Sermon Tone Analysis

! Introduction

            We attended a church last winter which we had never attended before.

I did not know much about the church, but I had heard that they had good singing and I had also heard that some of their teaching was not Biblical.

Knowing that, I attended and although I admit that the singing was good, I was unable to worship because I was always on my guard looking for areas in which they were not faithful to Scripture.

Truth is important in worship and where truth is compromised, worship is difficult.

Whenever we visited my mother in Scottsdale, we attended her church, which at the time was a Presbyterian church.

Although the style of worship was very different from what I was used to, being a more liturgical service, we had a good time of worship.

We enjoyed the choir and the pastor always had a good message.

Probably one of the most inspiring worship services I have had was a time when Carla and I led a group of campers on a canoe camp in Northern Manitoba.

We led two camps and in the second week camp, most of the campers were people who had been on staff for most of the summer.

In the evening, we gathered around the campfire and really enjoyed the singing and sharing.

It was a great time of worship, in a natural setting and we had a wonderful time of giving glory to God.

What is the best worship service you have ever attended.

How has it impacted you?

We are talking about being a healthy church.

As you see on the overhead, we are now looking at the fifth quality characteristic of a healthy church.

We have already talked about holistic small groups, empowering leadership, need oriented evangelism and passionate spirituality.

Today, we come to inspiring worship services.

What do we mean by inspiring worship services and how can we experience them?

!

I. Inspiring Worship Services

!! A. Worship Services

!!! 1.

We must worship

            God calls us to worship.

In Exodus 20, the first few of the ten commandments command people to worship God and Him alone.

He is the only one worthy of our worship.

Repeatedly in the Psalms, we are commanded to worship God.

Psalm 29:2, “Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name; worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness.”

Psalm 95:6 “Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the LORD our Maker…”

            Worship is important because when we worship, we recognize the one who is our creator.

Psalm 100:1-3 says, "... Worship the LORD with gladness…It is he who made us, and we are his ...."      Worship is also important because when we worship, we recognize and rejoice in the fact that we have a relationship with Him.

Psalm 95:6,7 says,  "Come, let us bow down in worship…for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care...."

            We have a lot of reasons to declare the worth of our God.

But what exactly is worship?

One of the mistakes we often make is that we assume that music is worship.

Sometimes in the bulletin it says that we will have a time of worship and what we mean is that we will sing.

Sometimes we start a meeting with a time of worship, and what we do during that time is sing.

Singing is one expression of worship, but it is not all of what worship is.

Worship is declaring God's worth.

It is recognizing who God is and praising Him for it.

When we focus on understanding who God is and what He has done and express our praise to Him because of these things, that is worship.

There are several words for worship in the Greek New Testament which help us understand what worship is.

One word means to bend the knee.

Worship is bowing in humility and adoration before the one who is Lord of all.

It is recognizing God’s greatness.

Another word for worship in the New Testament is a word that is sometimes translated worship and sometimes service.

In Romans 12:1, offering our bodies to God is declared as an act of spiritual worship or service.

It is the same thing.

This verse and the use of this word reminds us that whatever we do for God is an act of worship.

What this teaches us is that worship is much more than what we do on Sunday morning.

When in prayer we look to God for help - that is worship.

When we offer to help someone because of our love for Christ - that is worship.

When we choose to live our lives in holiness - that is worship.

When we gather in church and pray and sing and hear God’s word, that is worship.

It is important for us to recognize that worship is much more broadly defined than just the worship service.

!!! 2. But we are talking about worship services.

Having recognized that truth, however, this morning, we want to talk about worship services.

Being a healthy church involves worship services that are inspiring.

!! B. Inspiring Worship

But what are inspiring worship services?

Moses led the people of Israel out of Egypt and after three months, they came to Mt. Sinai.

It was time for God to introduce himself to them and to establish them as His people.

God told Moses to invite the people to the foot of the mountain and he would personally and audibly speak to them.

In Exodus 19:16-19, we have a record of this meeting between God and His people.

We read, “On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast.

Everyone in the camp trembled.”

Then in chapter 20, God spoke to the people and gave them the ten commandments.

Can you imagine what it must have been like?

That must have been quite a worship service!

What made it so exciting and powerful?

What made the people tremble?

God was present with them and they sensed His presence.

A while later, the children of Israel constructed the tent of meeting which would be their worship center in their travels through the wilderness.

They donated towards the work and they built a beautiful tent according to the pattern which God had given them.

When all the parts were built, they set up the tent and when it was all set up, we read in Exodus 40:34, 35, “Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle.

Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the cloud had settled upon it, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle.”

Once again, we read about a powerful experience for the people of Israel.

Can you imagine seeing the presence of God visibly over the tent in a cloud during the day and with a pillar of fire at night?

What made it such a powerful experience?

God was present.

After many years, they settled in the land.

The tent was no longer functional and David wanted to build a temple for the Lord in Jerusalem.

He was not permitted to do so, but his son Solomon, the next king, did do so.

In I Kings 8, we read about a service of dedication for the temple in Jerusalem.

It was a great celebration which involved many people coming from a great distance.

They offered many sacrifices and we read in I Kings 8:10, 11 “When the priests withdrew from the Holy Place, the cloud filled the temple of the LORD.

And the priests could not perform their service because of the cloud, for the glory of the LORD filled his temple.”

Once again the worship of God was a powerful experience because God was there.

After Jesus rose from the dead, he appeared to his disciples over a period of 40 days and then ascended into heaven.

Ten days later, as the disciples were together in the temple in Jerusalem to celebrate the Old Testament feast of Pentecost, a powerful experience changed the world forever as the Spirit of God came upon the disciples.

It was a remarkable day on which many people were saved and people recognized the power and presence of the Lord.

Once again, a powerful worship experience took place because people experienced and recognized the presence of God.

What is inspiring worship?

Inspiring worship, according to the examples we have just looked at is worship in which God’s presence is evident.

Inspiring worship is not necessarily worship that follows a particular style of music or has a particularly good message or is seeker friendly or has a dramatic presentation.

Inspiring worship is worship in which the presence of God is evident to those who participate.

We have read of times when God’s people experienced the presence of God in a powerful way.

These must have been wonderful experiences which made a tremendous impact on the people.

Is inspiring worship still possible today?

If we define inspiring worship as worship in which God’s presence is evident, then there is no reason why inspiring worship should not happen regularly.

The promise of God in Matthew 18:20 is that “…where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.”