How does God see Worship?

What do we think of when we hear the word worship? Some remember the songs and melodies they have sung. Others attach that word to the time right before a sermon is given. More important than what we think, the question we should ask is what does God think of when we say worship. To tap into God’s perspective let’s ask these questions.

• Does God need worship?
• Does God need attention?
• Is He insecure and needs validation?

God does not need or desire attention. He was God before any creature worshipped or even existed. He was complete and in no need of attention or validation. As we move to read a well known passage, we might find that God is not even seek worship at all because it is a byproduct of what He does desire. Worship has a different fountain that God established for a reason.

‍John 4:21-24

²¹ “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. ²² You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. ²³ Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. ²⁴ God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

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Jesus says that He looks for worshippers meaning He is desiring a type of people. He is looking for men and women who are conformed not to an action but a base identity. Worship is a byproduct of who we are and hence is grander than what we might believe it is.

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 I think after looking at these verses we can cut some long-held ideas.

• We should not box worship to being a song.
• We should not box worship to serving God with talents.
• We should not box worship as warfare to overcome obstacles in life.

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Worship can include the forms of songs and talents but does not base itself on them.

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In its essence from the beginning and displayed in the life of Christ, who is the prototype standard of worship, worship is the life founded on intimacy with Him. To be intimate with Christ is to accept the lifestyle of the Son presented by Jesus and to be in a loving relationship with the God the Father through the Spirit of God in you. This is what it means to worship in Spirit and truth. We see this from the cause of the creation of the heavens and the earth. God’s intent was always to elect man as an heir who He would intimately know and support in revealing His nature of love in all the spheres of existence. God was not lonely or in need of completion, rather He desired we would fully benefit from being included in Him. Ephesians 1:3-5

For this reason when God creates man He tells him to “tend the garden”

• The garden was the altar in creation where God would come to meet man and speak to him
• It was the place where Adam would learn the mysteries hidden in creation and further advance the fulfillment of God’s plan
• In this sense, the life of worship was the normal functioning of man on earth.

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Worship is not merely about warfare or pleasing God to get things, it is the intimacy between the Father and those who are in the Son.

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The enemy of man who despised God’s choice, decided to take the form of a serpent to destroy the cornerstone of worship and in turn, man’s purpose of being intimate with God. This story is recounted in Genesis 3. However in the declaration of God concerning the consequences of sin for Adam and Eve, He also makes a promise to Eve while condemning the serpent (Genesis 3:14-15)

Christ is the seed promised that will finally “bruise the serpents head”. By doing this He would show us the way back to the Father, making Him the only way to Him. He is the only one who shows us the lifestyle of intimacy and worship that pleases God.

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Conclusion

Christ has overcome the enemy that stood in the way for all of us to be worshippers. Like that woman Jesus spoke to, some of us still have other husbands and prefer lives of intimacy without God. The songs, hours of prayer, or reading His word are nothing if we do not have intimacy in our heart with Him. If we want to worship according to how God sees it, lets return to the Garden- the first altar of communion between the Father and son on earth.