Understanding How To Live A More Passionate Worship Life

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“Shout for joy to the Lord, all of you worship the Lord with gladness, come before him with joyful songs. Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his. We are his people, the sheep of his pasture, enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise, give thanks to him, and praise his name, for the Lord is good. And his love endures forever. His faithfulness continues through all generations.”

Well, there's nothing like the 100th Psalm to get you started for worship, right? And that psalm has inspired many other songs throughout the centuries. But believe it or not, it probably didn't start out as a song. It started out as a liturgical greeting for people who were arriving in Jerusalem for one of the major festivals, that as people would go on pilgrimage from places like North Africa and Mesopotamia, they would come to Jerusalem with great expectations. And an official from the temple might actually greet them, and he would have them turn and face away from the temple back to where they came from. And he would recite, and they would repeat, “Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth, worship the Lord with gladness, come before him with joyful songs, and know that the Lord is God.” And then he would have them turn and focus on each other and look at one another, and he would continue to lead them. “It is he who made us, and we are his. We are his people, the sheep of his pasture.” And then he would welcome them in, “Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise, give thanks to him, and praise his name, for the Lord is good. His love endures forever, and his faithfulness through all generations.” Isn't that a beautiful ritual of worship to welcome someone into the presence of God?

Now, when you think about this psalm, a couple of things really stand out. The first one is that worship is always to be joyful—if not passionate—that our feelings, our emotions are to be strong. And the joy emanates from their knowledge of God, who he is and what he has done. There's something that you might actually miss when you think about these pilgrims coming to Jerusalem: they did not wait until they got to Jerusalem to start worshiping. Because you can turn to Psalm 120 through134 and read those psalms. They would read or sing these “pilgrims psalms,” or “psalms of ascent” as they ascended the mountain to the city of Jerusalem.

Now, Psalm 122, Warren also talked about when he introduced worship a minute ago, and it goes like this, “I was glad when they said to me, let us go to the house of the Lord.” Now, when I was a kid, we had some Sunday morning songs my parents sang, and you know, how when your parents sing you songs in the morning when you’re a kid you are not always excited about it. But my mom was singing that song “I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord.” And she also had another one, I don't know if this is a Baptist thing or just my family thing, but it was “Happy Sunday morning, Happy Sunday morning, we sing and pray and read God's Word, Happy Sunday morning. And the deal is, she was singing that all the time, and I was going to church, but it was a “have to” not a “glad to.” Have you ever felt that way when it comes to going to church? And, quite frankly, if you're new to faith, or you're here because someone invited you and you kind of came more for them than for you, you might be thinking, Yeah, I kind of had to come. But I'm just not feeling the worship or joy today. Let me tell you, I understand that because I've been there before.

But here's my hope for each one of us as we walk through this time of teaching, my hope is that you will discover a more passionate worship life that is uninhibited by time, place, or expression. And hopefully, when the time is done, you'll be able to say, “You know what, I'm thinking in a different way about worship. And I think it's going to change the way I live out my life with God.” That's my hope for each one of us.

Now, there are some inhibitors of a passionate worship life, that can really be obstacles for us. And we need to be aware of those. And quite frankly, it is overcoming these obstacles that really deepens our worship life. So here are some of the inhibitors:

Sometimes we have a lack of knowledge and experience of God. Now, worship is a natural human response. In fact, we are born worshipers. To worship means that we ascribe worth and value to something that is important to us. We can worship different things without it being idolatry. But that's what we do we adore we worship the people who we value dearly. So, it's quite possible for you to worship your alma mater. And when you do that, you do it with vigorous activity. You can worship your favorite band. If you're a Beatles fan, all kinds of emotional expressions of worship are coming out. You can actually worship your favorite professional athlete.

But, here's the thing when it comes to God, if you don't really know him, or know much about him, or even know him at all, if you've never experienced him, it's going to be really difficult to feel the joy of worship in a place like this on a Sunday morning, not to mention any other time during the week. So, the lack of knowledge and experience of God can be an inhibitor, an obstacle that can impact our ability to have a rich worship life.

