Going To Worship With Worship

For most Christians this is a day set aside to worship God. People go to church with different attitudes. After a week of various interactions with family, coworkers, and strangers, it is easy to go to church only wanting to receive a blessing and refreshing. Many people go to church to experience worship. But in reality, we are to go to a worship service with a focus on who God is as opposed to how we feel. Here is how one worshiper encouraged other believers to enter into worship…

"Shout triumphantly to the Lord, all the earth.
Serve the Lord with gladness; come before Him with joyful songs.
Acknowledge that Yahweh is God. He made us, and we are His —His people, the sheep of His pasture.
Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise. Give thanks to Him and praise His name.
For Yahweh is good, and His love is eternal; His faithfulness endures through all generations.

(Psalm 100)

What can we learn about how to worship from this passage?

There should be a sound of victory in our worship, regardless of our circumstances. Everything should praise God… yes… even those who are not saved.

We should be glad to obey God to validate our worship. This gladness should be expressed in what we sing.

Make it known that our God is God… and the only God worthy of worship. To worship properly we need to understand our position to Him. We are the created. He is the Creator. He owns us and created us to be His. That understanding should enhance our worship.

He is in a special place. We can enter into His space, but as we go in we should be giving thanks.

In case you haven’t picked up on it yet, we should be giving thanks and praising Him. Sometimes we give thank because of what is going on in our life. But we should praise Him because of who He is.

God is good. Life is not always be good. People are not always good. Health is not always good. Work is not always good. Finances are not always good. But God is good. His goodness is not dependent on anything but the fact that He is. His love is forever. Some people don’t love you. Some people only love you sometimes. But God’s love is forever. Not only is His love forever. He is faithful forever. Again… people are not always faithful. But God is.

When we are truly immersed in these truths, we can begin to worship God without the baggage of the problems in our life. Whatever you focus on is what you will see. If you go into a worship time thinking about you, your worship will be limited by you and your situation. But if you go into worship today focused on God, you can go into His presence where there is love and faithfulness that will restore your soul to the place it was created to be.

[Bible quotes are from the Holman Christian Standard Bible, unless otherwise noted.]

Find more of David’s work at Heart Of Ministry.

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