The Worship of God, Part 1

The primary objective of the Christian is to worship. The primary objective is not to win souls. The primary objective of the Christian is not to tithe. The primary object Of the Christian is not to teach. It's not even to serve the church. It is to worship God. For if you understand worship, you will win souls. You will tithe, you will teach, and you will serve your God. Remember Luke chapter 10, verses 38 to 42. Mary chose the better part. She chose better than Martha. She chose to sit at the feet of Jesus and adore his nature.

I tr that over the next few weeks you will choose the better part. You will choose to worship God at any cost. Point number one: the import.

Worship. We want to see how it's first of all mandated in the Old Testament, and number two, modeled.

In the New Testament. Mandated in the Old Testament, modeled in the New Testament. If you have your Bible, turn with me over to Exodus chapter 20.

Exodus chapter 20, verse number 1. Then God spoke all these words, saying, I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness, of what is in heaven above, or on the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them, or serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate me.

But showing loving kindness to thousands, to those who love me and keep my comm. As God set forth the Ten Commandments, he began with helping you understand That there is a priority that you must keep, and that is you must worship the one true God. For if you don't do that, there are severe consequences that you will pay, and those who follow you will pay. So he comes from the very outset. To help the nation of Israel to understand that they need to worship their God and serve Him only. It was A.

W. Tozer who said, That true worship is to be so personally and hopelessly in love with God that the idea of a transfer of affection never even rem ex. That's true worship. God wants first place, and God will not settle for anything else.

God wants to be primary in your life. Tonight, you'd ask the question: Is God primary in my life? Is he is the number one object of my affection?

Christ would say in Luke 24, verse number 16: if any man If any woman, if anyone at all, desires to come after me and hate not mother, f, wife. Ch, br, sister, you name it. He's not worthy to be my disciple. Christ says, listen, I want you to follow me.

But if at any time in your life Your family becomes more important to you than me, you're not worthy of me. If your friends become more important to you than me, you're not worthy of me. If any relationship that you engage in takes precedence over me, Then you can't be a learner, you can't be a follower of me. You know why? Because you won't be willing to listen to what I say. You're going to listen to what they say. And you're not going to want to listen to what I say. I must have it all. That's why he says in Matthew 6:2, no man can serve two masters.

You can't serve God in gold. You can only serve one of us. Which one are you going to serve? And of course, Joshua, he would say it very clearly in Joshua 24. Well, he said, Now, therefore, fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and truth. And put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the river and in Egypt and serve the Lord. And if it is disagreeable in your sight, To serve the Lord, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve. Whether the gods which your fathers served, which were beyond the river.

Or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living. But as for me and my house, you know the rest of the verse. We will serve the Lord. Have you made that kind of commitment? We're going to serve the Lord. We're going to worship Him and Him only. I trust that you have. The importance of worship is mandated in the Old Testament. Number two, it's modeled in the New Testament.

Third would be Matthew chapter 4, verse number 1. Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. Right after Christ's baptism, right after that great voice came from heaven, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Christ goes up out of the river after being baptized. And the Spirit of God drives him into the wilderness to be tempted by the evil one for 40 days. Good lesson to learn for those of you who were baptized last week and the week before: that the Spirit of God is going to test your obedience and commitment.

That you made. And so the Lord God Himself is driven into the wilderness for 40 days to be tempted. And you know the temptations that came Christ's way. And notice down in verse number 8.

The devil's third round took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.

And he said to him, All these things will I give you. If you fall down and worship me, he said, Listen.

You don't have to go the road you're going to go. I know your Father in heaven said he's going to give you everything under your feet. But you know what? That path is a humiliating path. That path is a painful path. Jesus, you don't want to go there. You worship me, and you have it all right now.

Instantaneous satisfaction. Satan's biggest lie. What was the Lord's response? Be gone, Satan. Get lost. For it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God and serve him. Only the importance of worship is modeled in the New Testament by our Lord Jesus Christ. You shall worship the Lord your God and serve Him only. Now, I want you to know something. Very, very important. Because Jesus did not compromise the wor He would not compromise his worship. The reason worship today is not God-honoring. Is because we compromise on the wor.

It was John Scott who recorded these words. We evangelicals do not know much about worship. Evangelism is our specialty, not worship. We have little senses of the greatness of Almighty God. We tend to be cocky, flippant, and proud, and our worship services are often ill-prepared, slovenly, mechanical, perfunctory, and dull. Much of our public worship is ritual without reality, form without power, religion without God. He's right. The reason that is because, number one, we don't understand the importance of worship, how it was mandated in the Old Testament, from the very beginning.

Modeled in the New Testament by Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, because it was always practiced in the past. Because it is pres for the present and because it is the prospect of the future, we should be people who understand what it means to worship God. Main point number two is the experience of true worship.

