I. Worship is our purpose
Isaiah 43:6-7
I will say to the north, 'Give them up!'
and to the south, 'Do not hold them back.'
Bring my sons from afar
and my daughters from the ends of the earth--
7everyone who is called by my name,
whom I created for my glory,
whom I formed and made."
God created us for his glory
- He wants us to glorify him.
- In my life I will either glorify God or disppoint God.
Isaiah 43:20-21
The wild animals honor me,
the jackals and the owls,
because I provide water in the desert
and streams in the wasteland,
to give drink to my people, my chosen,
21the people I formed for myself
that they may proclaim my praise.
· Even the animals honor God
· God provides for us
· His is enough for us.
· God formed us for himself, TO PRAISE HIM.
Acts 2:46-47
Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, 47praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
- Do people see “Acts 2” living out at my household
When the Israelites worshipped God correctly they were blessed.
- I believe the same is true today
- If I can worship God correctly, although there may be challenges, God will bless me.
- God takes special note of those who are jealous for his honor.
ILL. I know that most of you know who Erma Bombeck (Newspaper columnist and humorist.
Cause of death: Transplanted kidney failure) was. In one article she wrote these words:
"Someone asked me the other day if I had my life to live over would I change anything? My answer was `No.’ But then I thought about it & I’ve changed my mind. If I had my life to live over again I would wax less & listen more. I would never have insisted the car windows be rolled up on a summer day because my hair had just been teased & sprayed.
"I would have invited friends over to dinner even if the carpet was stained & the sofa faded. I would have eaten popcorn in the good living room & worried less about the dirt when you lit the fireplace.
"I would have taken time to listen to my grandfather ramble about his youth. I would have sat cross legged on the lawn with my children & never worried about the grass stains. I would have cried & laughed less while watching TV, & more while watching real life.
"I would have eaten less cottage cheese & more ice cream. I would have gone to bed when I was sick instead of pretending the earth would go into a holding pattern if I weren’t there for a day. I would never have bought anything just because it was practical, or would not show soil, or was guaranteed to last a lifetime.
"When my child kissed me impetuously I would never have said, `Later. Now go & wash up for dinner.’ There would have been more `I love you’s; more `I’m sorry’s; more `I’m listening’s.
"But mostly, given another shot at life, I would seize every minute of it. Look at it & really see. Try it on. Live it. Exhaust it. And never give the minute back until there was nothing more left of it."
· simple acts of service that we reflect & reveal the glory of God.
II. A NEW WAY TO WORSHIP
Isaiah 42:21
It pleased the Lord
for the sake of his righteousness
to make his law great and glorious.
· The law is great a glorious
Mushroom can be a simple plant or a nuclear cloud
Star can be of crayons or Eta Carinae,
- Distance: 9,000 Light Years (LY = about 6,000,000,000,000 miles)
- (150 times the mass of the Sun and 4 million times brighter).
OT – Moses’ face was radient.
· Was it a crayon or a eta Carinae
Although it is fading
· Feel like Christianity is fading.
· Ever-increasing glory
· Key = relationship with God.
· Door inside my heart which I rarely open.
· At d-group I opened it.
· It felt so good, I was thinking, why don’t I do this more often.
· And yet I could feel Satan trying to close it.
· don’t want people to know who I really am, and that may be true on a deeper level.
· I usually just keep it shut.
· maybe I don’t want to open it.
· Maybe I tried to open it before and didn’t like the result.
· just don’t think about opening it.
2 Cor. 3:10
For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory.
- The New Testament should be so much greater than the old.
Hebrews 8:13
By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear.
The OT has become obsolete
Greek 3820 (palaios); to make worn out, or declare obsolete :- decay, make or grow old.
- It is decaying and getting older
- Like us, car,
- NT is getting better and better
- I want to feel that better
- I have felt it
- Time we feel it again.
In space and you saw the Earth
- Dazzling blue planet
- Ask the Earth why she shines so bright
- Not – city lights, stadiums,
- Because of the Sun
- We too shine because of the Son
Hebrews 8:5
They serve at a sanctuary that is a copy and shadow of what is in heaven. This is why Moses was warned when he was about to build the tabernacle: "See to it that you make everything according to the pattern shown you on the mountain."
OT was a shadow now we have the real thing.
- One is temporary the other is true.
Worship in the OT involved all 5 of the senses
- Colors and textures
- Trumpets and symbols
- Meats and bitter herbs
- Fragrances
Every aspect of temple life was sacred
Even the temple dust (Numbers 5)
Holiness
- The Holiness of the
1 Samuel 6:19
But God struck down some of the men of Beth Shemesh, putting seventy of them to death because they had looked into the ark of the Lord. The people mourned because of the heavy blow the Lord had dealt them,
God was going to instill and promote care and caution in worship
- We have lost our care
- Defiantly take for granted
- The privilege we have -
- We do not see it as a privilege to enter the holy of holies.
- 1st Class
III. THE GOD WE WORSHIP
True worship come from an encounter with God
Psalm 125:2
As the mountains surround
so the Lord surrounds his people
both now and forevermore.
God surrounds his people
Men crumble before God
Isaiah 6:5
"Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty."
· Isaiah came unraveled when he saw God
Ezekiel 1:1
In the thirtieth year, in the fourth month on the fifth day, while I was among the exiles by the
Ezekiel 3:15
I came to the exiles who lived at Tel Abib near the
· Ezekiel sat overwhelmed after seeing God
Daniel 8:17
As he came near the place where I was standing, I was terrified and fell prostrate. "Son of man," he said to me, "understand that the vision concerns the time of the end."
Daniel 8:27
I, Daniel, was exhausted and lay ill for several days. Then I got up and went about the king's business. I was appalled by the vision; it was beyond understanding.
