// April 27th, 2009 // Comments Off // Life, Theological illogical
We had our worship meeting on saturday and I’m excited for the changes happening not only in our worship team but in our church.
Carson did a great job putting together a worship team song book of around 80 songs. After going through them all I’ve chosen about 25 songs that I would like to learn. I’m not sure who picked which songs and what not but that leaves 55 songs extra that I probably wont be playing. I’m thinking that we need 2 worship song lists at church now… active songs and inactive ones. This would allow us to figure out which songs that all of the different worship leaders are planning on actually playing rather than having a song be played once every 16 weeks.
Yup 80 songs… 5 songs per sunday would take us 16 weeks to get through that list.
We’ll have to keep trying to refine the "active" songs so that the congregation can learn the lyrics.
Speaking of worship, I made a document that I would review every once in awhile… I didn’t write this but I pieced it together with a few other good worship articles that are just good to meditate on when in a position of leading worship.
The Life Of A Worshipper Has The Following Characteristics:
i) A Thankful Life
To live a life of worship before God requires a thankful heart and attitude.
Thanksgiving is a gate into the presence of God and as we give Him thanks and praise,
He comes and dwells with us. Paul exhorts us in Eph 5:19-20 to "make melody in our
hearts to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things." Thankfulness changes things.
It changes attitudes, changes us, and changes situations. Eg. Jonah in Jonah 2:7-10
When we love God and have a thankful heart we are able to rise above the
circumstances we find ourselves in. 1 Thess 5:18 & Phil 4:4. As we consider what
God has done, is doing and will do in our lives, it brings us into closer intimacy with
Him.
ii) A Sanctified, Holy Life
If we are to be true worshippers of God, we are to be a holy people, separated unto
Him – Holy in speech, thought and deed.
Matt 5:8 – "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God." God is a holy God
and without holiness none of us will see God. We are to be holy for He is holy. We
must be a person who is yielded to God’s Spirit for it is as we yield ourselves to His
Spirit, He changes us from from glory to glory. Joshua 24:15 – “Choose ye this day
whom you will serve”.
When we allow Christ to be revealed in our lives, there comes a hunger for purity and
righteousness. We must crucify daily the deeds of the flesh with its passions and
desires. Paul said to the Corinthians in 2 Cor 6:12 – "You are not restricted by us, but
you are restricted by your own affections." Let us set our affections on things above.
Constantly presenting ourselves as living sacrifices.
iii) A Repentant Heart
God is looking for people that constantly come with a repentant heart seeking His
cleansing and knowing that it’s only by His grace that we can enter into His presence.
One of the reasons why God said that David was a man after His heart was because he
would always come to God in repentance when he made mistakes.
iv) A Humble Heart
By function, you should be committed to serving. You should be constantly involved
with people. ie. whom he/she is leading. There should be more concern about the
"people" of worship than the "music" of worship.
A true worshipper recognises that without Christ he can do nothing. God detests pride
and if we ever get to a place where we think we’ve got it together and are better than
others we are in serious trouble. Eg. Luke 18:9-14.
v) An Obedient Heart
The true worshipper is obedient to God’s commands because they don’t want to in any
way grieve the one that they love. God considers obedience far more important than
any external expression of worship. Eg. 1 Sam. 15:22 – “Has the Lord as great delight
in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey
is better than sacrifice and to heed than the fat of rams.”
vi) He Is A Lover Of God’s Word
It is in God’s Word that we discover more of who God is – His character and nature.
God can speak to us in a number of ways, but the most common way is by bringing
revelation through the reading of His Word.
vii) A Passion For His Presence
In Him is our life, our health, our peace, our prosperity, our hope, our joy. He has
created us so that everything we need is in Him.
God’s command is that we love Him with our whole being – body soul mind and spirit.
We must realise that there is a longing within us that cannot be satisfied by anything
else, but our intimate communion with Him. We must so desire His presence in our
lives that we allow nothing to take His place, or to distract us from knowing Him. No
one else, nothing else can fulfil the cry of our hearts.
God the Father desires a people who are awakened in their affections and passions
for Jesus. Like Mary in John 12:1-8 the true worshipper is prepared to give
extravagantly unto God, holding back nothing. God requires our all and when we give
it, the rewards are beyond compare.
Mary’s sacrifice – a) cost her a lot in monetary terms (300 denari – a year’s wages) b)
was an act of public humility c) opened her up to criticism of the guests, d) it
challenged the other not so devoted guests.
We constantly must ask the question – "Can I ever pour too much cost, time and
effort into achieving greater levels of worshipping God?" When we consider Christ’s
love and sacrifice we realise that we could never give too much back to God.
viii) A Person Of Faith
A true worshipper becomes a man or woman of faith because they have built
relationship with God and have come to know His attributes. They therefore have
the confidence to believe that He will perform what He has promised eg. David and
Abraham.
Its such a good reminder to read this again.
