at His feet as though dead. When we come into God’s presence in worship, there should be a heart response to Him, or else we are merely going through the motions of worship.

It is important for us to understand at this point, that worship is also encompasses our whole living. It is not simply a matter of going to a worship service(by this, I don't mean just singing praises alone), although that is important. Paul points this out to us in Romans 12:1 when he says that we are to “offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship.” Worship is not just what happens when the church meets together. It is what happens each day as we offer ourselves to the Lord. The most powerful worship occurs when a congregation of believers who have been worshiping the Lord individually all through the week come together and offer a corporate worship in songs, hymns, testimonies that gives God all the glory, and teachings revealed to them by the Spirit from His Word, etc..

Let us now consider what is worship according to the Word of God? The clearest biblical teaching on how to worship comes directly from the mouth of our Lord as He discusses proper worship with the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well. In response to her questions about the proper place of worship, Jesus tells her that it is not a matter of place, but rather a matter of the heart and spirit. He says in John 4:24, “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.”

The first heaven-ordained characteristic of worship is that it must be done in spirit. It is in the realm of the spirit that we worship. “In spirit” should never be confused as an emotional fanfare, or even of the will or mind(though it does not preclude our mind as shown in verses such as Romans 8:6 and 2Timothy 1:7), worship goes deeper to touch us at the inner being of our spirit. This means that worship must move beyond the surface and superficial things that we do. Acts of worship is in fact a connection between the Spirit of God and our own spirit. This connection is spoken of in Romans 8:16: “The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”

In worship, we must allow God’s Spirit to touch our spirit or vice versa. For God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth. Acts of worship such as singing, praise, prayer, sharing, etc. need to be seen as ways to bring us into union and communion with God in order for Him to saturate us and to have His way with us. Here are some practical examples: The music that we use in worship should bring us into contact with God the Spirit in our spirit. Note that I didn’t mention a particular style of music….but simply music that draws our spirits to a place of worship. The prayers offered in worship are prayers that reach God's throne…prayers that ushers us into His presence and brings us in contact with the majesty of God. In worship there will be times of meditation for the purpose of seeking the face of God…times of quietly waiting before Him. It is sad that nowadays we equate silience as being death. That may be true among those who do not know how to exercise their spirit to contact the Lord, but it should never be said that a meeting devoid of loud singing and shoutings are devoid of the Spirit, because it is simply not true. Whether we are speaking of the acts of worship such as singing, praying, meditation, sharing, or of worship that involves giving, service or sacrifice, or our daily living, the focus should not be on what we receive out of it; nor is it a matter of how we enjoy it. Worship in spirit should not be self-seeking at all! Instead, it should be a glorious act of self-abandonment that focuses on God and delights in who He is and praising Him for who He is.

Jesus also told us that true worship must be in truth. The object of our worship must be true to God's nature that we share(i.e. consistant with who God is) and true to the way shown us in the Word of God. There is a lot of so-called “worship” that goes on in the world today. From religions such as Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, to pseudo-Christian cults like Mormonism or Jehovah’s Witnesses, worship is pervasive. The great lie today is that there are many ways to God and the only thing that matters is one’s sincerity in one’s act of worship. Jesus presents a stark contrast to that prevalent view. He says, “I am the way.” He states with authority, “No one can come to the Father but by me.” In other words, Christ Jesus is the ONLY way to God. Worship, to be true worship, must have as its object the One true God…Father, Son, and Spirit.

It is in the area of worship in truth that the Word of God takes precedence. It is in the pages of God’s Word that we see God’s self-revelation today with the aid of the Spirit. To come to know God in truth we must become a people of the Book, the Bible. I believe we can all testify that in our private devotional time spent with the Bible, it is truly a meeting place with God. It is vital to worship that we come to the Bible, praying as we read(this is not just vain repetitions, but turning the very Word of God into our prayers). As we humbly come before the Lord in His Word we may pray, “Lord, reveal more of Yourself and Your purposes to me from Your Word, and teach me more about Your Church and how we may build the House the have long awaited for. Show me today more of Your love, power, grace and majesty in a subjective way.”

God is calling His people to a renewed passion in worship. Today, the call to worship is the same as it was in the Old Testament, as we read in 1 Chronicles 16:29, “Ascribe to the Lord the glory due His name. Bring an offering and come before Him; worship the Lord in the splendor of His holiness.”