· Daniel fell prostate and was terrified.
Job 30:19
He throws me into the mud,
and I am reduced to dust and ashes.
· Job was humbled.
Matthew 28:4
The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men.
Rev. 1:17
When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. Then he placed his right hand on me and said: "Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last.
· When you see God you die
· We will all see God when we die.
· I must be prepared for that day.
God is just as near today as he has ever been
Matthew 18:20
For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them."
1 Cor. 5:4
When you are assembled in the name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you in spirit, and the power of our Lord Jesus is present,
The power of Jesus is with us when we worship
- Even a small group
- Special when we come together.
- More aware we are of God - better worship is.
- Don’t grasp - missing the point.
- “God invades the human soul”
We need to capture God during public worship
- And in every day life
Psalm 119:18
Open my eyes that I may see
wonderful things in your law.
- Pray to open my eyes & see him and his plan.
God’s legislation touched every aspect of the Jews life.
- Planting, harvesting, cleaning, cooking, cups, seeds and lands, animals, offerings, sickness, sacrifices, lending, borrowing, menstration, marriage, mildew, molds, burying human excrement.
- God’s word was to be read to them, bound to them, tied to them.
Deut. 23:14
For the Lord your God moves about in your camp to protect you and to deliver your enemies to you. Your camp must be holy, so that he will not see among you anything indecent and turn away from you.
We need to include God in everything, even the “small stuff”
1 Cor. 10:31 So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.
1 Thes. 5:18 give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.
Psalm 16:8 I have set the Lord always before me.
Because he is at my right hand,
I will not be shaken.
God needs to be in everything
Open you eyes
John 5:17
Jesus said to them, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working."
God is always working in our lives
- Even when we think he is not.
- Feel like God does not see me
- “Where is God”
- I am not doing well.
Romans 8:28
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him
· God works for the good in ALL THINGS.
Joseph
- The coat, dreams, well, Potiphar’s house.
- Joseph became second on command
- Where was God?
Genesis 39:2
The Lord was with Joseph and he prospered, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master.
Genesis 39:23
The warden paid no attention to anything under Joseph's care, because the Lord was with Joseph and gave him success in whatever he did.
God was with Joseph, even when he it seemed like it wasn’t
· Feel like God is not with us sometimes.
· Doubt God and wonder, “Is he really listening.”
· “Maybe He is mad at me right now.”
· But I must remember that God is always with me.
· He will not leave me.
God is the great conductor
There is no God. All of the wonders around us are accidental. No almighty hand made a thousand million stars. They made themselves. No power keeps them on their steady course. The earth spins itself to keep the oceans from falling off towards the sun. Infants teach themselves to cry when they are hungry or hurt.
The earth gave itself day and night, tilted itself so that we get seasons. Without the magnetic poles man would be unable to navigate the trackless oceans of water and air, but they just grew there.
How about the sugar thermostat in the pancreas? It maintains a level of sugar in the blood sufficient for energy. Without it, all of us would fall into a coma and die. Why does snow sit on mountain tops waiting for the warm spring sun to melt it at just the right time for the young crops in farms below to drink? A very lovely accident.
The human heart will beat for 70 or 80 years without faltering. How does it get sufficient rest between beats? A kidney will filter poison from the blood, and leave good things alone. How does it know one from the other?
Who gave the human tongue flexibility to form words, and a brain to understand them, but denied it to all other animals? Who showed a womb how to take the love of two persons and keep spliting a tiny ovum until, in time, a baby would have the proper number of fingers, eyes, and ears in the right places, and come into the world when it is strong enough to sustain life?
God
Believe
Hebrews 11:27
By faith he left
- We need to see with the eyes of faith “Him who is in invisible.”
Hebrews 11:1-2
Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. 2This is what the ancients were commended for.
Hebrews 11:6
And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
2 Cor. 4:4
4The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of Go
- Like belief, unbelief is powerful.
There was a difference between Elisha and Gehazi
2 Kings 6:17
And Elisha prayed, "O Lord, open his eyes so he may see." Then the Lord opened the servant's eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.
Pray that God will help us believe.
- Gehazi was afraid and could not see God like Elisha
- He was not close to God.
- Elisha didn’t have to call the angels to come
They were with them
- God is with me NOW.
- His angels are here.
- I just need to see with faith.
Ask
James 4:2
You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God.
Ephes. 1:18
I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints,
Exodus 33:18
Then Moses said, "Now show me your glory."
Psalm 27:4
One thing I ask of the Lord,
this is what I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord
and to seek him in his temple.
I must ask God
- Can’t expect anything unless I ask.
- How do kids get us – they keep asking
Desire
I must hunger for God
Jeremiah 30:21
Their leader will be one of their own;
their ruler will arise from among them.
I will bring him near and he will come close to me,
for who is he who will devote himself
to be close to me?'
declares the Lord.
God wants us to devote ourselves.
- He wants it to be our decision.
Hebrews 11:6
And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
- God rewards those who seek him
Psalm 37:4
Delight yourself in the Lord
and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Psalm 63:1-6
O God, you are my God,
earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you,
my body longs for you,
in a dry and weary land
where there is no water.
2I have seen you in the sanctuary
and beheld your power and your glory.
3Because your love is better than life,
my lips will glorify you.
4I will praise you as long as I live,
and in your name I will lift up my hands.
5My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods;
with singing lips my mouth will praise you.
6On my bed I remember you;
I think of you through the watches of the night.
We need to desire God the way David did.
- Consecrate and Pray
- Setting our hearts towards God
The 1992 Summer Olympics in
When
That's exactly what they did. The son's head was sometimes buried in his father's shoulder, but the two men stayed in Derek's lane and crossed the finish line together as the crowd looked on, then rose up, cheered, and wept.
Determined to finish