As you can see, we're not going to make it through the out tonight. That's okay. We're in no hurry. The experience of true worship. Four things I want you to see. We're probably not going to finish them. In fact, I know we're not going to finish them. But it begins with a recognition of his person. It begins with a recognition of his person. Turn with me to Matthew chapter 17, the trans.

Peter, James, and John, the executive committee of the disciples, the best friends of Christ, the inner circle, the men that he was most closest to. He takes them up into the mountain. And they behold Moses and Elijah, and Peter was interested in building a tabernacle there. For every. And it says in verse number five: While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and behold, a voice out of the cloud saying, This is my beloved Son. With whom I am well pleased, listen to him.

And when the disciples heard this, they fell on their f and were much Afraid. And Jesus came to them and touched them and said, Arise and do not be afraid. And lifting up their eyes, they saw no one except Jesus him al. These men fell down. And began to worship God because they recognized who he was. The word for worship, the most common New Testament word, pro, is a word that means to kiss the hand, to bow down, to prostrate oneself. Very few people today prostrate themselves before Almighty God in order to worship Him effectively.

Wors would be that which we do as we come before Him and respect Him and honor Him and pay Him the glory due to His superior giving. The point being is that worship centers on giving. Giving God honor, giving God glory, giving God everything He so desperately would love to have from you. And that is your. But worship centers around giving to God. When you recognize who God is, there's nothing you ever desire to withhold from Him. Did you get that? When you recognize the true person of Jesus Christ our Lord and real all that He's done, there's nothing you want to withhold from Him because there's nothing more important to you than.

Hymn. Think about that for a while. When we gather together on Sunday, we don't gather together to give respect to the choir. We don't gather together to give respect to the soloist. We don't gather together to give respect and honor to the preacher. We don't do that. Why? Because that would not be worship. The sermon, the music, are those things that we do That somehow create in us a desire, that stimulate us to understand and desire more of who He is. But we don't come to pay respect to those things.

I'm afraid there are a lot of churches like that. If you attend church to receive a blessing, you will never biblically worship God. How many people do you know go to church to receive something? I go to church so I can be with my friends. I go to church so I can fellowship with my friends. I go to church so I You know, get a blessing from God, or get a word from God. You don't go to church for that. That's not what church is about. How come you come to worship on Sunday? You come to give to God.

To prostrate yourself before him, to give him what he deserves, all the glory, and all the honor, and all the respect due to his name. The reason we can't worship is because we're coming here to look for something, coming here to find something. And if you don't find it, what do you do? You go to the next church. And then you go to the next church. And then you go to the next church. Because you never can really find what you want. What do you need to find? You need to find what real true worship is, and you ain't got it yet.

Once you find it, you stop going from church to church to church to church to church because you've come to give to God. We give our, we give our heart attitude, we give our possessions. And when you recognize who he is, you'll do that. When you read through the Bible and you read people about how they encountered God, those who really experience Him are different than those today who experience God. People like Abraham, when he entered God's presence, confessed that he was nothing but dust and ashes.

I'm just a big zero. I'm nothing. See, that wouldn't go over too well in our self-est churches. See, they want you to come to church and say, man, you're it, man. You're the man. You are the one. But unless you come to God and recognize who He is, you can't worship Him. And when you recognize who He is, you realize what? You're just dust and ashes. You're Big Zero. Big Zero. And you fall down and you worship him. Now, I know some of you might not like that. You don want to look at yourself as a zero.

I'm sorry. I don't want to offend anybody. That's not my desire. But I just want, no, I'm just a big zero. I'm a nothing. And I hope you see yourself as an absolute zilch. Because if you do, it's because you've already seen God. Remember Job? The most righteous man on the face of the earth. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine there's no one more righteous on earth than you? That's what Job was. Now, Job didn't say that. God said that about Job. Now, for God to say that about Job is a pretty high compliment, wouldn't you say?

Sure, it would be. God says, This is the most righteous man on the earth. You know what Job said? Job says, when he saw God, I abhor myself and I repent in dust and ashes. I repent. That's what a righteous man does. He falls down and says, God, I am absolutely nothing before you. Even though God said he was the most righteous man on the face of the earth. Manoah, the father of Samson, saw the angel of the Lord and said to his wife, We will surely die because we have seen God. Habakkuk heard the voice of the Lord, his reaction.

When I heard, my belly trembled, my lips quivered at thy voice, rottenness entered my bones, and I trembled in myself. When we come to church on Sunday and hear the word of the Lord, most of us don't tremble inside of ourselves. Most of us don't feel the rottenness of our lives. We're more upset the preacher might have confronted some sin or done something that would offend me because of my lifestyle. Instead of being like Habakkuk, I am a rotten person and I need to tremble in myself because God has shown me him.

