Before You Change The World

“The actual connection”

 

In session I we discussed the importance of embracing and trusting again in the power and presence of God. Letting Him run the worship service and your heart. In session II we are going to learn how to walk this out.

 

Before you change THE world you must change YOUR world

 

When I was attending Bible College at Portland Bible I often heard a strong and passionate statement made by students. Every time I heard the statement something just didn’t sit right with me. Everyone else seemed so impassioned when it was used but I was never moved or inspired. Now that you are totally curious…the statement was “I want to change the world!” Now at first glance sounds like a pretty valid statement and I do not question the motive and sincerity of those who so passionately proclaimed it. I often found myself feeling overwhelmed by the statement as it meant something so much greater then me, that I could be a part of something greater then myself. I was an off campus student. At the time it felt as though I was missing out on true bible school experience because I didn’t share in the dorm life and all the clubs. Later on however in my last term there that I discovered that God was doing something in my heart and using my off campus experience to really speak to me. I was working in a music store with a staff of about 30 men and I the only female amongst the group. It was an educational experience to say the least. Everyday was a chore for me. I was in constant culture shock between Bible College and my horribly crass working environment. My school was up on a hill in North Portland and everyday I would drive down off that sheltered mountaintop of glory into the valley that I call “my real world experience”. Over the course of this season I grew increasingly worn down and frustrated. I would go to my classes and chapel times at school and sit frustrated. Frustrated because it felt like that world wasn’t reality. I would hear all these great statements like “I want to change the world”, and I thought to myself “ok well that’s really going to happen with you all sitting up here and talking about it for you 4 years.” Now let me be the first to say that my thought process there was completely pious and judgmental but bare with me here it’s going somewhere. My attitude at work grew increasingly irritable and impatient. It was two extreme experiences colliding and I was at a breaking point. I would barely get through each day at work keeping to myself and reading my bible with great fury on my breaks. One day as I was tuning and polishing the acoustic guitars I began to pray. I pressed God for answers and clarity. “God, it’s so overwhelming sometimes. How can we really change the world? I am only one person and it’s such a big statement to throw around. There is so much to change, where do I even start?” I felt the presence of God with me right there in that room full of guitars polishing cloth in hand. I heard what I believe was the Lord speaking to me and He said, “Before you can change the world you must change your world.” It was just so profound. How could I have missed it? I was humbled yet again in the presence of my king. I was surrounded by a world of hurting and searching people. I was a small little light in a big dark room but my light had grown so dim in weariness. Dim in selfishness. I learned something that year. Something that changed my faith in its entirety. I learned that it starts with me and the immediate world that has been given to me. It’s the person sitting next to me on the bus or train, the cashier at the grocery store, the homeless person on the side of the road, or the elderly woman crossing the street. This was the greatest act of worship. It is the essence of who Jesus is. It starts with who I am touching, loving, and serving. It starts with me.

 

If we are going to change our world with the mighty presence of God and His awesome love it starts with us. We have to get bigger on the inside!! How do we do that? I have compiled 4 ways that will help you to grow bigger on the inside through worship on a personal level.

  

1. Worship with your heart not just your mouth

Matthew 1-11 “ 1 Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted there by the devil. 2 For forty days and forty nights he fasted and became very hungry.3 During that time the devil came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become loaves of bread.”4 But Jesus told him, “No! The Scriptures say,‘People do not live by bread alone,
but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”5 Then the devil took him to the holy city, Jerusalem, to the highest point of the Temple, 6 and said, “If you are the Son of God, jump off! For the Scriptures say,‘He will order his angels to protect you.
   And they will hold you up with their hands
so you won’t even hurt your foot on a stone.7 Jesus responded, “The Scriptures also say, ‘You must not test the Lord your God. 8 Next the devil took him to the peak of a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. 9 “I will give it all to you,” he said, “if you will kneel down and worship me. 10 “Get out of here, Satan,” Jesus told him. “For the Scriptures say you must worship the Lord your God
 and serve only him. 11 Then the devil went away, and angels came and took care of Jesus.

When Satan tempted Jesus in the wilderness and asked him to bow down and worship him, was he asking Jesus to sing a chorus with his name associated with it? Perhaps that was part of it, but the greater goal was to get Jesus to deliver His entire being to the hands of Satan. Surrender His thoughts, His desires, affections, dreams, everything within Him. His heart essentially. I think this story is one of the truest teachings we can find on worship. Even the devil has it down! God is asking for our entire being. Not just part of your heart. Surrender sums up our relationships with Christ. The person who has worship in their heart is the one who will have the Lord walking with them all the days of their life.

2. Worship when nobodies watching

When you are alone you discover the heart of worship. You will discover that you were built for it and made for it. Out of the heart of worship comes your entire Christian life. You find a new ability to hear the voice of God when you worship. If you don’t sing, start singing!!! Love worship and let it create an atmosphere over your life.

Go to the throne room daily. Hebrews 4:16 says “come boldly to the throne room of grace”. Remember that your public worship expression is an overflow of your personal worship experience.

Heb. 9:11-18   11 But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. 12 Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. 13 For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, 14 how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? 15 And for this reason He is the Mediator of the new covenant, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.

We have complete access into His amazing presence because of the once and for all offering. The first part of this verse speaks of God as our “High Priest”. He entered the most holy place with His own blood. He didn’t come with an animal sacrifice or offering but with His own and that is what makes Him the high priest. No one else can hold that office, only Christ. In the Old Testament, a priest main function was to carry out the worship of God through the offering of sacrifices. There were essentially two different kinds of sacrifices: sin offerings and thank offerings, which were offered to express gratitude for God’s goodness and blessing. The New Testament tells us that Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament sin offerings through his death (Heb. 9:11-14; 10:1-14); so, we never need to make those types of sacrifices to God again. But as Christians who have benefited from his sacrifice, we have the freedom to express our gratitude to God for Christ’s work in many ways. In 1 Peter 2:5 when he says that we “offer up spiritual sacrifices to God.” Peter does not say here what these sacrifices are, except that they are spiritual, not physical. By studying other passages in the New Testament, however, I discovered several different sacrifices that we can worship God with. I think it is important to recognize that no one way is viewed as more spiritual than the others; all are important if we want to have well-rounded spiritual lives. A few different sacrifices or ways to worship are:

1.      we can offer our whole selves Rom. 12:1,

2.      we can offer God our praise Heb. 13:15

3.      we can offer service to others Heb. 13:16.

 I really think this study in the New Testament makes it clear that worship is to be a lifestyle made up of lots of different kinds of actions and not just a corporate meeting. This concept of worship is so important because when Christians view worship as the most important priority (which is correct) but have a superficial view of what worship is, the result is often a superficial Christian life. These kinds of Christians are faithfully committed to attending the Sunday worship service, but because they view that as the heart of worship, they fail to develop a lifestyle of true whole-hearted commitment to God, thankfulness, financial stewardship and ministry. I think God is more pleased and we are more fulfilled when we develop lifestyles surrounded by the full worship experience described in the New Testament. So go to your prayer closet. Open your bible and begin to sing the word over yourself, your circumstances, and others in your life.

3. Forget about you, think about him

Matthew 6:10-13 “Our Father in heaven,
may your name be kept holy. 10 May your Kingdom come soon.
May your will be done on earth,
as it is in heaven.
11 Give us today the food we need 12 and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us. 13 And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one.

Notice the first five points of the Lords prayer are to do with God?

God’s sitting up in heaven saying “Hey pray my prayers would ya?”

Humility is the essence of worship. We will be talking more about this later on in the study but humility is key to experiencing a real worship life.

4. Change your attitude

Psalm 100:2 “Worship the Lord with gladness.

                     Come before him, singing with joy.”

Don’t come into His presence with a crappy attitude!! Rejoice and go to your happy place. Think happy thoughts. Your attitude will make or break your personal worship times with the Lord.

FRONT FOOTED WORSHIP

GET INTO IT!!! Get into whatever is going on in your life. Don’t shrink back. Sometimes we have to make a decision as Christians to stop complaining about life and jump in. We must enter in with thanksgiving. You make a choice to worship the living God and let go of offenses and bitterness. It will tear you down and separate you from His presence.

Before You Take the Stage

You’re back stage with the worship team five minutes before show time. You’re tuning your guitar, warming up your voice, running the set list and opening thoughts through your head. Mentally rehearsing all the little parts you worked out with the band. You check your face and outfit one last time to make sure you look like a rock star.

STOP

What’s wrong with this picture? Maybe if we took out the words “worship team” and inserted the words “rock band” instead it would work better? There is something important missing here. Can you guess? Ok, you probably guessed it, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, God, you know the big cheese? That is what will make or break your worship service. BEFORE YOU HIT THE STAGE YOU MUST HIT THE THRONE ROOM!!!

To the worshiper and worship leader

Just as we have been talking about the atmosphere of worship over your life and how to create that we must go deep into His awesome presence ever time we even attempt to lead people into worship.

Preparation: Every person is different. Do what you have to do to touch the face of God on your own and together with your worship team.

5 ways to immerse yourself in His presence before you hit the stage:

            1. Exhort

            Stir the fire up. Everyone comes in carrying stuff from the day. Some will come in excited and some not so much. Each other with scriptures and pump yourself up for Jesus!  Pray for each others needs and for an increased anointing. Be sensitive to each other and to the spirit. This will help in creating unity too.

2. Worship!

Before you worship, worship!!!

Sing together or my favorite is praying out and singing spiritual songs. Songs of God. Your times in communion with God before the service will typically determine what kind of worship experience you have in the service.

3. Express the vision

            Share the vision and create the mission for the service. What is the purpose God is speaking? What does He want to accomplish? Carry that mission with great significance and priority and know and make clear what the focus is for that worship time.

4. Pray the Vision

            Not only can you pray the vision but the job of a worship team is to sing and prophecy the vision of the church. Did you know you actually have the authority to sing things into existence? YOU DO!!!

It is so easy to miss out on the importance of having a clear vision.

Proverbs 29:18 says “without vision the people will perish.” If you don’t have a vision pray that God gives you one and see the change it brings. Know the vision of the church. Ask your pastor for the vision if it’s not clear.

5. Sing the word together

            One of my favorite memories in my worship training times is singing the Psalms. We would start a simple chord progression, split up the scriptures and then take turns singing them. As we were singing we would let the spirit move and begin to flow in prophetic song.

Sing the word, build up your faith and it will cause your passion for Christ to awaken and your heart to come alive.

These are just five ways I have encountered in my experiences. Dig deep and seek the Lord about maybe what He is wanting you to do before you hit the stage and before you change your world.

Jesus,

Take me deeper. Deeper into your presence before I hit the stage. Show me the people and needs around me in my world that need your touch. Then use my life to minister to them. May my personal times with you grow greatly and deepen as I seek to touch a world that is dieing and know you in a greater way. Enlarge my heart for people, for you, and your presence. Amen.