Revolutionary Leaders

Worship: Touching Heaven, Changing Earth

The HEART of the matter is that Worship is a matter of the HEART.

If we sing or go through the other motions of “how we worship God”, we actually end up mocking him and insulting him if our HEART isn’t in it. It would actually be better for you to just sit there and do nothing than to do it and not mean it.

Jesus was quote from Isaiah when he yelled at the religious people of his day. He said,
"You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you: " 'These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men." (Matt 15:7-9)

Ecclesiastes 5:1-2
1 Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. Go near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools, who do not know that they do wrong.
2 Do not be quick with your mouth, do not be hasty in your heart to utter anything before God. God is in heaven and you are on earth, so let your words be few.

- If you don’t love Jesus, don’t sing “I love you Lord”
- If He’s not the King of your life, don’t sing “You are my King”
- If you’re not surrendering your life to God, don’t sing “I Surrender All”

False worship hurts God and will distance you from Him. That's why he says that true worshipers will worship Him in spirit and in truth.

You can’t touch God without being touched BY God.

1. Worship brings God into your situation
Psalm 23:3
he restores my soul. He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

2. Praise dispels darkness
Psalm 149:6-9
6 May the praise of God be in their mouths and a double-edged sword in their hands,
7 to inflict vengeance on the nations and punishment on the peoples,
8 to bind their kings with fetters, their nobles with shackles of iron,
9 to carry out the sentence written against them. This is the glory of all his saints. Praise the LORD.

3. Praise will help cast off heaviness and burdens
In Isaiah 61:3 God tells us that Jesus has given us
“and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair”

4. Worship brings God’s blessing & deliverance
Psalm 67:5-7
5 May the peoples praise you, O God; may all the peoples praise you.
6 Then the land will yield its harvest, and God, our God, will bless us.
7 God will bless us, and all the ends of the earth will fear him.

* When you have your personal or coorporate times of worship...
- Remember WHO God is
- Remember WHAT God has done
- FIND ways to worship

Psalm 150
1 Praise the LORD. Praise God in his sanctuary; praise him in his mighty heavens.
2 Praise him for his acts of power; praise him for his surpassing greatness.
3 Praise him with the sounding of the trumpet, praise him with the harp and lyre,
4 praise him with tambourine and dancing, praise him with the strings and flute,
5 praise him with the clash of cymbals, praise him with resounding cymbals.
6 Let everything that has breath praise the LORD. Praise the LORD.