Throughout the Bible, in both Old and New Testaments, God’s people are repeatedly called to worship him. And it’s not just us: angels are shown worshiping God in Isaiah 6, and then again in Revelation 4. Hebrews 1:6 even commands the angels to worship Jesus. Worship is a topic that can (and does) fill, not just a book, but an entire library. All I have space for in this article, however, are a few observations that have been personally meaningful to me.
Worship is an Action
We are commanded in both the Old and the New Testaments to worship God.
Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness. (Psalm 29:2)
Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our “God is a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12:28-29).
The command to worship, like every other command in Scripture, is not to feel something, but to do something. A command to feel wouldn’t work; we simply don’t have the ability to feel on command. And God, who created us, certainly knows what we are and are not capable of. So the first thing I need to recognize is that worship is not just sitting in a pew listening to live music, and it’s not something I’m told to feel, it’s something I’m told to do.
Sadly, for some, “worship” has come to mean trying to achieve an emotional high. I know this far too well. At one time I myself was part of a church where the so-called “worship time” was mostly about pursuing a feeling of being close to God. But true worship is not chasing after an emotional experience. It is awesome to have a feeling of God’s loving presence, but although that sense of his presence is something God often gives us when we worship him, the feeling itself is not worship, nor is it a reliable standard by which I can measure worship.
If the only feeling I have is irritation because I don’t happen to like the music that’s being sung, but I choose to join in the singing anyway, simply because the words we’re singing are true, does that make my worship false? Certainly not! On the contrary, that is genuine worship; worshiping God for who he is, not for how I feel about him. True worship can occur without any emotional response at all, but it can never occur when the emotional experience becomes the goal. That’s idolatry; worshiping my own feelings rather than worshiping God.
But if true worship is an action not a feeling, what exactly does that action entail?
Worshiping in Truth
Look back again to the first part of Psalm 29:2. “Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name.” Worship is nothing more, and nothing less, that giving God the honor that is rightfully his. It’s telling the truth about who he is, whether by my actions or by my words.
God doesn’t command me to worship him because he has a big ego, but because I do. If I don’t worship God, I will always end up worshiping something else, usually myself. If I don’t proclaim the truth I will eventually, inevitably, end up proclaiming lies.
Far from limiting worship to a few minutes of singing once a week, everything I do can and should be an act of worship. This is why I said in another article that even working at a secular job can be done as an act of worship if you, “work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters” (Colossians 3:23). That is, if you consider yourself to be working for God, and then give him the very best work you can do because he deserves your best. This is also why Paul, writing by the Holy Spirit, can say, “whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him (Colossians 3:17). That’s letting your actions tell the truth about who God is
Right now someone is asking, “but doesn’t worship mean singing?” It’s a reasonable question. After all, the “worship” time on Sunday morning in many churches, especially Protestant ones, consists almost entirely of singing. If worship is, as I’ve argued, giving God the honor that is rightfully his, then singing is not the only way to do that. It is, however, a very good way, and one that it found over and over again in Scripture. In the Old Testament we read:
Sing the praises of the Lord, enthroned in Zion; proclaim among the nations what he has done (Psalm 9:11).
and:
Sing the praises of the Lord, you his faithful people; praise his holy name (Psalm 30:4)
and again:
Sing joyfully to the Lord, you righteous; it is fitting for the upright to praise him (Psalm 33:1).
While in the New Testament we’re told:
Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ (Ephesians 5:19-20)
and:
Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise (James 5:13).
Even the angels in heaven sing to worship God, as we read in chapters 5 and 15 of Revelation. And we should do the same.
Rejoicing in Worship
God has done something amazing. He has redeemed me, rescued me from death, forgiven all my sins, and seated me with Christ on his throne. What’s more, he has entrusted the message of reconciliation to me and made me his ambassador. How can I not rejoice in that?
In the Scriptures we are told:
Further, my brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you. (Philippians 3:1)
This was addressed to the church in Philippi at a time in which they were facing some sort of persecution (Philippians 1:29-30), although we don’t know the details of it. They were also deeply concerned about Paul, one of the founders of that church, who was in prison. In the midst of their trials, Paul told them to rejoice, and he repeated this exhortation later in his letter (Philippians 4:4).
“Joy is the serious business of heaven,” C. S. Lewis wrote1. Here on earth, we are also told to rejoice. Not to feel happy; an impossible command to obey because, as I noted above, we simply aren’t able to feel on command. No, “rejoice” isn’t a feeling. Like worship itself, it’s an action. We are to celebrate the blessings God has poured out on us, even if our feelings don’t line up. Rejoicing is a form of worship. It’s not about what we feel, but about what’s true. Do you believe the Jesus died for your sins? Do you believe that he rose from the dead? Then rejoice!
We are strange creatures, however. I know very well how often my feelings follow my actions; I start doing something I know I should, and after a little while it starts feeling right as well. I’ve seen it happen thousands of times. But a little while later I’m back to letting my actions follow my feelings. When I get up every morning I have to make a conscious choice to rejoice in the Lord. Paul reminded the Philippians to rejoice in the Lord. I have to remind myself to do that too.
Worshiping Together
It should go without saying that if I can’t tell the truth about God when I’m surrounded by my brothers and sisters on Sunday morning, I shouldn’t expect that I’ll be able to tell the truth about him out in the world during the rest of the week. Worshiping together with my brothers and my sisters doesn’t just honor Christ, it also builds up his body, the church. As Paul tells us in Colossians:
Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. (Colossians 3:15-17)
Notice that this Scripture mentions singing, or more broadly, worship, in the context of believers living in peace with one another. Singing to God follows immediately after the command to teach and admonish one another, and just before the command to do everything “in the name of the Lord Jesus.” Teaching and admonishing are paired with singing, and both are the working out of the “message of Christ” dwelling richly among us.
So mutual teaching and joining together in worship are closely connected. This should remind us that the church is not just a bunch of people who are all traveling in the same direction. My relationship with God is not divorced from my relationships with my brothers and sisters; the vertical and the horizontal are connected. And both come from living with and by the word of God. This short paragraph basically shows us what the church is supposed to look like.
It follows, then, that I can not acceptably worship God if I’m not living in peace with my brothers and sisters. Jesus himself said as much in Matthew 5:23-24. Sadly, many Christians throughout the history of the church have forgotten this truth.
This obvious doesn’t mean that worship is impossible if I’m by myself. The command in Colossians 3:17, whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him, pretty clearly includes both things I do with others and things I do by myself. But it does, I think, mean that my worship is incomplete if I never join together in worship with my brothers and sisters. I belong to a family, and even though I’m sometimes alone, the context in which I worship is my membership in that family, the body of Christ.
And not only do I need to join with my brothers and sisters in worship, I need to remind them from time to time to rejoice in the Lord. And I need them to remind me, just as Paul reminded the Philippian church.
Worship, then, is not supposed to just be something I do for half an hour on Sunday mornings. It should be a fundamental part of everything I do. And it’s not just between me and God. Rather, joining in worship is part of how I’m supposed to be relating to the other Christians around me. Worship comes out of understanding who I am, but then it circles around to remind me once again who I am, and to remind me also who my brothers and sisters are. So let us all join together to:
Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.
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.
(Psalm 100)
1. 1964 Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, San Diego.