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-- © GodSpeak International 2008 --
-- Do not republish without written permission from <copyright@godspeak.net> --

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND CONTRIBUTING RESOURCES
Author: Teresa Seputis ts@godspeak.net http://www.godspeak.net

Encountering God

Lesson 10
Being Proactive To Encounter God
Part 2 - Worship

By Teresa Seputis

We saw in our last lesson that the more actively we pursue God, the more we will have encounters with Him--providing we pursue Him in ways that He finds acceptable. We began looking at some of the ways that God likes to be pursued:

We talked about prayer and devotions in our last lesson, and we discovered that both of these are intended to be two-way interactions with God, where we both talk to Him and hear what He has to say to us.

Now, let's move on to another way that God likes to be pursued: worship.

Worship

We know that worship is very important to God because it is the one thing that He will not share with anyone else. It is okay with Him if we honor others, it is ok with Him if we obey others and it is even ok with Him if we pledge loyalty to others. But it is decidedly not ok with Him if we worship anyone but the one true and living God. Look at what He says about it in Exodus 34:14: "You shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God."

Why is worship so important to God that He won't share it with anyone else? One part of the reason is because our worship ushers in His very presence, so it is something that is very intimate to Him. Psalm 22:3 says in the King James Version that God: "...inhabitest the praises of Israel." E.g., our worship is His habitation, the place where He dwells. The New Century Version puts it this way: "You sit as the Holy One. The praises of Israel are your throne." The throne is where the King sits, and this verse is tying God's presence to praise and worship.

I believe that worship is not a one-way thing that we direct towards God, where He passively receives it. I believe that God responds to our worship by increasing His manifest presence in our midst, by showing more of Himself to us, and by allowing us to experience Him in a deeper way.

Worship is not just saying praise things to God and telling Him how wonderful He is (though He is indeed wonderful). Worship is more about our entire lifestyle and how we give Him lordship in it. The entire law was given to explain how God wanted the children of Israel to worship Him. It included the things that we think of as worship--singing, music, rejoicing, seeking God. But it was much more inclusive than than--it included guidelines for how to conduct ourselves in every aspect of their lives, including in their business transactions and in how they are to treat each other.

A person could not come to the temple to do their sacrifices or prayers or other forms of worship if they were unclean. If they violated the rules of conduct that God wanted them to live by, then they were not allowed to come and worship Him. This was in essence saying, "When I come to worship God, I also acknowledge Him as my Lord and master, and I decree my commitment to walk in His ways because He is so wonderful and so powerful and so amazing and because He deserves my worship."

The same is true for us in the New Testament. That is why Jesus said, in Matthew 5:23-24: "Therefore if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you; leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift." He was basically saying, you can't worship God if your lifestyle doesn't back up the worship you offer. That is false worship that God won't receive from you. It is not enough just to say worship words to God, you have to back it up by living the way He wants you to live so that He is indeed your Lord.

What Jesus said makes more sense if we remind ourselves of what Jesus considered the greatest two commandments: "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.' This is the first commandment. And the second, like it, is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these" (Mark 12:30-31).

The Apostle John sheds some light on this in 1 John 4:20: "If someone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?" In short, God expects us to be in right relationship with each other if we want to be in right relationship with Him. He expects us to obey the command to love one another that Jesus gave us in John 13:34. And that is why He can tell us that if our brother has ought against us, we need to leave our gift on the alter and go get right with our brother before we start worshiping God and bringing our offerings to Him.

Worship is not just the words we say (or sing) to God, telling Him how wonderful He is; worship is living out His lordship in our day-to-day lives as we say these words to Him. That is why Psalm 24:3 says, "Who may ascend the hill of the Lord? Who may stand in His holy place?" (E.g., it asks, "Who may come into God's presence to worship Him?") Then it gives us the answer in verse 4: "He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to an idol or swear by what is false." (E.g., the answer is: those who live the way God asks us to live because He is our Lord and Master.)

But when we have that Lordship relationship with God, and we come to worship Him, we are able to move into a direct encounter with Him.

One of the things that can happen when we have an encounter with God is that the Holy Spirit may convict us, to help us repent of sin or disobedience and get our hearts right with God. It can feel somewhat uncomfortable for us to come seeking God and find His conviction instead, but it is His mercy when He does that. Many of us have prayed a prayer like this: "Lord please take the things out of my life that keep me from being in intimate relationship with You." And that conviction is God's answer to this type of prayer. It is not intended to push us away, but to purify us so that we can go deeper in Him.

