Worship 1

October 7, 2024 Monday Message:

Psalm 96:1 KJV: “O sing unto the Lord a new song: sing unto the Lord, all the earth.”

I’ve been asked to teach about worship repeatedly, so I thought it might be a good idea to include some of that in these daily messages.

Our weekly church service should include 2-way communication. First, we praise God Almighty, our Creator. Exalt him as the source of all things, from the vast universe to how many hairs are on your head! Omnipotent (all powerful), omnipresent (can be in more than one place at the same time), omniscient (has all knowledge), and is deserving of his place on the throne over everything! This is speaking and singing to the Lord, praising his majesty!

The other aspect of church requires us to listen. God speaks to us through Pastors and Bible teachers, so that each week we can garner a bit more knowledge about God and his inspired Holy Book, the Bible.

Unfortunately, it’s easy to get off track. Many “Christian” songs tell us to be good people, but say nothing to exalt the Lord. We can do better than just agreeing with God’s value system. At the same time, he’s both mighty, loving and forgiving. We owe him our eternal lives! God had the foresight to send Jesus as our rescuer, the one who sacrificed himself to forgive our sins. God has been so good to us. To paraphrase Martin Luther, having examined the eyewitness testimonies, I can do no other than to place my faith in the one true God! True worship means that we shout about it!

The teaching in some churches can also be a problem. Some pastors have a message in mind, have a point to make, and then search for one-liners in the Bible (lifted out of context) to support their position. That’s backwards. The message should start with what the Bible says, and then one can explain and exposit God’s inspired Word as the Holy Spirit moves the speaker. But it starts and ends with the Bible.

David was both Israel’s king and its worship leader. He is said to have played the harp and the lyre, an instrument sort of like a guitar. He was constantly composing new songs to sing to the Lord. Many of them are documented in the book of Psalms. Nowadays many churches sing what we call “contemporary” worship songs. “Contemporary” means that we’ll be adding new songs, that our repertoire will be perpetually changing!

More on worship tomorrow!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship