Just A Thought #9

Worship With Abandon

Worship. All believers have their own ideas of what worship means and how it is best done. This is not another “how-to” lesson, but rather, a call to worship our Lord, the Creator of everything.

It does not matter if you sing hymns, choruses or the latest modern worship song, whether accapella, or accompanied by a piano, bass guitar, tambourine or drums. It does not matter if you lift your hands, sit, stand or kneel. What matters is your heart. What is the attitude of your heart? Not just during designated times of worship, but in every area of your life.

Worship is a lifestyle. King David is an example of this. He worshiped the Lord with his whole heart. In one of my favorite passages of Scripture, the Ark of the Lord is being brought back to Jerusalem. As it moves, the Scriptures report that King David danced before the Lord with all his might and arranged for sacrifices to be made and trumpets blown. He was worshiping with his whole heart. He did not care what others thought. His own wife thought he was crazy for being so undignified and not acting like a king. David’s response was perfect. “I will celebrate before the Lord. I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes.” (2 Sam. 6: 21b-22a)

Was David showing false humility? No he truly did not care what anyone but God thought at that point. You can also see David’s heart of worship throughout the Psalms.

It does not matter what others think. We are instructed to worship the King of Kings. Like David we should focus on God and not those around us. When we worship the Lord in song He should be our every thought. We have so much to praise Him for. From the earth and everything in it, to our very lives, our family. Look around at all of the beauty. The mountains, rivers, and oceans are testimony to Him. The clouds, sun and moon speak of His creative powers. He is awesome. We should be in awe of Him daily! There is nothing beyond His ability or power.

So how do we worship as a lifestyle? Obedience is one key. If we believe in Him and that His Word is true should we not honor Him by keeping His Word in our heart? Another word for worship is honor. We should honor Him with our words, thoughts, deeds and life! In everything we do we need to consider whether it will bring glory to God or not. Our highest goal should not be to attain a level of “holiness” as we worship in song, but to allow the “wow” of knowing God to saturate our everyday life. Our worship should become a flow of communion with our Father, where we can drink anytime, rather it’s during our morning commute to work, while cleaning the bathroom, or hiking in the mountains.

I encourage you to worship like King David. Worship with abandon. Don’t worry about what anyone but the Father thinks. Fall in love with Him again. Rediscover Him as a little child does. Re-capture the “Wow!”