Here's the second inhibitor, we have a limited understanding of the nature of worship itself. Now, a lot of us compartmentalize things. And as we do, we tend to put things in nice little categories. And for many of us, worship is something that we reserve for Sunday at a particular time. And we actually only call a segment of what happens during that time “worship.” But here's the thing, while those things are indeed expressions of worship, worship can be so much more.

The third inhibitor is a self-consciousness that inhibits our God consciousness. And I think this is true, especially in a corporate worship setting like this. Well, when I'm singing, you know, I'm not sure I sound like I can carry a tune—the bucket leaks every now and then. And I'm not sure about the quality of my voice, so I'm wondering what people thinking about my singing. Or if I ever express my adoration of God physically, I may wonder What are people going to think? And so it happens many times when we're thinking about how we're worshiping, we're expressing it to God, but we're actually more focused on ourselves than we are on God. That’s why Psalm 100 is really helpful for us. Because it's going to point us in the right direction and help us understand how to develop a more passionate worship life.

So now I'm going to turn to the keys that I believe will help us develop and enrich our worship life. And here's the first one. If you want a more passionate worship life, seek a more personal knowledge of and experience with God.

Now clearly, the writer of Psalm 100 (we're not sure who actually wrote it), had a personal knowledge of God. He knew him and experienced him. Otherwise, he could not have written, “Oh, Lord, You have made me. You have made us your people. We are the sheep and your pasture. Your love is enduring, and your faithfulness has come down through the generations.” It's an expression of his knowledge of God. And lying behind all of that terminology is his awareness that God redeemed Israel, rescued them from slavery in Egypt and brought them into the promised land. There's so much about God that the psalmist knows. And it really is all focused, in Jewish thought, on that Exodus experience. That's where they learned and began to understand that God is a redeemer, and a rescuer.

Those of us who follow Jesus live under a different covenant now. We also have a central event that really shapes our understanding of God and who he is. And that is the sacrificial death of Christ on the cross and his resurrection. And I love the way the Apostle Paul connects this essential truth with worship. In Romans, chapter 12, verse one, we read these words: “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy…” Now, what Paul is saying here is, in light of everything that I've been writing over the last 11 chapters—God's kindness and goodness, our rebellion and sinfulness, and then in demonstrating his love for us, and sending Christ to die for us—Paul is saying, in view of all of that, now offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. Now look at this last phrase, “This is your true and proper worship.”

Now, what is Paul saying, He is saying, when you consider the lengths to which God is willing to go, and the cost that he is willing to bear so that we can be rescued and redeemed and reconciled to him, the most logical response on our part, is, in a spirit of worship, to offer him our whole selves. That is our true and appropriate worship. I love the way William Barclay, an Anglican priest from the previous century, puts it. He says, “When men worship Jesus Christ, they do not fall at his feet in broken submission, but in wondering love. A man does not say, ‘I cannot resist a might like that.’ He says, ‘Love so amazing, so divine, demands my life, my soul, my all.” A man does not say, ‘I am battered into surrender.’ He says, ‘I am lost in wonder, love, and praise.’” And when that is your experience, then worship becomes something that is a part of your whole life.

Now, you may say, Jim, that's all well and good, but I'm not sure I know God that well yet. I can't even say that I’ve really experienced him.” but you would like to, you'd like to know more about him, you would like to experience him. Well, I have good news for you. Jeremiah, one of the Old Testament prophets, puts it like this, you will seek God and find him when you seek him with all your heart. That's a wonderful promise that if you really want to know God, and you want to experience him, he wants you to know him. And so, here's how you can seek him, you can seek him in his story. And I would encourage you if you have not already, begin reading the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John. Read the story of Christ and his coming and revealing the love of God through his sacrificial death on the cross. Learn about what it means to follow him and to live out this kind of life that is godlike in terms of its quality. You can also experience God in nature. It might be the summer beside a Colorado mountain stream. Or it might be one evening next week, looking at a Texas sunset. You can experience God in the cooing of a newborn.

