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Paul writes in his letter to the Galatians, “I have been crucified with Christ”. Is Paul speaking in code, or is he speaking clear truth? The questions that revolve around this are at the heart of the gospel. What took place on the cross, and what effect does it have on the life I am living today?
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For worship to be accepted by God, our heart must be right before Him. God knows every thought and intent of our heart. We cannot believe the lie that we can just do what we believe or feel to be the right thing and God will be pleased by it; just dropping some money in the offering plate or singing a song or praying a prayer are not accepted by God if our heart is not right. If we want our heart to be right before God, we must know what the bible says the heart is and how it can be right in His eyes.
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When we look at other religions and cultures of the world, we recognize that they worship their god. For Christians, we know that their worship, whether image-worship or spirit-worship, is idolatrous because they are not worshiping the one true and living Holy God. Is their a difference in the worship aside from the object being worshiped? What is at the heart of idolatry?
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Idolatry is essentially falling down before someone or something other than God. Pride is knowing God, and refusing to fall down before Him. True Worship begins with both knowing God, and falling down before him. In knowing Him, we begin to understand how valuable He is. It must be significant to true worship then, how valuable God is to us.
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To paraphrase Mark 7:6-7 & Matt. 15:8-9 Jesus says that people attempted to honor God with their lips but because their hearts did not belong to God their worship was in vain. They placed a high value on following their traditions that they had set in place, but the very traditions replaced the object of their worship; not intentionally I’m sure, but this is the case. There are two specific requirements that must be met for worship to be genuine, or true; Knowing God, and Falling Down before Him. If these two prerequisites are not met, worship of God is in vain. Do you know God? Have you fallen down before him?
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The events surrounding Jesus birth are so amazing when we pause and meditate on what took place. Specifically to focus our thoughts on the wise men and compare them with Harod and the Jewish Scribes, some interesting facts pop out. The wise men came to fall down before an infant; Harod was not willing to. What’s so significant about falling down? Have we fallen down before Jesus?
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A Spiritual Life requires Spiritual Food. As born again believers, we must nourish ourselves with Christ; He is the bread of life. Do you feel spiritually dry, or spiritually dead? Have you been eating at the table with Jesus; enjoying fellowship with Him? For the two on the road to Emmaus, it was once they sat down to fellowship with the stranger that they understood. Their eyes were opened when Jesus broke and shared the bread.
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Knowing the importance of giving thanks is one thing, but actually doing it can be challenging. We don’t naturally give thanks when circumstances in life seem wrong; when our car breaks down on the freeway or we get in an accident, or we lose our job, or anything else that we would determine as less than desirable for ourselves. But it is in the context of life’s circumstances that we glorify God; the way we respond and react in life reveals great truth about who we are. We can prepare ourselves for life so that we respond and react in a way that glorifies God; thanksgiving.
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In Luke 17 Jesus heals ten lepers but only one returns to gives thanks. Though Jesus did not command them to return and give thanks, he was surprised that only one did; and that he was a foreigner. What can we learn about being thankful from this? Was this man simply being respectful, or was there more? Why should we be thankful, and what does that mean?
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Jesus washed the twelve disciples feet; it seems even the feet of Judas Iscariot. Jesus does however state that “not all of you are clean”, speaking of Judas. Even though Judas was one of the twelve, he was not counted clean by Jesus. Are you clean? If so, are you still clean? Jesus also spoke to Peter saying “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me”. Even though most of the twelve were already made clean, they needed a little washing to stay clean. Are you still clean?
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“The Love of God is greater far than tongue or pen can ever tell; It goes beyond the highest star, and reaches to the lowest hell.” These are lyrics to a hymn by F.M. Lehman which help us broaden our scope of understanding the measureless greatness of God’s love. To know and understand that His love for us is as intense today as it was the day Jesus’ willingly gave his life for ours. We have no need to doubt the depths of God’s love, we can knowingly trust that He will receive a repentant sinner.
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The Lord is good. He is the measure, the standard, the definition of “good”. Our faith must be grounded in Him, not in the world around us. Because He is good, we can know that everything he says or does is completely good; He would never do something contrary to himself. When it comes to our life of faith, do we believe that he is good even if our circumstances seem to indicate otherwise?
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