Full On Worship // Overboard with Jesus, Part 10

A Different Perspective Official Podcast

Worshipping is singularly the most selfless thing any person can do but all too often our view of what worship is limited by our experience. Some people think that worship is what we do when we sing songs at Church on Sunday but worship is so much more than that.

Okay, so how do you worship God? More recently, I guess, as many if not most Churches have moved to contemporary worship. The songs have become more upbeat, many Churches use lighting and wall banners and logo's and contemporary furnishings not to mention extremely professional music teams to help their people worship.

It's easy to be critical of all of that but there's nothing new in any of that. Go and visit any old cathedral and there are plenty of them scattered across Europe, and you realise we've been going to huge lengths to express our awe and wonder of God for a very long time. But to tell you the truth, maybe it's just me, a lot of those external trappings leave me just a bit cold.

It's not that I don't appreciate great ecclesiastical architecture or Handel's Messiah or some of the great hymns or some of the great worship songs that have been written more recently but I've been in places that have all that and more and yet the best way to describe them is dead. It's as though God isn't in that place, it's as though sometimes we try to conjure up God's presence by designing, by building, by performing.

I remember just before I graduated from Bible College we had Graduands Retreat Day. There was about forty of us who were graduating together with a few of our lecturers and tutors. We headed off to a Church building in a leafy suburb away from distractions just to spend a day fellowshipping and praying and, well, worshiping. The guy who led worship had a scratchy voice, his guitar was slightly out of tune and yet it remains to this day the most awesome time of song worship that I've ever experienced.

We're heading towards the end of a series today, a series that I've called Overboard with Jesus. It sort of began around that great passage of Scripture where Peter gets out of the boat and walks towards Jesus on the stormy ocean of Tiberias. Let's go back and have a quick read just to remind ourselves, Matthew chapter 14 verses 22 to 33:

Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go ahead to the other side while He dismissed the crowds and after He had dismissed the crowds He went up the mountain by Himself to pray. When evening came He was there alone but by this time the boat, battered by waves, was far from land for the wind was against them.

And early in the morning He came walking towards them on the sea but when the disciples saw Him walking on the sea they were terrified saying 'it's a ghost' and they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, 'take heart, it is I, do not be afraid.

So Peter answered Him, 'Lord if it is you command me to come to you on the water'. He said 'come'. So Peter got out of the boat started walking on the water and came towards Jesus but then he noticed the strong wind and he became frightened and beginning to sink he cried out 'Lord save me.

Jesus immediately reached out His hand and caught him saying 'you of little faith, why did you doubt?' When they got into the boat the wind ceased and those in the boat worshipped him saying 'truly you are the Son of God.

So there's good old Pete, stuck in a boat with his mates on the Sea of Tiberias. They're a long way from home, the boats been battered by waves, the wind's against them, remembering that this was Jesus decision for His disciples. And when Jesus finally comes out to rescue them the disciples are petrified until He identifies Himself and within a split second Peter, who remember is a fisherman, he knows these waters, he's sailed them many a time, he knows the danger of the storm but despite that, within a split second he says to Jesus:

Lord if it's you command me to come to you out on the water.

Here's what I believe, what was going on in Peter's heart in that instant is worship because in that moment Peter is prepared to connect his faith in Jesus with his actions, with his life with what he's about to do. Peter is prepared to step on to that stormy sea to follow Jesus.

There are two different words used for worship in the New Testament, one is the word 'proskunio' from which we get the English word to 'prostate yourself'. It's the sort of worship we do on Sunday mornings when we're singing songs in Church; it's bowing down and declaring with our hearts, with our mouths that Jesus Christ is Lord.

And that's awesome stuff, although as I said you can sing songs without worshipping God, I've seen people checking their watches, looking around to see who's coming in late or who's leaving early, scrolling through social media on their Smartphone’s during worship time. In that case worship is a complete misnomer, it's just singing.

But if your heart is engaged then yes, what’s going on there is proskunio worship. Bowing down before the throne of God, awesome stuff whether it’s a guy with a scratchy voice on an out of tune guitar or whether it’s a full on rock concert, the trappings are pretty much irrelevant.

The other word, and we looked at this one yesterday on the program, is 'latreo' from which we get the word lateral. In other words, outward lateral worship through what we do, how we live, how we behave, how we spend our money, how we spend our time. Many times this word is translated as service rather than worship. There's one verse in the New Testament where both words are used in that single verse. Its Jesus replying to the second temptation in the wilderness, he says and I quote:

It is written 'worship the Lord your God and serve only Him.

Luke chapter 4 verse 8.

So here's the question for you today, as you live out your life - are you living it all for Jesus? Are you worshipping Him with everything that you think and say and do? Because truthfully, stepping out of that boat onto the stormy ocean is worship. It’s living out the proskunio worship that’s in our hearts as latreo worship in our lives.

Much later the Apostle Paul put it like this in Colossians chapter 3 verses 1 to 3 and verse 17:

So if you have been raised with Christ seek the things that are above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things that are above not on the things that are on the earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, is revealed then you also will be revealed with Him in glory and whatever you do, in word or in deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.

So yes, by all means, set your mind on the things that are above. Worship God, see Him for who He is, explore the deep mystery of God with great wonder in your heart, worship Him with all of your heart and then, then whatever you do, do everything that you do, every word, every deed in His name for His sake.

Your life, my friend, is meant to be a celebration, a reflection, a worship of who God is. If the Spirit of Christ truly dwells in you, if you are sold out to Jesus, then how you live your life tells the rest of us, tells God, of your worship and adoration of Him. Or not.

He wants to lead you to places that you've never imagined. He wants to work in you and through you in the most amazing ways. He wants to pour His love out into this world through you, through the unique gifts and abilities and motivations and dreams that He's woven into your DNA.

Why is it that so often we're too distracted with the mundane, day to day, unimportant issues of life to worship God with our very being? What's the matter with us that we want to squander the opportunities that present themselves every day to worship God with our hearts and with our hands? Why do we do that?