Or you might even experience in him in the dark night of your soul, or a dream as you sleep. Or even serving the homeless. You can experience him, too, in music or in quiet solitude. That's one of the things I have realized through the years, that whenever I get away from the noise of modern life, where it is nowhere to be heard, it is so much easier to hear and experience God. And even in an experience like this in a worship service, the psalmist says in Psalm 22:3 that the Lord inhabits the praise of his people. Whenever we praise him, his presence is here, because our praise is welcoming him into our presence. So, if you want a more passionate worship experience, you can begin to seek him more, but you can also expand your notion of what worship truly is.

You know, as I've been thinking about it, our view of what worship is, is many times shaped by our experiences growing up. And that was certainly true for me growing up in a large Baptist Church in Midland, Texas. Worship was on Sunday at 11 o'clock, there were no multiple services back then, you know, and it was while we were singing that it was kind of limited to that. And the same thing was true in Jesus’ day. That is the view that the people in that day had of worship, and it was shaped and formed by their experience. But in John, chapter four, Jesus begins to open up people's hearts and minds to a different way of understanding worship. He meets a woman at a well in Samaria who was there in midday. And the reason why she was there at midday was because she had been married five times and was now living with someone who was not her husband. And the other women had ostracized her. She couldn't come in the cool of the morning, she had to come in midday by herself. So, she strikes up a conversation, actually, Jesus strikes up the conversation with her. And it gets pretty deep pretty quickly, because he wants to offer her this living water that she's missing—that she's looking for. And after they have that conversation for a while, it turns to worship, and the woman says, “We say you should worship here on Mount Gerizim. And you say you should worship in Jerusalem.” And Jesus has a response. Here's what he says, “Believe me, dear woman, the time is coming when it will no longer matter whether you worship the Father on this mountain or in Jerusalem. But the time is coming, indeed, it's here now, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The father is looking for those who will worship him that way.

Now, here's what Jesus is doing. He is asserting a couple of things. The first one is this, is that because God is spirit, and because his spirit resonates and connects with ours, we can now worship anywhere. It doesn't have to be in Jerusalem in the temple where they thought God's presence always was. Now, every place is a place that you can worship. And when you do worship, you worship the truth. And I think Jesus was referring to himself because later in John, he'll go on to say, that I am the way and the truth and the life. And it is his a revealing of God that helps us understand God's true nature. So we worship him, the Spirit who is with us, anywhere we worship, and we worship the true God. But I think he also was implying that whenever we worship—for it to really connect—our worship has to be a true expression of who we are, and what we think about him, and how devoted we are to him.

Whether you're singing from a hymnal or from words on a screen, or you're kneeling in front of a pew, or taking communion, or you're singing in the shower, or you are on a quiet walk in the morning, if you are worshiping the true God, and it's a reflection of your heart of love for him, you're worshiping in that moment.

Jesus’ declaration means that you can now work 24/7/365 at any 20. So, if you have a military background, or you used to have a CB radio, you know that your “20” is your location is. So what Jesus is saying is that God is looking for people who are willing to worship any hour, any day, any week, any year, any place. He changes the whole way we see worship. And then if you really want to become more passionate about your worship life, open yourself up to a new expression of worship.

Frederick Buechner is one of my favorite writers. About 40 years ago, he wrote a little book called Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC. In this book, he takes different theological concepts and writes creative and very accessible definitions of theological terms. One of my favorites is his definition of worship. And I think it is spot on. He says to worship God means to serve him. Basically, there are two ways to do it. One way is to do things for him that he needs to have done—like, run errands for him, carry messages for him, fight on his side, feed his lambs, and so on.

