Believe #11 Worship
RUMC January 8, 2017
WORSHIP TEST:
(slides used to give choices)
Which of these is not a place of worship?
Which person is not a worship
leader?
Which face is not a person in worship?
All of them are part of the great mosaic of
different styles and preferences of Christian worship. None is more right or
wrong, or more pleasing to God or less pleasing to God. There are as many
different worship preferences as there are people.
I used to lead worship with a fog
machine, gobo lights, and a live band. That is no less worship, and no more
worship than an orthodox service surrounded by icons and gold statues and
filled with incense, which is no more and no less worship than sitting in pews
and singing hymns and listening to the preacher.
As we journey through this 10 weeks of BELIEVE we will focus
on spiritual practices. If you learn nothing else, I want you to learn that
there are as many practices of Christian spirituality as there are Christians
in the world. Whether that is worship, prayer, use of the Bible, or
stewardship, there as infinite variety of practices and combinations of
spiritual practices, that bring someone closer to experiencing and living the
transformative power of the gospel. Your job is to find the combination of practices
that work for you at this time in your life.
Unlike the first ten weeks of believe where I laid out the
basic doctrines of the faith and said we all have to believe these things in
one way or another, this 10 weeks is more of a smorgasbord. We are not going to
come anywhere near talking about all of the spiritual practices. But these 10
represent some of the most common practices that help people to experience and
live in the transformative power of God. My prayer is that you will be affirmed
in the practices you already use, and be stretched to add 1 or 2 new practices
that help you to grow closer to Jesus.
This week we start
with one of the most visible spiritual practices, worship. We all think we know
what worship is. After all, we have been doing it together for a long time.
So, What is worship…<<<>>>
When most people are asked about worship, they talk about
• music and
• prayer
and
• community
and
• scripture
and
• preaching
Those things are the
outward trappings of worship, but they are not in themselves worship. They reflect your personal preferences of how
you worship.
In order to get to the heart of worship, let’s go to the
scripture for the day, because Jesus is discussing the nature of worship with the Samaritan woman at the well.
The Samaritans were fundamentally Jews with a Pagan
influence. After the return from Exile, this group called the Samaritans
decided God should be worshipped on Mt. Gerazim. Notice I said THEY decided.
They followed the attitude of the evil king Jeroboam. In I Kings 12. He made
two golden calves and said, “You have gone up to Jerusalem long enough. Here
are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.” 29 He
set one (calf) in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan. 30 And this thing became
a sin, for the people went to worship before the one at Bethel and before the
other as far as Dan.”
From that time on, there was hatred between the Jews and the
Samaritans. Why? Because they had differing preferences for the proper location for worship.
It was a scandal that Jesus was even talking to this
Samaritan woman. He finally says, “Woman, … believe me, a time is coming when
you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.” (Then
Jesus goes on to say, by the way, the Jews are right and the Samaritans are
wrong, but that is not important because) “A time is coming and has now come
when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth,
for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.” In other words, Jesus
tells her that the Jews got it right worshipping on mount Zion, but in the long
run, it isn’t going to matter because worship is not about the location. So what is it about?
Jesus says worship is
about SPIRIT. To say that worship is spiritual is to say that it is not
earthly.
We have to remember that the writer of John had a dualistic approach to life. There was dark and light. Good and evil.
There was flesh and there was spirit.
To say worship is Spiritual is to say that worship has more
to do with heaven than earth. Spiritual worship is a rehearsal for the day when
like the 4 mysterious all powerful, all knowing, creatures in Revelation 4, we
will worship God in person “day and night saying, ‘HOLY, HOLY, HOLY IS THE LORD
GOD, THE ALMIGHTY, WHO WAS AND WHO IS AND WHO IS TO COME.’” Spiritual worship
is a rehearsal for heaven.
Spiritual worship is when fleshly creatures get a glimpse of
the eternal and experience a bit of the spiritual reality.
God’s presence and
power surrounds us all the time. In the business of our day-to-day lives, we
don’t often take time to experience it. When we come to worship we step back
from our earthly living long enough to experience being in the presence of the
one who created us, sustains us, and loves us more than we will ever know.
• Spiritual
worship is taking time to experience the awe and power that is our God,
• Spiritual
worship is taking time to experience an explosion of awe and praise as we stand
in God’s presence.
Sometimes we come here to worship, and other times worship
sneaks up on us. Sometimes heaven breaks into our experience when we aren’t
expecting it.
• It
happens on my deck on a starry summer night when the world fades away and there
is nothing but God, that is worship.
• Heaven
might break into your walk on a wooded path where God is peeking out from
behind every tree. That too is worship.
• Heaven
might sneak up on you in your living
room where God envelopes you like a warm afghan. That is the spiritual worship.
Whether we come to find heaven or heaven comes to find us
that is worship.
Of course, we know that God is always with us. We also know
that we are too often oblivious to God presence and power. Worship happens when
our fleshly eyes are opened to the spiritual reality which surrounds.
