Have you ever asked this question?
Have you ever probed the depths of your own heart and wondered, “Is my worship acceptable to God…really?”
It’s scary to think that some worship is pleasing to God and some worship is detestable. To think that I could approach the throne of Grace, lift up my voice, and bare my soul – only to be rejected.
What kind of worship does God seek?
Throughout Scripture we see the kind of worship God is seeking. It has more to do with your closet than it does the stage. It has more to do with the unseen than what is seen.
God loves singing. God loves music. But it’s not all that He is after.
Consider this:
“My eyes will be on the faithful in the land, that they may dwell with me; the one whose walk is blameless will minister to me. No one who practices deceit will dwell in my house; no one who speaks falsely will stand in my presence” (Psalm 101:6-7).
There’s a lot of worship buzz words in this passage that we all like to use.
Dwell with God.
Minister to Him.
Dwell in His house.
Stand in His presence.
But we tend to think that this just means hanging around the altars a little longer on Sunday morning. Maybe being in church an extra evening this week. Or having devotions for a half hour rather than 15 minutes. Can I just tell you? – it is none of this.
None of this is what God is after. Sure, they are beautiful, healthy habits. But God is seeking something deeper – worship that is stained with Kingdom action.
Worship that reaches out to the broken. Worship that obeys God. Worship that isn’t self-centered.
How to Bring Acceptable Worship
Let’s pull apart this Psalm 101 passage. It outlines three qualities of acceptable worship:
1. Pursue Faithfulness – The most passionate person isn’t always the most Godly. Just because someone can jump around, waive their hands, shout, and sing at the top of their lungs in a church service doesn’t mean they are where God wants them to be. God’s eyes are on the faithful. The steady. Those who are pursuing obedience at all costs.
2. Walk Blamelessly – God isn’t after passion. He didn’t ask you to just be “on fire” for Him. People like this travel from one Christian event to the next, seeking another spiritual “high” to carry them through life until they hit rock bottom. Rather, focus on living a blameless life. Live in such a way that nobody can point a finger at you and say, “He doesn’t life what he speaks. He’s a fake!”
3. Live Honestly – It’s easy to manipulate – to tip the scales in your favor. God searches for honesty – honesty in your words, your business dealings, and in your relationships. It’s not just about songs. Want to stand in God’s presence? Speak the truth.
Consider this:
“I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the peace offerings of your fattened animals, I will not look upon them. Take away from me the noise of your songs; to the melody of your harps I will not listen. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” (Amos 6:21-24).
How would you like to be greeted on Sunday afternoon (after all your hard work) with, “Take away from me the noise of your songs. I’m not listening.”
Again, God is after something deeper.
Look at this:
“This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men” (Matthew 15:8-9).
The heart.
How close is your heart? You may say all the right things and know all the churchy phrases, but where is the position of your heart? Far? Or right up close to the heart of God?
I don’t know about you, but I want the eyes of God to be on me. When he looks at my life, I want him to see a faithful, blameless, honest heart – a heart that acts justly, loves mercy, and walks humbly with God.
God sees all things at all times but His eyes aren’t on all things at all times. Like our passage in the Psalms – His eyes are on the faithful. They have His full attention.
Live in such a way that you capture the full attention of God (tweet this).
“The true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in Truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks” (John 4:23).
Question: How do you become the kind of worshiper the father seeks? What would it take to lead your team and your church in this sort of worship? What does it look like?
Let’s talk. You can leave a comment by clicking here.
[ois skin=”Beyond Sunday 2″]
“The most passionate person isn’t always the most Godly. Just because someone can jump around, waive their hands, shout, and sing at the top of their lungs in a church service doesn’t mean they are where God wants them to be. God’s eyes are on the faithful. The steady. Those who are pursuing obedience at all costs.”
Wow. David, you are saying things that I have said for years and, honestly, copped crap from various worship pastors for daring to suggest what you wrote here. Thank you for your confirming post!
Sure, Chris. It’s not an easy truth to accept. We typically view the charismatic, visible, passionate, “on-fire” people as the most Godly. But we’ve got to relentlessly bring our lives in line with Scripture. Are we loving God, walking in obedience, and expressing our passion by living it out? I have nothing against passionate people. When I worship, I challenge myself to be on fire and passionate. But I need to devote more energy to truly living for Jesus each day.
You just can’t get through to some people about the significant differences between performing and worship.Many choose to hang around the surface and will not put the effort into getting deeper and understand where your heart, head and soul must be as a group in order to do this well. You have to be mostly or all on the same page. I’ve seen it work right and it’s anointing. I’m in a ministry now of performers who want all the Glory. They try harder every week to bring notice to themselves. My heart says, do not judge but, they represent the image of the group. Makes me question their” calling” to the ministry especially when you try to offer subtle nudges and they tell you you’re out of touch, making too much of it, You’re too serious, ( when I was voted class clown and have fun when it’s proper to do so, etc… The feedback is that of being showy, taking away from Mass. Talent doesn’t equal great ministry. I’ll take genuine hearts and a handful of fair players over a group of power grabbers any day. we just played our last Mass before taking a 2 month break. I will not be returning to the ministry because of the pain it causes me to be there. I gave it 11 years. One door closes right?
Voltin, sorry you’ve been going through such a rough time. Have you taken your break yet?
Pursuing obedience at all costs.Waw that’s it! God doesn’t care about all the offerings or ‘big’ things we are giving him. He wants our true selves, our obedience to Him in all things.
We have to show people the real us, who can’t live right by ourselves and without God’s grace. If we only show them what we like about ourselves or act or say what is socially desirable, then we are missing the point and people are surely gonna see the real us (with all our mistakes etc.) and think about what we’ve said in the sundaymorning service and say: “Hey, they are such fakes! They don’t live what they preach.I don’t wanna be like them!” God also doesn’t wanna look at us when we think we can do it on our own.
David, many thanks for you post! God bless you;-)
Yep – our offerings are meaningless if we’re not offering our lives. Thanks for sharing, Claire!
Thanks for the boat-load of biblical truth again, David! God’s had me parked on this area of personal purity and sincere worship since the new year. Our music ministry is not moving away from this until He releases us. That’s probably when we see Him face to face, but that’s o.k. with me!
Yep – I don’t think you ever get “released” from this!
Practicing what we preach. Living a righteous and holy life–remember we are the hands and feet of Jesus. Ask yourself: am I an encouragement or a discouragement to the unsave? There should be a total submission to His will, obedience, Love and compassion for others. I remember in the book of samuel– obedience is better than sacrifice. A heart that is undivided- sold out, all out for Christ! 🙂
Great stuff, Marc!
This article of yours is really true, because there are a lot of times when we go up stage to minister, very well we tell them the truth from the Word of God, but our life after ministrining is a total different thing… In a nutshell worshipping God falls down to the kind of life we live…
So true, my friend. Who we are off the stage is more important than our talent on the stage.
“The true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in Truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks” (John 4:23).
Such an awesome t and overwhelmingly heartwarming thought !!!
Wow, you brought it – jab, uppercut, hook!
Thanks for saying this.