The restored rem. Over in Haggai chapter 1, when the holy words of God were spoken by Haggai to the restored remnant of Israel, the people did fear before the Lord in Ezra, that great Man of God, when he goes before the Lord with a broken and contrite heart to truly worship him, says, Oh my God, I am ashamed and blushed to lift up my face to thee, my God, for our n are increased over our head. And our trespasses are grown up into the heavens. And then he said, Behold, we are before thee in our trespasses, for we cannot stand before thee because of this.

You see, most of us kind of like skip into God's presence, you know, dippity-do-da, zipp-a. How you doing, God? How you doing today? You know. I got a real problem with that. God does too. Because that's not how you go into God's presence. You haven't recognized his person. A true worshipper comes into the presence of God with fear, knowing that God has the right to take his life. You say, well, wait a minute, Pastor, I'm a born-again Christian. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

That's correct. But you've got to realize that God says in Hebrews 12, those whom I love I chasten and I scourge with a whip.

And so, when you go before his presence, you realize who he is. You fall down, you worship him, you say, God, I am nothing, and you are everything. My sins are higher than the heavens. And I can't even begin to lift my voice nor my eyes towards you, for I am a sinful, sinful man. But I thank you for allowing me to come boldly into your presence that I might receive grace and mercy to help in time of need. Then you're on your road to understanding true biblical worship. Number one, there needs to be a recognition of his pres.

Number two, there needs to be a release of his power. If you're going to experience true worship, there needs to be a recognition of his power. Presence, and then there needs to be a release of his power. Not only do we need to see God, but we need to be able to reach out and touch God that He might be able to reach back and touch us. And there'd be a release of His power in our lives. You see, the reason most of us are powerless is because we haven't recognized His presence. If you recognize His presence, there will be a release of His power in your life to transform your life, to turn you around.

In order that you might be like him. It says in Mark chapter 5, verse number 25, and a woman who had a hemorrhage for 12 years and had endured much at the hands of many physicians. and had spent all that she had and was not helped at all, but rather had grown worse. After hearing about Jesus, came up in the crowd behind him and touched his cloak. For she thought, if I just touch his garments, I shall get well. And immediately The flow of her blood was dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction.

And immediately Jesus perceiving in himself that the power proceeded from him had gone forth, turned around in the crowd and said, Who touched? My garments. Here's the Lord. The context. He's on his way to Jairus' house. There needs to be something done. With Jairus' daughter, she's dying. And Jairus says, God, you got to come. You've got to come to my house. Jesus says, let's go.

They're on the way, and here's this woman who for years has suffered greatly. Jairus' daughter, 12 years old. The woman with the hemorrhage, 12 years. She's had it. Jair' daughter has a family. The woman with the hemorrhage has no family. She 's ostracized. She 's an outcast. She's unloved. Jair's daughter, she's loved. She 's a part of the family. But she 's dying. And Jairus says, You got to come. You got to help my daughter. You got to heal my daughter. On their way, he's this woman thinking, if I can just touch the hem of his garment, I'll be healed.

She represents all of us. People who have tried everything to receive what we so desperately need and never received it. So desperately she wants it. She wants to be healed from her affliction. And so she seeks to touch the garment of God that somehow she'd be relieved. her misery. If you know the story, Christ is delayed. Delayed. Jair' daughter dies because God's delayed. God 's got perfect timing. There's a big crowd there, and of course the disciples pipe up and say, What do you who touched you, Lord?

Everybody's pressing against you anyway. I mean, we're all touching you. What kind of ridiculous statement is that for you to say, Lord? Everybody's up against you. Everybody's touching you. Nope, there was a release of power. Because somebody came to me recognizing who I was, realizing that I was a son of man, and knew that if they came to me and touched me, they would receive what they so desperately needed. And there was a release of his power. And therefore, she worshipped God. I wonder if you this evening has recognized the presence of God, under his person, who he is.

And by faith, reached out and touched the only one who can do for you what no one else can, no amount of money can buy. But only God can do what God did for this woman, He wants to do for you, He wants to do for me. Our only fear is that Jesus will come. We'll recognize His person. But we will lack the faith to reach out and touch him. Therefore, never experience a release of his power. And therefore, leave every Sunday. Living a normal, average, boring life because the Spirit of God has not touched our lives.

It says in Hebrews 11:6 that God rewards those who diligently seek him. I trust that you're a seeker of God Almighty. Call unto me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me. God says, Are you in pain?

Are you in trouble? If you call them to me, it's because you recognize my person. If you recognize my person, I will touch you. And you will glorify me. You will worship me. You will experience true worship. But in order for us to really experience it, there are two more things we must understand. But to get those, you got to come back next time.