Connecting Inside and Out // Worship as a Way of Life, Part 4

Sometimes what we do on the outside reflects what’s happening on the inside. Other times, we try to hide what’s happening on the inside by behaving differently on the outside. And in the long run – that just doesn’t work.

Something we love to do, it comes pretty naturally, is to have a disconnect between our spirituality or our faith on the one hand and our lives on the other.

Maybe we go to Church on a Sunday, that sacred zone over there, you know you go there and you sing songs and you worship God. "Oh God, you're so wonderful, I love you so much, I exalt you above all. Lord, I worship you and I praise you", all that stuff. Brilliant, it's great but then on Monday morning we go back to work, the same old, same old. Back in the groove.

If you're a Mum maybe you have to rush to get the kids off to school and then head out to work. Dad, you're on the train or in the car, on the bus doing the commute. Or maybe you're unemployed or retired or whatever, sitting at home alone and that thing we call worship that happened over there on Sunday morning seems a million miles away, somehow it's not connected to the realities of life. It was great while it lasted but now it's back to earth with a thud.

Have you ever felt like that? It's like you have a disconnect between faith over in this little box and life over in that box. Worship's something that happens over here in the sacred zone but when you get back to the real world, well it's hard you know, it's tough, there's a grind, there are pressures, there are issues, people make compromises.

You're not alone; I mean in the West many Christ followers experience that. The sense that their faith and their worship and their prayer and all that stuff is in one box and life is in a completely separate box.

Now in the East, in Asia and places like Africa, peoples upbringing and culture, well the spirituality's a lot more connected with life but wherever or whatever, it's important that we understand what worship is all about. It's not something we put in a box and take out on Sundays; worship is a way of life.

That's the name of this week’s series. When we understand what worship is in God’s heart then all of a sudden life and spirituality become inseparable.

Just the last couple of days we began to look at the fact that the New Testament talks about two different forms of worship. One verse where both of these forms of worship appear is Luke chapter 4 verse 8. Grab your Bible if you have one, have a look.

Jesus had been led by the Holy Spirit out into the desert, He's been there starving and fasting for the last 40 days so He's weak and He's at a low point and the devil comes to tempt Him. In fact, next year we're going to be doing a whole series on this wilderness passage but just today, I just want to look at this second temptation where the devil comes to tempt Jesus with a grand delusion:

The devil led Jesus up to a high place to show Him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world and he said to Jesus, "I will give you all their authority and splendour because it's been given to me and I can give it to anyone I want. So if you would just worship me it will all be yours." And Jesus answered him, "It is written, 'Worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.'"

Here's a standard temptation of the devil. I believe in the devil because Jesus does. A lot of people don't believe in the devil today, well I'm sorry, Jesus clearly does and so do I. And here is a standard temptation. He shows us the world and says, "Look at this wonderful world that I have control of," and frankly you don't have to look very far to see what an enormous influence the devil in fact has.

And the devil says, 'What are you doing out in this wilderness for God? Why are you starving? Why is this so tough? Look, just come and worship me and all this can be yours.' Yeah right! Listen to what the devil says to Jesus:

So if you worship me it will all be yours.

Now this word 'worship' is the first, I guess dimensional type of worship. The Greek word is ‘proskuneo’ and it's a word from which we get the word prostrate. So to prostrate ourselves, to bow down, to kiss someone’s hand, to fall down on our knees and face to worship. It's the sort of worship people do on Sunday mornings in Church. Hebrews, chapter 12, verse 28 talks about worshipping God with awe and reverence.

It's a heart worship, its expressing our allegiance and gratefulness and awe and reverence and wonder of God by singing songs of worship and the devils saying to Jesus, "Now, bow down to me as you would to God" but look at Jesus' reply. Jesus answered:

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

Jesus is quoting the Old Testament, Deuteronomy chapter 6 verse 13.

There are two verbs in what He says, worship and serve. Now that word worship the Lord your God is the same word as the devil just used "prokuneo", to bow down but then the second verb, this doing word, is the Greek word "latreuo". It's the word from which we get lateral or outwards.

This word is used a number of times in the New Testament and it is variously translated as serve or worship. To"latreuo" is to render religious service or homage, to worship, to perform sacred services, to offer gifts, to worship God and the observance of rights for worship. You see,"latreuo" is outward worship, its worship through doing and serving.

For Jesus, the answer went beyond simply bowing down to God or the devil as the devil wanted Him to, it included serving God. What we do in our hearts AND what we do with our hands, inside and outside. Jesus said it again when someone asked Him, "what’s the most important commandment he said":

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength and with all your mind.

You see, strength is what we do with our heart on the inside, with our strength on the outside. You know something; if what we do and believe on the inside isn't reflected in how we live on the outside, what we believe on the inside will die.

We can't pray one thing and do one thing on Sunday morning singing songs to God and worshipping Him and then not serve Him by living that faith out in life. For God worship is a holistic thing. For God worship is what happens in our hearts and what we do with our hands. In James chapter 2, verse 26, read it. It says:

Faith without works is dead.

If we're going to exalt God in our hearts but not in our lives by the way we think and act and treat other people, it's just never going to work.

Some people struggle to see the relevance of their faith in life. And can I suggest the reason is because they've got worship over here in a little box that they open once a week and that we haven't come to grips with the fact that worshipping isn't just what we do in our hearts, it's not just the songs we sing. When we live out that faith, when we sacrifice the things we want for the things that Jesus wants and it hurts some days, that is worshipping God.

Psalm 24, verse 7 talks about having clean hands and a pure heart. In fact this linking of inside worship and outside worship,"prokuneo" worship which is bowing down and"latreuo" worship which is serving happens over and over and over again in God’s word. God just doesn't want us to worship Him once a week; God wants us to live a life that is worship to Him.