Now, you may not realize this, but Psalm 102, in the NIV and the New Living Translation, translates verse two as “worship the Lord with gladness.” But the literal Hebrew says, “serve the Lord with gladness.” And I think there is certainly a connection. That's why we call this a worship service. Because we are serving him by worshipping him. And we'll talk more about that in a second. But also, what Buechner is saying is that almost every part of your life can become worship, because whenever you do whatever it is that God needs to have done, it can become an expression of worship. So that means your vocation, can be an expression of worship. If you're a first responder, God needs people to care for people who are injured and who are in need, God needs people to help keep the peace. And to the degree you do that, out of a heart of gratitude and appreciation for God, that is worship. You could be a financial advisor and help people get their retirement portfolio in place. God needs you to do that so that people will be cared for. And to the degree that you do that with a heart of gratitude and thankfulness that God gave you the gift to do that, it can be worship. If you work on computer software, that helps keep personal information secure, you’re serving God’s people. If God needs something done, and you are doing it, it can be worship. You know, here's another thing that God needs to have done. He needs someone to be patient and parent two year olds. And it can be really challenging to do that. You can lose a lot of sleep, and you might have less time to pray or read the Bible on your own, but to the degree that every expression of love to your two year old, you're giving thanks to God, then parenting a two year old becomes worship. And it even applies to parenting middle schoolers. I mean, it can be worship.

Now there are also some things that are worship that we might normally think—like when you're on the greeting team and you're welcoming people into Preston Trail, you are welcoming them into the gates of worship here. And that is worship for you. If you're the leader of a small group, and you're helping people discover life with God in a very real way, you are worshiping. If you're caring for a neighbor, if you're sharing your story of how Christ has transformed your life, that can be worship. You know, so often people divide the world into the sacred and the secular. But when you understand worship like this, there is no longer any secular moment in your life. Every moment of your life is open to the sacred because it can all be worship to God.

Now, the other way of worshipping according to Buechner is to do things for God that you need to do. Like sing songs for him, create beautiful things for him. Give things up for him, tell him what's on your mind and in your heart. In general, rejoice in him and make a fool of yourself for him the way lovers have always made fools of themselves for the one they love. He goes on to say a Quaker meeting or a typical high mass. The family service at First Presbyterian, a Holy Roller happening unless there's a moment of joy and foolishness in the proceedings, the time would be better spent doing something more useful. Buechner's trying to help us understand that God is good—that his love endures forever, that his faithfulness endures through all generations—and he has demonstrated that love for you in Christ. When you get in touch with that, when you experienced that, it wells up inside of you. And sometimes it comes out in different ways.

This week, I was having a conversation with Gwyn Lau who's on our staff. Gwen has a musical theater background. And she said, “You know, in musical theater, they tell you this: ‘sometimes, if it's too much to say, you sing it. And if something's too much to sing, then you dance it.’” And Alison Harrell, who did our welcome earlier, and is an introvert, says, “And if you're an introvert, you write it.” And that's also true. But when we experience God in real ways, it is a whole body response. It's our voice, it's our bodies, it's our minds and hearts as well. That's why when you read through all the Psalms, you will notice there are a half dozen verbs that the psalmist uses to call us to worship. The most predominant one is singing, singing is used 69 times in the Psalms, the Psalmist calls us to sing our love and our praise to God. On 19 occasions, we’re called to shout our praise to God, on seven occasions to bow in humility, in worship of God. on four occasions we’re called to lift our hands in worship. And on two occasions were called to kneel or to clap.

Tim Hawkins is a Christian comedian, and what he's done, he's kind of cataloged for us some of the external experiences that we have in worship. He says some people are a little shy, so they worship with their hands in their pockets. But when the Spirit starts to move, they kind of flap their elbows a little bit to the music. Now, he doesn't use this, but I'm a swayer. Do you ever sway to the music? I'm doing that bodily. Then you might want to put your hands out like you're holding a TV, and you're kind of right here and you're singing, worshiping. And then if you get a little more spiritual, you do a widescreen TV, and you get here (holds arms wider). And then the deeper you get, you can “hold a baby,” you know, you’ve got it right here. And I really like this one. For really spiritual people, they do the Mufasa (holds hands above head). I mean, they're, they're all up with God right here. Now you can do a one-arm kind of worship thing. And then you can raise your arm and you can point, or you can do a “hatchet.” And this is what I do now. And I don't always feel comfortable this, but this is called the school arm, where you raise your hand. So, I'll raise my hand. And then Hawkins says there's the “goalposts.” You can do arms up in a v and do a “village people.” And then there's Rocky, and there's a touchdown. So, all of those things are expressions of worship. But I confess, I struggle with these kinds of physical expressions. I do them on occasion, but I struggle for several reasons. Number one is because in the church I grew up in, clapping was really pushing the envelope. And so, I was used to sitting and not do anything. So therefore, most of my worship, I just sing out. I just try to sing out wholeheartedly. But as guys, you know, we're more reserved. Even when I go to a Baylor football game, I'm not all that expressive, because I have to watch the game. I like to watch the plays. And when Baylor scores a touchdown, I'll give Robin a high five, I might even high five the guy next to me. I may not know him from Adam, but I high five him. And on occasions I will shout out blessings to the referees. I will do that occasionally. However, I've been learning some things, of all places, from the Liverpool football club. In England, football clubs, man, it's the center of their life. It's the focus of all that they do. And in Liverpool, they have a song called “You'll Never Walk Alone,” and they sing it before every game and after every game. They won the Champions League Championship two years ago this month, and I want you to watch them sing and celebrate this championship and see what all you can see while they're doing it.

