Worship the Lord

From the very beginning of man, our God wanted to be worshiped.  We see this with Cain and Abel where Abel offered an acceptable sacrifice to God, but Cain did not.  From this story we know that God had given instruction to these people about what He wanted from them in worship.  But all through the Bible we learn of the importance of acceptable worship and respect toward our God.

Leviticus 10 tells us the story of Nadab and Abihu.  They offered "strange fire," a type of incense to God, and He ended their lives because of it.  The punishment seems extreme, but these men knew better and took it upon themselves to violate God with strange worship.

Early worship consisted of building altars to God and making sacrifices.  Later God would give a special Law to the Hebrew, Jewish, people, brought to them through Moses.  In this process God set up priests and a High Priest to assist with proper worship.  He instructed them to build a tabernacle which would include the Ark of the Covenant.  The Ark was a box of about 4 feet by 2 and a half feet by 2 and a half feet; it was to be reverenced.  There were very specific instructions as to who could see it, when it could be seen, and how it was to be handled, and every Jew knew that.  In 2 Samuel 6 we read of the Ark being moved.  It wasn't being handled properly and trouble was about to happen.  Uzzah, walking along beside the Ark, saw that it was about to fall.  He reached out to steady it but was struck dead by God.  His action seems only reasonable, justifiable, from a human viewpoint.  But God had given specific instructions about how to handle His Ark.  Man has his (our) own ideas about what pleases God.  But we need to be looking at what He says, what He teaches and what He wants.

So we jump to the New Testament.  We learn that Jesus was a good Jew and that He kept the Jewish Law during His lifetime.  One of the last things He did before dying was to take the Passover feast with His apostles.  But after He leaves them, as recorded at the end of Luke and the beginning of Acts, a new age begins.  Followers become "Christians."  The "church" is born.  Sunday worship begins, where before it had always been on Saturday. Christians took the communion, the Lord's Supper, when they came together to worship, an example being Acts 20:7. 

So what is the message for us today?  First, we must recognize that worship is very important to God.  He wants it, and He wants it done His way.  And what is His way?  We go to His Word, the Bible, and see what He has His early followers doing in terms of worship.  They were meeting each week on Sunday, taking the communion to "remember" Him, preaching, praying, singing, giving a contribution as needed.  Thus, we should follow the example, the pattern given to us by these early followers.  We need to please Him with our worship.....and do it His way.

Thanks for reading.  Feel the love....

Micah

Micah was a prophet to Judah from about 735 to 710 BC. He brought a stern message to Judah about God's judgment to come.  He also talked about the coming fall of the Northern kingdom, Israel.

Notice Micah 6:6-8, "With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the High God?  Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, ten thousand rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?  He has shown you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?"  He is telling us that God does not need our sacrifices, but He does want our hearts, our love, our dedication, our obedience.

Paul tells us in Philippians 2:1 on, "Therefore if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind.  Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself.  Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.  Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus..."  This gives clues as to how we should live during our short time on earth. 

Let's listen to these wise words and try to live them daily.  Have a great week!

Saul

We can learn a lot of valuable lessons by going to the Old Testament.  Saul is a good example of this point, although not a good example of how to do God's will completely.  In this post, we will examine two passages that show that God is a particular God. 

First, let's notice who Saul is.  He was chosen by God to be the first, the very first, king of the nation of Israel.  Actually, there was a king in Israel before: God Himself.  And God allowed the people to have a king, but He was not in favor of it.  So God picked Saul, a tall and beautiful man to be the king. 
Saul made a great and powerful start as king; we read of this in 1 Samuel 11 and 12.  But as we get to chapter 13, we see that Saul disobeys God.  He gets impatient and decides to offer a burnt offering to God that he knows is wrong.  he knew this was the job of a prophet and priest , but he didn't wait for Samuel to come and make the offering.  God through Samuel pronounced judgment on Saul. 

In chapter 15 of 1 Samuel, Saul is clearly charged with utterly destroying the Amalekites.  The Amalekites had been a problem for Israel in the time of the Exodus from Egypt.  God wanted them punished.  but Saul made the decision to save back the king and the best of the spoil for purposes of sacrifice later to God.  But Samuel the prophet comes down hard on Saul saying, "Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams."  The point is being made to Saul that, yes, he made a sacrifice to God; but he didn't do exactly what God had asked.  Consequently, God rejected Saul as king and would proceed to replace him with David.

The main lesson in all of this is that God wants obedience.  He wants us to do what He says regardless of what we might think is best.  This message is taught all through the Bible.   Thanks for reading.  I hope your week is a great one!

Weekly Worship

It is common practice in the "Christian" world today to worship God weekly.  In this posting we will look at this practice and examine why this is so, and why it matters.

We see in the Old Testament that God instructed Moses, when giving him the 10 commandments (Exodus 20), that worship should be on the Sabbath.  This was Saturday worship, set aside because God rested on the seventh day when creating the world.  So all through the Old Testament, beginning with the time of Moses, we see the Jewish people doing their worship on Saturday.

This all changes in the New Testament, beginning in the book of Acts; this is after Jesus has left the earth and gone back to heaven.  We read about these early Christians worshiping not on the sabbath, on Saturday, but on Sunday, the first day of the week.  Note Acts 20:7, "Now on the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them and continued his message until midnight."  And in 1 Corinthians 16:1,2, "Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given orders to the churches of Galatia, so you must do also: On the first day of the week let each one of you lay something aside, storing up as he may prosper, that there be no collection when I come."  In each case we see that the typical practice of these early Christians was to meet on Sunday, the first day of the week.

Yes, times have changed; we live in a new age with new ways.  But the Bible is not out of date.  We would do well to follow the pattern given to us by these Christians, and really to follow the pattern given to us by God since it is His Word.  And not only in worship, but we need to follow the NT pattern that God has given in all ways. 

Thanks for reading again.  See you next week. 

The Word

Jesus Christ is the Word of God.  This seems confusing; how can a man be "the Word?"  We may not understand everything about this, but we can know some things because the Bible gives us clues.

John 1 starts this way: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.  All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.  In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.  And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it."  He not only is the Word of God; He was with God, was God, in the beginning, at the creation.  Verse 14 tells us, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."

We see in Revelation 19:11-16 that His name is the Word of God.  This is a powerful view into heaven.  We see our Savior, the Word of God, with His armies.  They are all in white on white horses.  He is "clothed with a robe dipped in blood."  He gave His all, His life, for us.

The Word of God is called the Son of God, Son of Man, Christ, Savior, Lord and much more.  We need to follow Him...the Word of God.

Thanks for reading again.  Have a great week!