Continuing on all the notes I took Sunday, I’m moving to that morning’s sermon, which was about worship.
First off, what is worship? Worship is ascribing ultimate value to someone or something. When you worship something, you are building and scheduling your life around it. You give it supremacy by doing this. You are stating with your actions that this is more important to you than everything else.
This not about whether or not you worship. By the definition above and by our hard-wiring, all people worship. This is about what or who you worship, that to which you ascribe ultimate value.
What are you worshiping? Our lives are already oriented and controlled towards what we have ascribed ultimate value.
Be sure that God is in His rightful place! If you aren’t worshiping God, then what you are worshiping is not worth it. Why?
If you are worshiping a thing, be it an object or a concept, then it can’t love you or help you. It has no feelings or power of its own. It quite literally cannot provide the things you need most.
If you are worshiping another person or group of people, that won’t help you either. Even if they know you exist, love you very much, and would do anything to help you, they are just as finite and limited as you are. One day they will fail if they haven’t already. They may not mean to, but they will.
But if you are worshiping God, you are worshiping the very One who will not fail. God created you and everything you see. He is ultimate good and the source of all unconditional love. He is infinite, unlimited, boundless, all-powerful, all-knowing, and present everywhere. He will not fail you, because He can’t.
Now, just because you say, “I believe in and worship the God of the Bible,” doesn’t automatically mean that you will worship. Worship is something you must make a conscious effort to do. Even if you go to church and do the “Christian thing,” you can do all of that without actually worshiping (like the Pharisees did). When you worship, it should engage your entire being. It requires your participation, and you only get something out of it if you put something into it.
Before I leave you, I want to remind you of one more thing. Worship God, but not as you make Him. Worship God as He is!