I am so amazed at the things that churches will fight about! I am so amazed at what people will judge one another for. Why am I amazed..........because I have been the very one doing all the fighting or judging or whatever you want to call.
I remember having a preacher that would not engage in worship. At least that is what it looked like to me. He would just stand there rocking back and forth and look as if it meant nothing to him. Once I finally got to know him I understood that his way of worship was to look down at the floor and really concentrate on the words. He was not into looking around, raising his hands, and closing his eyes. His way of worship looked so boring.............but who made me judge of who is worshipping right or not - NO ONE!!!
God has shown me through the years that just as he has made everyone so individual, he made or encourages everyone to worship individual as well. It can beautiful if we have the right perspective seasoned with a bit of Romans 13 and 14.
Ps. 150
1 Praise the LORD. [a]
Praise God in his sanctuary;
praise him in his mighty heavens.
We cannot just save worship for church? We have got to praise Him in all locations of life!! Praise must happen here on earth (He inhabits the praise of the people), but if don't enjoy worship here on earth - you just might not be ready for worship in heaven!
2 Praise him for his acts of power;
praise him for his surpassing greatness.
Praise Him for all the things He has done and will do, but we must also be compelled to just praise Him for who He is!
3 Praise him with the sounding of the trumpet,
praise him with the harp and lyre,
Sometimes our praise will be loud and boisterous, but there will be and should be other times our praise will be such a small, sweet, angelic sound much like a harp.
4 praise him with tambourine and dancing,
praise him with the strings and flute,
There is room for movement in praise. There are times I can not sit still. I have trouble in church not moving some part of me! There will be those whose praise may even look crazy (running laps in church), but those that are calm and somber doesn't mean their hearts are not running laps.
5 praise him with the clash of cymbals,
praise him with resounding cymbals.
Your praise may be a clashing sound and even seem inappropriate, but true and honest praise will be heard all throughout the nation. Your praise must go on and on!
6 Let everything that has breath praise the LORD.
Praise the LORD.
Bottom line, we must praise. We must come before Him in any situation and praise! We must develop a praise that honors Him. Praise no matter what form must be part of our every day if not moment!!! If it has breath - it needs to be making known His praise!! He will make sure the rocks cry out, He just wants us to make sure His greatest creation cries out to the greatest Creator!!!
Oh Jesus - forgive me for all the times I have casted judgement on those that don't praise like me! Forgive me for being something that I am not at times!! Forgive me for my heart can be so ugly!!! Oh Lord - I praise you!!! I love you!
2 comments:
And then there are all of the elements of creation that praise God simply by being! I love St. Francis' Canticle of Creation for just that reason. Thanks for a very lovely post!
LOVE this post about praise and worship!! The Enemy (and sometimes our own flesh) will do anything to get us away from praising God. And I think the Enemy does some pretty "good" work in getting Christ's people distracted from worshipping the one true God. We get distracted by how others praise or thinking about if that person is really praising at all. When we get wrapped up in all of that we are at a point of showing "worship" to the Enemy. I know that's a pretty strong statement. But it's what happens when we go down that road of nasty.
Again, love this post and how you broke down that passage of Scripture. You rock! :)
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