What exactly IS
worship?
So what is Christian worship? In modern American church services, it means the singing part of the service. For others it means love feelings for God. Literally, worship means to bow down or lay down. In the Bible, worship always includes the element of a sacrifice. Taking those two elements, worship could be defined as a life surrendered to God and given over to Him as a sacrifice.
In Romans 12, Paul tells us that in light of God's mercies to offer our lives as a living sacrifice. This, he says, is our acceptable act of worship. He says in doing this we will get renewed minds and come to know the will of God. I see at least five things we can lay down or sacrifice in our worship of God:
- We can give God our time
- We can give God our treasure
- We can give God our attention
- We can give God our talents
- We can give God our praise
All of these are things we do in order to worship. But here's another important point: To truly worship we give these things as a free offering of love, born out of a genuine encounter with God. If we do them in a legalistic way, we won't have our minds renewed and we won't come to know the will of God but instead become religious modern day Pharisees. Worship is first and foremost the willing sacrifice made out of love because we have been met by the deep love and mercy of God in Christ.
Worship is first and foremost
the willing sacrifice made out of
love because we have been met by
the deep love and mercy
of God in Christ
