Worship at Resurrected Life is more than music and emotion. Worship is an attitude and
a lifestyle that determines to give God everything he deserves. Worship should never be perceived
as a show, because people cannot see it. It is an act of the heart and the manifestation of
an existing relationship with God. Why do we worship? How do we worship? What does it mean?
P U R P O S E
The purpose of Christian worship is to glorify and please God. We please him by adulating him from our hearts, with our mouths, and with our daily actions. Moreover, we seek to please him not to reap the benefits of having God's favor on our lives, but to be closer to his heart. This mindset is necessary for true Christian worship because it highlights the importance of having an in-depth relaitonship with God, not a superficial "pour me down a blessing" offering. One way the Bible describes this relationship is found in 2 Corinthians 11. Paul mentions that he wants the church to be presentable to God as a pure virgin is given to a husband. The metaphor of a pure virgin means the church should be undefiled and completely dedicated to God based on true love. When our hearts are turned toward God, with no distraction and the motivation of pleasing him, our worship is acceptable.
W H Y W O R S H I P G O D ?
Why does God require worship? Is He vain? Vanity is a quality thinking too highly of oneself. Ergo, vanity is a sin and it is
impossible for God, by definition of his holiness, to sin. It is simply not possible for God to think too highly of himself,
because he is not limited and does not owe his existence to anyone else. God is absolute greatness, and only he in his
perfection is worthy of worship. Worship of anything or anyone else is a supreme insult to God's supremacy.
It is effectively a slap in the face. All glory belongs to God and stealing from God is unacceptable.
Another reason we worship God is because it identifies us as his Church. In the Old Testament God made a covenant with
Abraham that he should cut the foreskin of the males in his household. This act of circumcision was a visible covenant
between God and man, identifying the Jewish people as set apart from the rest of the world as God's elect.
The new covenant established by Christ requires, not a circumcision of the flesh, but a circumcision of the heart.
Our worship, in essence "our hearts turned toward God", is what identifies us as belonging solely to God. As Paul eloquently
wrote it in Philippians 3, "For we who worship God in the Spirit are the only ones who are truly circumcised. We put no
confidence in human effort. Instead, we boast about what Christ Jesus has done for us."
I N S P I R I T , I N T R U T H
Jesus tells us that it is a requirement that we worship God in spirit and in truth. As mentioned, this requires that
God is our sole object of dedication. Therefore, we must be humble subjects to our King. In James 4:6 we are notified us
that God resists and opposes those who are full of pride. Any attempt to make ourselves into the god of our relationship
with God, demanding that he bow to our whims and desires, is an affront to God and never a manifestation of love. Pride has
caused many great worshippers to fall from the places where God exalted them to. Lucifer, the chief angel of worship, fell
completely from the presence of God and became the reprobate we know as Satan. Adam and Eve, who had direct connection with
God and every need they could possibly have met by his infinite provision, let their interests in becoming "like God" ruin
paradise. Ultimately they died, when that was never God's pure intent for them. Solomon, the wisest man of his age and heir
to the throne of Israel at one of the peaks of its prosperity, let the pride of life and the interests of his many idolatrous
wives make him appear to be the most foolish man to live. His choice to have God resist him and his pride eventually led to
the complete fall and decimation of Israel.
Through these examples, and more, we see that our relationships with God cannot be self-centered, self-serving,
or people-pleasing. Worship is not a performance or a show. It is done in the spirit, beyond what people can see.
Thus, our worship is not contingent on whether or not we enjoy the song being sung, the volume of the music,
the existence of music, or whether or not our hands are lifted. Worship is personal and relational, and only those
in the relationship can judge whether it is real or not. Our worship, therefore, should never be people-pleasing,
but always God-pleasing.
S E E K I N G G O D ' S H E A R T
The term "seeking after God's heart" is a way to describe complete dedication to God. We have a destination,
and because of our imperfect, muddled existence due to the calamity of sin, sometimes it is difficult to get a clear
view of what we are aiming for. Sometimes it is simply difficult to understand God because of our relative lack of
knowledge compared to his omniscience. Nevertheless, the Bible presents a biography for getting to know the creator.
It provides a blueprint for building our relationship with him. And it lays out a roadmap for finding his heart. As the
psalmist said, "Your word is a lamp for my feet and a light for my path."
James 4:8 alerts the body of Christ that if we draw close to God he will return the motion and draw close to us.
We relate to God in one way, and he responds to us. The verse tells us how we do this: by purging sin from our lives by
living holy and purifying our hearts by choosing to live single-mindedly. Christians often quote that we should,
"Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus," and then blindly apply it to any context. However, Paul does not
end that phrase with a period. He defines what the mind of Christ is: humility, obedience, and complete submission to God's
will (Philippians 2:5-11). God's will for us is that we present ourselves completely and wholly as living sacrifices, holy
and acceptable to His Majesty.
J E S U S C H R I S T
Lastly, our worship is only possible because of what Jesus Christ has done for us. Simply put, our imperfection as sinners who were completely turned away from God and focused on our own interests left us incapable of having a relationship with God. We could not identify him as our Father or our Ultimate Friend. Any way that we tried to relate to God was superficial and our attempts at worship were always thwarted by our self-interest in sin. That sin required our death. However, God recognized our plight and because his love toward us is so great, he became incarnate and lived a perfect life as a human being. Offered upon the sacrificial offering known as the Cross, he was murdered by the people he came to save. Nevertheless, his innocent blood became the antidote to the problem of sin and his resurrection from the grave proves the infinite power of Christ. As the children of God and those reborn through the blood of Christ, God now sees us as cleansed by that innocent blood. The perfection of Christ's blood allows us to reconnect with our perfect Creator. Finally, we can worship God in spirit and in truth.