"3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments; and his commandments are not burdensome. 4 For everything that is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith. "1 John 5: 3-4
When you see what God asks of you as burdensome, difficult and unnecessary, without realizing it, your way of thinking has become carnal; You fight with your flesh to go to church, to give your tithes and offerings, to pray, get up early. We have to make effort, sacrifice. And people do not want to spend any effort for any relationship or anything, but they want the great results. God is always there and He is a God of mercy, of love, and He forgives everything; But God does not reward everything. God does not reward everything you do; He only rewards faith; And those of us who dare to present ourselves before God, with the best of our lives, to those is that God brings great reward.
The problem of the carnal man is that the conscience is like the stomach: You have to fill it all the time, you have to feed it to calm it down. That is why there is someone who presents himself as Cain to worship God; Because they do it just to calm their conscience. Meet the requirements, just to satisfy their way of thinking; They see the results of others, which they do not have, and question God, when all that is happening is that you have transferred your worship of the spirit to your worship of the flesh, and your consciousness is the only thing that is satisfied. There are those who worship God for the wrong reasons; By habit, for example, because consciousness tells you that you have to do things out of habit.
A marriage where the woman cooks out of habit and the man returns to the house out of habit, what relationship is that? In a relationship, even after time has passed, there must be the same passion, the same desire to be seen, to be together, gratitude for everything, for being when no one else was; That alone should put in you passion, love; It is not having company, someone who breathes next to you so you do not feel alone. You can not have a relationship out of habit; And so there are those who have a relationship with God, by habit, they worship him to feed their conscience, by superstitions.
There are superstitious Christians, who have to worship, pray in such a way, walk with the amulet or with the cross. Then, there is the battle that if you put the cross, that if the crucifix is sin, that you should not have images; There are those who need the crucifix, and there are those who do not; It's all a crazy thing; Brother, with cross or without cross in the chest, you what you have to believe is God. Do you like a little cross? Looks Good? Put it on! But this is not with superstitions that works. You can not go to the house of God with superstitions, for fear of not being there. You have to go because you like to go.
There are people who go to the house of God to calm their conscience and their carnal impulses. There are those who worship God by vainglory, for others to see; They talk hard, they throw themselves to the floor, they cry looking for attention. Worship God with your tears, but also give him a day of joy; There is no problem with you desserts, but when you worship standing, you say: He has given me victory, he has blessed me, he is with me. Jesus warned: Do not pray like hypocrites, who pray to be seen by others, I tell you that they have their reward; But you, when you go to pray, shut yourself up, and your Father who sees you in secret, will reward you in public.
You do not need another to see how much you pray, you do not need to have their approval and admiration, you do not need another to believe that you are spiritual; You do not go to church to please another; You go to meet the Lord. If that other does not go to the house of God, it is lamentable, we feel it, but if God does not go, the thing is difficult. That other has not healed, freed, changed anyone; So it may be missing; But if God is missing, then we have problems. You do not do anything for another to admire or celebrate you. When you go with a sincere heart, sometimes you cry, sometimes you applaud; No matter who looks at you, you go only to meet the One who changed your life, not to change your consciousness. Understand this, and worship God with all your heart.
An adoration that is made to feed the conscience, is based on fear. You go to church, for fear of failing the habit, for superstition, because you are afraid that something bad will happen to you. You go by vainglory because you can lose the admiration of others and what you have achieved. The basis of your adoration, should never be fear. It is a mistake to lead people to worship God out of fear; The end of the world is preached, and when it does not happen, fear goes away, people return to the same thing. People are afraid of not going to heaven; Heaven is wonderful, but what good is it to live a lifetime in the hell of the earth, for not having God, to then be up there in heaven; It is better to start living heaven from here and now, in the presence of God, from the moment you decide to change your life, and make this land the most pleasant place.
Your thanksgiving makes you pour out before the Lord, and give you the best of you. The true worship that surpasses our conscience is the one that bases its faith; You have the faith that God receives your offering, your worship; It is when you present yourself before the Lord, and you bring your seed, your offering, you give him his tithes and you believe him, in gratitude for all that he has done and for all that he has given you.
We were created to worship, and we are commanded to worship God alone (Exodus 20: 3-5; Revelation 22: 9) in the ways He has commanded us in Scripture (Ecclesiastes 5: 1-7). Therefore, in preparing our hearts for worship, we must emphasize that worship is about God, not about our preferences.
The Word of God is the basis of everything we do in worship (announcements, welcome, songs, prayer, preaching, etc.). Why? Because God works through his Word. He created through his Word (Genesis 1); He sustains his creation through the Word of his power (Hebrews 1: 3); He came to this world as the Word (John 1: 1); He saves us by the power of his word (Romans 1:16).
Preaching is the primary form of the Word in our worship because this is the model Jesus and his disciples left us (Luke 4:43, Romans 10: 14-15) and because we are commanded to preach the Word until Christ returns. (2 Timothy 4: 1-2) And because true worship is based on the Word, when we come together as a church we want to read the Bible, sing the Bible, pray the Bible, preach the Bible, and see the Bible (at Baptism and Holy Communion).
Jesus Christ is the image of God, the creator, sustainer, and reconciler of creation, and the head of the Church (Colossians 1: 15-20). It pleased God to reveal himself through the Son and reconcile us to Him through the death of Jesus. Just like the disciples, we worship Jesus (John 20:28). Jesus is the focus of our worship because He is the focus of the Father's work (Revelation 5).