The War On Worship

Matthew 4:1-11 Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungered. And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread. But he answered and said, It  is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and showeth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.

      The hour is such that we are confronted and challenged by constant temptation to compromise our worship and the integrity of the worshiper himself.  In the above passage of scripture, I find three specific areas of warfare that have been launched against the

worshiper and the Lord's worship.

     1.  In our hunger for God there is a temptation to settle for something earthly, "command that these stones be made bread" knowing that only something heavenly can satisfy. We hunger for the proceeding voice of God our Father and only that whisper satisfies the worshiper!

      2. There is also a temptation to replace performing for praising, or as the case may be, continue in a performance for the audience gathered in the holy city as we look down from the pinnacle of the temple. People come to church to watch preachers, choirs, dancers, singers and such perform for them, rather than participate. Worshipers or watchers, the one is divinely inspired but the latter is demonically invited!   The breach between the platform and pew must be bridged by the corporate celebration of the whole body as a kingdom of priests. Leaders must, like David a man after God's own heart, dance before the Lord with all their might.  Most churches don't worship because their leaders don't worship!  Worship can be taught, but better caught!  The best way to teach worship is to worship!  The church needs to see its leaders exemplify worship before them.

     3. There is a contentment some are finding in the accumulation of material things. This heresy is being taught in our charismatic churches, that gain is godliness" and that spirituality is measured by how much you have or how high you've climbed the mountain of success. The modern church has settled for wealth at the expense of worship, and in the midst of our glitter we've lost the glory!  We modern Christians have learned a few of God's Principles and seem content to practice them without the presence of God. Modern Christianity secularizes God to the point where we don't feel the need of the divine presence. We are devilishly clever in adapting the world's business methods to the work of the Kingdom. We deliberately ignore all of Christ's warnings about motivations and methods of the unconverted and function lust like the person we re trying to convert (Romans 12:1.2). If the sound is turned down on the TV set, it is difficult to know what is being sold - records or Jesus.  Pastors build their kingdoms around themselves instead of on Jesus. The preaching of creativity has replaced the preaching of the cross, and happiness – not holiness has been set as the goal for the believer's life. We still talk about worship, but not the worship of God.  Instead, people are led to worship a program, doctrine, denomination, building, or themselves, but this is a gross compromise of worship as Jesus taught it. We've sidestepped sin and crisis. We haven't required repentance, restitution or transformation.  It is little wonder then that so little true worship of God is found in our churches.  If people never have met God, how can we expect them to worship Him?

       We need a rebirthed hunger for the God of our worship, realizing that people for the most part will allow YOU to pretend you know God, as you fulfill their need for religious pretensions. Furthermore, this world and all its god has to offer cannot fulfill the worshiper! The worshiper is wanted by God and wants God!  Jesus showed us by His example that while it is true that worship is the expression of a feeling we have for our Lord, the substance of worship is neither the feeling nor the expression of that feeling; rather it is the Person who inspired that feeling in the first place. Worship must deal with God first, last and always. If our worship is based on feelings alone instead of Jesus then it is idolatry. Whenever the method of worship becomes more important than the Person of worship, we already have prostituted our worship. Unfortunately, there are entire congregations who "worship praise" and "praise worship" , but who have not learned yet to praise and worship God in Jesus Christ.  The song, the dance, the banners and shouting have been accepted as worship instead of being seen as means of expressing worship. Worship is not a choice; we must worship.  Only the object of our worship remains our choice!  The issue then is not to find worshipers.  Jesus did not tell the woman at Jacob's well that the Father was seeking worshipers.  He told her that the Father was seeking those who worshipped Him (John 4:23). This always has been the problem: to find those who worship God exclusively. The Father searches for people in whom His name, nature, attributes and glory have constant attention; people to whom nothing in life is more important than God Himself. God is seeking persons who are consciously in love with Him that every thought of their minds, every feeling of their emotions and every response of their lives is in harmony with that love.  If God is who He says He is and if we are the believing people of God that we claim to be, then we must worship Him. This was the purpose of creation and it is the reason for our redemption. God yearns for fellowship with His people whose lives have been rescued from self-centeredness and restored to a God-consciousness. It is His desire and it should be our delight.

