So here we go...
"Ministry to God (worship) is often put into the context of songs and not into life." -Bill Johnson
I so often see the parallel between how our worship looks today and what David said many years before Jesus even came to earth:
"You do not delight in sacrifice or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise." Psalm 51:16-17
David understood the importance of the internal sacrifices of the heart (that bring transformation) even when external sacrifices were the practice of the day. He understood the importance of the presence of God.
Let us not merely bring our weekly external offering with just our songs on Sunday, but let us be transformed by the continuous internal offering of a sacrificial heart desperate for the continuous presence of God.
Just as the priests fell on their knees before God as His presence entered the temple (1 Kings 8:10) and as Isaiah gave His life as an offering when He was in the presence of God ("Here I am! Send me!" Isaiah 6:8), how much more should we also fall on our face and give our lives as an offering as we are being transformed from glory to glory.
I do not want my praise on Sunday to be equated with worship. Yes, it is a form of worship! Rather, my worship of God through the offering of my life spills over into the praise I bring Him through song.
Let our lives be the offering. Everything else is just overflow.
Forever His,
Rach