The prophet Isaiah experienced this when he was called to be a prophet (Isaiah 6). He had a vision of God on His throne and experienced the glory of the Lord. This was a worship experience and he saw the angels worshiping God. "And one [angel] cried to another and said: 'Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!" (Isaiah 6:3). When Isaiah saw God's holiness, he was overcome with conviction and cried out "Woe is me, for I am undone! because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts" (Is 6:5).

God seemed to agree with Isaiah's assessment of his sinful condition, but instead of condemning him or pushing him away, God purified him. Verses 6 to 7 tell us: "Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth with it, and said: 'Behold, this has touched your lips; your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged.'"

Once God had dealt with the conviction, He brought Isaiah into a life-changing encounter with Him.

It is not uncommon for the Lord to convict us when we first start to come deeply into His presence in worship. This is because God is holy and we all have a sinful nature. When we see His holiness in comparison to our own sin, conviction is a very natural response. The good news is that if we respond to God's conviction with genuine repentance, then God will move us past the conviction and into a wonderful experience of His presence in worship.

But conviction is not the only way that God meets us when we first begin to encounter Him in worship. There are times when we are so beaten up by the enemy and by false condemnation that we would not be able to respond properly to conviction. The Lord is usually very gentle and loving when we are in this state, and He will usually choose to manifest His wonderful love and acceptance to us instead of His holiness. He does this to get us to the place where we are secure enough in His love that we can begin working with Him on the things in our lives that separate us from Him.

I am reminded of friend of mine who now walks pretty close to the Lord. But she had a season of rebellion and backsliding. It all began when she started dating an unbeliever because none of the guys at church were asking her out. She ended up getting pregnant and becoming an unwed mother. She also walked totally away from the Lord for a season, and tried a lot of worldly things, including recreational drugs and alcohol. When she first started coming back to church (after her child was born) she had what I call a low threshold for temptation and frequently found herself sleeping with one "new date" after another, taking drugs, getting drunk, etc. If anyone was a good candidate for "conviction," she was it. There were so many different areas of her life that the Lord could have chosen to convict her about--her unmarried sexual activity, her recreational use of illegal drugs, her lying and deception. But God had a different strategy with her.

It actually took quite a bit to get her to come to church at all. I remember her first Sunday back with us, because I was sitting near her. It was a day when the Lord's came into our sanctuary very strongly in response to our worship. She started to cry, and she cried the entire worship session. I assumed that God had convicted her and that was why she was crying. But when I talked to her after service, she said that she'd never felt the Lord's love on her so strongly. He wasn't doing a conviction thing at all. She was a very wounded individual, and He was simply showering His unconditional love and acceptance on her, and it was very healing to her. This went on for months, and she starting bring her own box of Kleenex with her to service. Every single worship service, God would come and love her--despite the fact that she was still actively sinning. She would sob through the whole worship service, and she got a little more healed each week.

Then one time during the worship, God spoke to her in the midst of showering His love on her. He said something like, "You know, I really don't like it when you sleep around like that. I won't stop loving you if you do it, but it would make Me so much happier if you would choose to walk in My holiness in this area." She was so melted by His healing love that she purposed in her heart to change. It took her a few months to learn to stop putting herself in tempting situations and get victory in that area. But it was the love of God that drove her to repentance. The first six months or so, all God did when He met her in worship was to manifest His love to her, and for her the conviction did not start coming until she was secure in His great love for her.

For myself, He did things in the opposite order. First came the conviction and the getting rid of things (actions, attitudes, thoughts) that separated me from Him. After that, He took me into a season of just loving on me until it really became real to me that He loves--not just when I am good, but all of the time.

The key to worship is that it starts out as us telling Him how wonderful He His, and then He shows up to inhabit or worship. It moves from us directing our affection to God to a two-way interaction with Him.

There are times when God will pull me out of singing along with the congregation to speak to Me. There are times when He will manifest one aspect of His character to me very strongly--His love, His holiness, His faithfulness, His patience, His goodness, etc. There are times when God catches me up into personal encounter with Him, where I am no longer aware of the congregation worshiping Him around me, I am just aware of Him and His nearness. There have even been times when God has caught me up out of a worship service into the heavenlies in an open vision with Him.

Quality worship is one of the easiest ways to enter into an encounter with God, because He does love to inhabit the praises of His people. So next time you go to a worship service, go looking expectantly to have an encounter with Him.


-- © GodSpeak International 2008 --
-- Do not republish without written permission from <copyright@godspeak.net> --

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