       Perhaps our text is best translated: "You shall worship the Lord your God and Him only." All spiritual worship must have God as its object. Each local church exists to become corporately what individual Christian believers are called to do: worship God!  This is our exclusive calling, and everything else in our lives must flow out of that worship. If the purpose of our gathering is to worship, then nothing that calls attention away from God to itself should be allowed in that service. Worship is one thing that God refuses to share with another. That or those who seek to be worshipped will find a similar treatment to that given to Lucifer: Out!

      Because worship is the mission of the church, all satanic temptation ultimately is directed against worship. If Satan cannot get us to worship him directly he will seek to divert, prevent or pervert our worship and he is a master at this. During the forty days of temptation in the wilderness, the devil dared to approach Jesus with the same temptation he uses so successfully against many today: "Worship me!" Christ was offered the world, without the pain of the cross in exchange for a shift in the object of His worship. A crown without a Cross!  Jesus resisted it totally, and the tempter was spoiled in his attempt to divert worship away from Father God.

       The devil has continually tempted the church to worship that which is beneath God Himself. Just as in days gone by, the devil is busy in the church today, tempting us to

dispossess or replace God as the object of our worship. To accomplish his task he needs the help of the church, so he comes to her leadership with temptations, such as holding firmly to the tradition of the elders no matter what God is presently revealing. Tradition can be as serious a bondage as sin, and need not be 100 years old to become a trap. Sometimes we have week old traditions that prevent us from moving with clear direction of God's Spirit. At other times we are tempted to hold to our preplanned program rather than set it aside for a move of the Spirit. The enemy also entices us to exalt ourselves above God. We are tempted to bring America's humanism and "rights" into our relationship with God and the church. We fail to remember that when we allowed God to run the awl through our ear and place a golden earring in the hole to keep it from healing, we became a love-slave with no rights whatever. God reigns - we do not!  Another temptation the devil brings against believers is that of adoring someone beneath God,

worshiping a position or someone in a position. While leaders are to be honored they are not holy; they should be godly, but they are not God.  As long as we are adoring someone beneath God we will not be extolling God in worship and that is the purpose of Satan's temptation.  Finally people are so self-conscious that they fail to give God the attention that worship requires. We are so focused on our outer appearance that we've failed to give place to the development of the "inner man."

     All temptation is concerned with worship. If Satan cannot get us to worship him he will seek to prevent us from worshipping God. Today's church is tempted to worship anyone and anything other than God, and all too often the temptation is successful. If we are going to follow the platform of Jesus, we must refuse to worship anyone and anything other than God Himself. Purity in worship will produce purity in lives and ministry. Jesus settled the issue of the object of His worship before He ever entered into His ministry. So must we. Once Jesus settled this issue, He gloriously entered into the product of worship that God Himself provides: VICTORY!

     The Mary-Martha syndrome still exists in the church. Some dedicate themselves to do work for God, while others feel called to be worshipers of God. This is inconsistent with the statement of Jesus in the hour of His temptation for He said: "You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve. In quoting the OT passage, Jesus declared the divine priority that worship is first and service is second. This denounced the division of the church into Marys and Marthas. It is worship and service, not worship or service. Each of us is to be a worshiper, and out of that worship should flow service. However it is much easier to teach the mechanics of activity than to bring persons into a vital relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. Many of these active Christians and non-active I might add, are serving an absentee Master Who is not only distant, but quite unreal. Service quickly becomes a job instead of a joy, for dedication wears thin when exhaustion sets in.  They need fresh motivation into new endeavors on behalf of this unknown God or their service will completely cease.  Motivation or meditation?  Motivation produces service, but meditation of the Lord produces worship.  Relationship with Him must be the first step in worship of Him. Otherwise our worship will be as cold and callused as the worship of the Pharisees.

Bishop Jim Dutton – New Covenant Christian Center – Augusta, GA - or - http://www.bishopdutton.org