“Worship personally, worship closely, and worship always. Jesus paid the price and changed the way we worship forever.”
Maybe you’ve heard of the Adoption Curve or Adoption Life Cycle. This is a sociological model that suggests how we adapt to changes around us. It puts us into categories; early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. The early adopters are the people who immediately embrace change. The early majority are the bulk of people not afraid of change, but who don’t jump on quickly. The late majority are those who eventually join the crowd, but it take a little while longer. The last group, the laggards, are those who hold on and are very reluctant to change.
You see this used most often in adopting technology, but I think the same happens in the way that we adopt changes worship as well. Now, I’m not referring to the methodological changes in the way we execute worship services, but a deeper level of change that occurred more than 2000 years ago when Jesus gave his life on the cross.
At that moment, Jesus changed everything, but I want to talk specifically about how he changed the way we worship. In that one moment Jesus made worship personal, he changed the proximity of worship, and open the door of worship possibilities.
PERSONAL
Prior to Christ’s victory on the cross worship wasn’t personal for each individual. Sure they all brought sacrifices in a ritualistic system, but only the priests could offer the sacrifices. And only the high priest, once a year, could go behind the veil. Not everyone could offer a sacrifice. Sure everyone could sing a song about God, but not everyone could enter into his presence, not everyone could offer the sacrifice. Worship that engaged with God presence was reserved for a few.
Jesus changed that.
Jesus tore the veil and opened up the opportunity to worship for all of us. We can offer our own sacrifice, we can enter into his presence. You can worship God directly. No matter what you’ve done, where you’ve been, or how sinful you feel. Jesus made worship personal.
So… Don’t let someone else worship for you. Don’t depend on the worship of others. Jesus made worship personal so YOU could worship. You don’t need a priest, a pastor, or a worship leader to worship for you. Don’t stand on the other side of the door looking through at others worshipping. Walk through the door that Jesus opened and engage with God. Sing with YOUR voice, lift YOUR hands, bring YOUR own sacrifice. Jesus gave his life so you could become a worshipper.
PROXIMITY
Before Jesus worship was done from a distance. As I mentioned before only the high priest at a certain time could go into the presence of God in the holy of holies and offer a sacrifice. Very few people in the Old Testament got to draw near to God because his presence was so powerful. The brokenness of sinful man couldn’t be in the presence of a holy God. So worship was done from a distance.
Jesus changed that.
Jesus made nearness to God possible and open the door for us to draw near to the presence of God. He forever changed the proximity of worship and in fact worship became part of our transformation. My friend Miles Welch says, “Nearness to God becomes likeness to Christ.”
Paul said it this way…
1 Corinthians 3:18 (ESV) – “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.”
This nearness is important not just because it makes worship transformational, but even more so because it changed the very nature of our relationship with God. We no longer worship from a distance we can draw near to the living God and that proximity is wondrous, undeserved, and life-changing. Don’t worship from a distance. There is a temptation for all of us at times to keep God at arms length as we worship in an effort to not lose control or become undignified. We are afraid if we get to close we may succumb to tears or raise our hands a little too high, but God invites you close, to worship with abandon, and to worship in surrender. Nearness will and should render us “undone” just as it did Isaiah in Isaiah 6.
Don’t worship from a distance. Draw near to the Lord as you worship and let it change you forever.
POSSIBILITIES
As I’ve mentioned worship in the Old Testament was very ritualistic. If sinful man was going to approach Holy God he must do it very specifically and very carefully. It was to be done at certain times through certain methods and in no other way. Worshipping God incorrectly or even obeying God outside of his specific instruction could cost you your life. Check out the story of Uzzah who didn’t carry the ark correctly in 2 Samuel 6. Worship had to be executed very specifically and only through certain acts at certain times by certain people.
Jesus changed that.
Jesus opened the door to “lifestyle” worship. Maybe you’ve heard someone say the phrase “worship is a lifestyle” and they would be correct, but only because Jesus allows it to be so. Because of Jesus sacrifices can by offered by any means, by any person, at any time. Worship in it’s simplest form is giving God glory. Because of Jesus we can worship God while playing with our kids, enjoying nature, and even while we are driving down the highway, well sometimes… 🙂
Paul gives us the great scriptural foundation of lifestyle worship in Romans 12:1 and I love the Message paraphrase of this verse.
Romans 12:1 (MSG) – So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life and place it before God as an offering.
So do just that… take the wholeness of your life and realize that every simple act of life can be offered to God as worship. You may say, “How?”. The best place to begin to worship is in gratitude. In fact Psalm 100:4 says, “Enter his gates with thanksgiving…” Enter… begin with thanksgiving. You can be thankful for your job, your car, your food, your friends, football, music, etc… gratitude is a great way to begin to offer worship to God for all things you experience and love in life. After all he is the giver of every good and perfect gift.
Don’t limit your worship to 20 minutes of singing in church. Offer your life as worship.
CONCLUSION
Jesus changed the way we worship forever. He made it personal, change the proximity of worship, and open the door of worship possibilities. Take advantage of this. Don’t depend on others to worship for you, don’t worship from a distance, and don’t limit your worship to certain times or a certain place. Worship personally, worship closely, and worship always. Jesus paid the price to change the way we worship forever.
Key Thoughts:
- Don’t let others worship for you
- Don’t worship from a distance
- Don’t limit your worship to 20 minutes on Sunday