We can sometimes ask what we need to do to prepare our hearts for worship. This daily devotional looks at how and where we praise God.
Nuggets
- God expects us to worship corporately.
- We need to praise God throughout our lives.
- We need to worship God completely in our hearts.
Devotions in the Preparing for Worship series
I thought — this coming out on our day of worship — that we should talk about preparing our hearts for that. I thought there would be a lot of verses on preparation.
Wrong.
Most of the verses commanded us to worship. The others had a different take.
Let’s look.
Let's Put It into Context #1
Worship is our personal or corporate response of admiration (confession, thanksgiving, praise, etc.) based on our attitude to God’s presence and our imitation of His character.
Praise is also our response to God, but it usually involves music.
Praising God in His House
“Praise the Lord! Praise God in his sanctuary; praise him in his mighty heavens! (Ps. 150: 1 ESV)
God expects us to worship corporately.
When we think of the word sanctuary, how many times do we think of cathedrals — at a minimum church buildings? In David’s day, it would have been the tabernacle as the temple hadn’t been built yet.
Whatever the name, it was a designated spot that was considered the house of the Lord. We were supposed to go there.
Yes, we still are. The problem with that is we feel like we are just visiting.
Well, if that is the way we approach worship, we are just visiting.
Jones said that we have to get our worship down to the heart level. He wrote, “He that singeth hymns, and psalms, and spiritual songs must make melody in his heart unto the Lord; he must hold faith and a good conscience; he must also have a mind superior to the world and its low enjoyments and cares; for that soul which is chained down to the earth, no praises, no, not the finest harmony in the world, can lift up into heaven.”
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That tells me that it isn’t about where we go to praise God. It talks more of our motives.
We can’t just sit in the back row, sing the songs, and listen to the preacher. We have to prepare to truly praise God.
The reason for worshiping God is to fix our hearts on Him.
How do we do that? We have to keep our minds on God. We have to distance ourselves from the worldly things and look solely to Him.
In another devotion series, we called it setting our hearts on things above. “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God” (Col. 3: 1 NIV).
To read a devotion in the On Things Above series, click on the button below.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
It gets easier to focus on worship as we continue to focus on worship. That brings us peace.
We do that through faith. Faith is a gift from God that enhances the conviction that the doctrines revealed in God’s Word are true, even if we do not understand all aspects of them, a belief which impacts our lives and distinguishes us from others.
Glossary
We worship God so that we can hear about the doctrines and grow our faith.
Another way of looking at that is we grow our confidence in God. We know He will meet us in our sanctuary. Our worship is accepted when we worship His way.
As we grow closer to God, Satan is defeated. We prepare ourselves for an eternity of praising God.
Praising Him in Our Walk
“Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name” (Heb. 13: 15 ESV)
We need to praise God throughout our lives.
Wait! What?
Where is the prayer for God to open our hearts so we can engage? Where is the shut off from things of this world? Where is the repent from sins?
How can we get prepared an hour or two before the service starts if we aren’t told how?
Easy. We are always supposed to be prepared for worship because we are always supposed to be worshiping.
24/7/365. From conversion to eternity.
We talked about this before. When God created the universe, on Days 1 though 6, He always said morning and evening made a day.
On Day 7, there was a morning, but there never was an evening. That means we are still experiencing the Sabbath.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
It says we are to “… continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God …” (Heb. 13: 15 ESV). We go from being out of line with God’s laws and commandments in our sinful life to being a living sacrifice after conversion.
A living sacrifice is the embodiment of becoming sanctified and giving everything to God after being forgiven of our sins. That is the first duty in our disciple’s job description.
The Disciple’s Job Description
Complete Job Description
But look what this verse says. It says nothing about getting all the laws and commandments right. It says, “… let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name” (Heb. 13: 15 ESV).
- We have to acknowledge His name, i.e., His authority.
- It comes from our lips, not our actions, so it is a confession (Rom. 10: 9).
- It should never stop.
Doing acts of kindness is not worshiping God if we are not accepting His authority and always proclaiming it with our lips. We have to submit to Him.
The outward expression is not the focus. It is the inward compliance to God’s Will.
Being inward takes the worship out of the cathedral, church, tabernacle, or temple. It puts it in our hearts.
What tells me is the place doesn’t matter. Heart-felt worship is supposed to be part of the walk. Walking is the term used to describe how we live our lives.
Spurgeon expanded on that. He wrote, “Not only in this place or that place, but in every place, we are to praise the Lord our God. Not only when we are in a happy frame of mind, but when we are cast down and troubled. The perfumed smoke from the altar of incense is to rise towards heaven both day and night, from the beginning of the year to the year’s end.”
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Spurgeon was talking praise and trust here. Trust is assurance that the promises of God are true.
It is our expression of gratitude. We finally find our happiness and contentment when we find the purpose God has for us.
We need to start today.
Dwelling in His Worship
“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God” (Col. 3: 16 ESV)
We need to worship God completely in our hearts.
Paul advised us to “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly …” (Col. 3: 16 ESV). He wanted us to get it to the heart level.
What Paul wasn’t talking about here is head knowledge. Oh, yes. Many people have heard Who Christ is and what He has done.
We have to put our complete faith and trust in Jesus. We have to hide Him in our hearts.
- “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (Jn. 1: 1 ESV).
- “I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you” (Ps. 119: 11: ESV).
I love how Sydnor explained it. He wrote, “It must not be as a stranger, or a visitor, or as an acquaintance with whom we are not specially intimate, or as a friend away and seldom seen, but rather as a resident member of our family with whom we are in constant and loving communication. … It must be in our heart, pervading our whole spiritual nature, directing and controlling all our life and conduct.”
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See, Sydnor said constant. As in all the time.
It has to be in our hearts, as that is where our relationship with God is. That is where our character is, so it can control it.
Did you see how it is supposed to be in our hearts? Richly.
No, that has nothing to do with money. Paul is talking about it being completely in our hearts.
Not just a part of it. Not just sometimes.
Wholly and continuously.
We’ve talked about it before.
Candlish made an interesting point. Scriptures aren’t Scriptures just because Jesus taught them. They are Scriptures because they are the inspired Word of God about Him, His love for us, and His plan of restoration for us.
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The gospel is all about Jesus. It is His message.
Making the Connections
Isn’t preparing ourselves for an eternity of praising God what it’s all about? The only way we can do that is by getting our relationship cemented in him.
This can’t be a once–a–week occurrence. It has to be continual.
Wynne made a great observation about the Book of Psalms. He noted that it starts out with songs of confession. Then, it progresses to prayers. But then the trials start popping up. In the end, though, the focus is praise.
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Isn’t that how life goes? It circles around in fits and starts until we finally find the traction we need to start praising God as we should.
How Do We Apply This?
- Grow in child-like faith.
- Believe what God’s Word says.
- Strengthen our prayer life.
- Find joy and be content in where God has placed us.
- Be genuine in our praise.
- Foster a sincere gratitude for all God has done for us.
- Love God with all of our hearts and study His character.
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We were made to worship God. We need to continually praise Him.
Father God. We want to worship You in the way You desire and deserve to be worshiped. Help us to continually worship You. Amen.
What do you think?
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