Our hearts flutter with the awareness, our mouths are filled with
praise, and our spirits soar in awe as we simple flesh and blood earthly
creatures stand in the presence of the
almighty God.
Jesus goes on to say
that we must worship in truth. Jesus says he is the way, the truth, and the
life, but truth is harder for us.
We all wear masks. That is part of how we get along with
each other. Worship, however, is the time to take off your mask for God. It is
time to come to God humbly and honestly. After all, do you really think you are
going to fool God anyway? We worship in truth standing completely exposed in
all of our glory and all of our shame before the one who knows us better than
we know ourselves.
• Jesus was
hard on the Pharisees who faked worship in order to be seen by others.
• Jesus
called those who acted out worship like a play “whitewashed tombs,” appearing
clean on the outside but filthy and full of dead bones on the inside.
• Jesus
warned that faking prayer by using all kinds of fancy words doesn’t impress
God.
• He warned
faking the offering by making a big show of it isn’t nearly as precious to God
as true sacrifice.
• Finally,
Jesus warned that those who come to worship for false reasons like the Pharisee
who prayed “God I thank you that I am not like that tax collector” are not
worshipping in truth, but worshiping themselves.
On the other hand, the one who comes in complete truth
saying God forgive me I am a sinner is the one who is truly worshipping God.
• Fancy
clothes will not fool God.
• A fake
smile will not hide the struggle you are having at home from God.
• Going
through the motions of worship will not fool God.
WE might be fooled, but not God. Nothing can be hidden from
Jesus who is the truth. Nothing can be hidden from the God who created you.
Worship is an encounter with God in complete and utter humility and honest
truth. Worship is being vulnerable to the one who is truth… more vulnerable
than we can be with other people and more honest than we usually are with
ourselves.
Finally, when glory
of heaven touches the most vulnerable places of our lives, we are transformed.
It is impossible to truly stand in the presence of God and walk away
unchanged.
The conversation with the woman at the well ends like this.
She says to Jesus “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When
he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.” Jesus said to her, “I am he, the
one who is speaking to you.”
Then the disciples came into the picture, but John comes
right back to the woman saying “Then the woman left her water jar and went back
to the city. She said to the people, “Come and see a man who told me everything
I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?”
She didn’t quite understand what had happened to her, but
she did not walk away from the experience as the same woman.
1. In her
conversation with Jesus she experienced of spirit of the living God face to
face-
2. In her
conversation with Jesus, the truth of her life was exposed in all of its ugly
details.
3. And she
could never be the same again.
Like an athlete training for a marathon, day by day we might
not notice the change, but surely the spiritual practices, like worship, change
us for ever. If we are not prepared to be changed we should not venture into
any of the spiritual practices, because that is a given… you will be changed.
Many people come to worship with the idea that we come in
order to be filled up for the coming week or encouraged, or uplifted, or
strengthened. Sometimes that happens. But that is not why we come. Worship is not about us. It is about God. Worship is about God breaking into the truth
of our existence, We can’t help but be changed by that. But maybe not in the
way we want.
• You might
leave worship with a whole new burden on your heart for the persecuted church.
That is change.
• You might
leave with a new sense of your own guilt in the breakdown of a relationship.
That is change.
• You might
leave worship with a conviction that someone has to do something… and a sick
feeling that the someone might be you.
You can’t expect to encounter God in any kind of honest way
and not be changed… and that change will not always be what you expect. It will
be, however, what you need. That is the risk you take when you come to worship
in spirit and truth. That is the risk you take when you experience the living
God and truly expose yourself to God’s transforming power.
The truth is everybody
worships something. That’s why you can go to any culture in the world and find
people worshipping. If you don’t worship God, believe me, you’re going to find
a something to worship real quick, even if it is just yourself.
Jesus calls us, however not to worship ourselves or anything
of this world… he calls us to worship in spirit and truth. And that changes us forever.
The greatest
commandment is what… to love the lord you God. Worship is how we show
our love. God wants us show him love in worship for two reasons.
1. because he deserves it.
2. Because when we are vulnerable to the power of the spirit
of God, we are made new creatures in the image of God.
If you think about it, Worship is the only gift that the
creature Can give to the creator.
Most of you are parents so you will understand this. A man
told a story about his son’s 6th birthday. The boy always knew what he wanted
so he asked him what he could get him.
He expected a well-planned reply, but his son’s request was
a bit different.
He said, “Dad, I’d like a ball to play with for my
birthday.” The dad said, “Great, what kind of ball?” “Oh, I don’t know, either
a football or a soccer ball.”
“Well, which would you want more?”
He said, “Well,” and thought about it. Then he said, “If you
have some time to play ball with me this year, I’d really like a football so we
could throw it back and forth in the back yard. But if you’re gonna be real
busy this year, maybe you just better get me a soccer ball, because I can kick
the soccer ball around by myself.”
At the risk of over simplifying it, God just wants to be in
relationship with you. He’ll settle for a soccer ball if he has to. But God
would really prefer that football because he wants more than anything for you
to take the time to play with him. Spend time with him. Worship him.
What kind of gift can you offer to God this week?
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