Man, did you see some expressions that Tim Hawkins didn't even mention. Some guys are even throwing kisses, man, there's a lot of this going on. And here's the thing, I’m thinking, these are very masculine, mostly inebriated, rowdy soccer fans. And they are lifting their voices full throated. And they are expressing their love and devotion to a temporary team. And when it comes to worshipping the one who gave his life for me, and won the ultimate victory over sin and death, why am I so shy about expressing my love and praise to him by singing my heart out—by expressing physically, what he means to me. You know, if I could sum it all up, here's the way I would put it: at Present Trail, when we gather for worship, we want you to feel free to express your praise and adoration of God, spiritually, emotionally, and physically, in a way that reflects your authentic self, and your love and devotion to God.

A lot of you are still kind of new at this whole thing called Christianity and you're feeling some things, but it hasn't gotten to the physical part yet. But you can sing. You can sing your heart about your love for him. And some of you who are living every day, and you know God has forgiven you of so much, and you're so aware of that. Then when you think about his love and his grace, something's moving you inside, and you’ve got to do more than sing it, you've got to lift your hands and say, “Oh, thank you, God. Thank you!”

It doesn't matter where you are. Your authentic expression might be simply to stand and listen and look at the words and seek to know God better. Or your best expression might be to sing full throated with all your heart to him. Or it might be to sway a little bit. You might want to flap your elbows, you might want to lift a “classroom” hand, I don't know. But this is a judgment-free zone. And we're not looking, we're not seeing what anybody's doing. We just want you to have the freedom to worship the one who gave his life for you, who won the ultimate victory over sin and death. And as we do, guess what happens? He will inhabit our praise. And we will experience him, and we will know him more. So, this morning, we're going to get to do something a little bit sooner perhaps than normal. We're going to get to practice what I’ve been preaching. And so, the band's going to lead us now, and we're going to have a couple of songs that we're going to sing, and you have an opportunity to give an authentic reflection of your worship to God. And we invite you to do so in the wonderful spirit of Psalm 100.

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Let's pray together. Father, thank you for inhabiting our praise, and thank you for your presence with us. Father, we know that you love every person within my hearing. You want their very best. You want them to grow up in you. You want them to experience their purpose and meaning in life. You want them to love and be loved. And Father, I just pray that your desire for each one of us will well up inside us and that we will begin to live every moment of every day, worshiping you while we're at work. While we're at home, while we're spending time in leisure. When we're out with friends, Father, I pray that we will become the kind of people who are always worshiping, and you inhabit that worship so others are seeing you, and they too will want to know this God who is good, whose love endures forever. And whose faithfulness will go throughout all generations. Father, thank you. Thank you. Thank you, and we worship and praise you today. Amen.
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We hope that you feel encouraged and inspired by the message you've just listened to. If you'd like to get in touch with someone on our team, you can send an email to info@prestontrail.org. Additionally, you can call us at 972-668-1244. We would absolutely love to hear from you. Thanks so much for listening.


SUMMARY KEYWORDS
worship, god, people, sing, life, called, expression, psalm, experience, jerusalem, praise, read, love, song, lord, jesus, heart, true, occasions, church


Recorded in Frisco, Texas.