Do I Worship God?
00:00:00.000 | [Music]
00:00:05.000 | Juliet, a podcast listener, writes in to ask this.
00:00:08.000 | "Hello, Pastor John. I have a simple question for you.
00:00:11.000 | So what does it actually mean to be a worshiper?"
00:00:15.000 | Pastor John, what would you say?
00:00:17.000 | The key text for me is Matthew 15, 7 and 8.
00:00:23.000 | "You hypocrites, well did Isaiah prophesy of you
00:00:27.000 | when he said, 'This people honors me with their lips,
00:00:30.000 | but their heart is far from me.
00:00:32.000 | In vain do they worship me.'"
00:00:37.000 | So from that I see first that worship is about honoring God.
00:00:45.000 | A worshiper is one who honors God.
00:00:48.000 | "This people honors me with their lips.
00:00:50.000 | In vain do they worship me."
00:00:52.000 | In other words, they're failing in what they're
00:00:56.000 | attempting to do rightly.
00:00:58.000 | So it's right to want to honor God.
00:01:00.000 | That's what worship should be,
00:01:03.000 | to show God to be of highest honor in the universe,
00:01:07.000 | highest value, highest worth, highest worthy of praise,
00:01:12.000 | worthy of most admiration.
00:01:14.000 | That's what God is, and worship shows Him to be that,
00:01:19.000 | reflects that.
00:01:20.000 | Worship is an echo of those excellencies of God,
00:01:25.000 | and worship should be a way to think about it.
00:01:28.000 | And then the second thing I notice in that text,
00:01:31.000 | besides honor God, is the prominence of the heart.
00:01:35.000 | "This people honors me with their lips,
00:01:38.000 | but their heart is far from me.
00:01:40.000 | In vain do they worship me."
00:01:42.000 | Their worship is empty because they're doing it with lips
00:01:46.000 | without heart.
00:01:48.000 | There is no authentic worship where the heart is not engaged.
00:01:53.000 | It's empty worship. It's vain worship.
00:01:55.000 | So the essence, I'm going to argue in answer here,
00:01:58.000 | that the essence of worship is not the movement of your lips,
00:02:01.000 | not the movement of your hands, not the movement of your knees,
00:02:04.000 | not the movement of your tongue.
00:02:07.000 | The essence of worship is the movement of your heart,
00:02:12.000 | that is, your affections, your spiritual emotions.
00:02:16.000 | And those other acts, those outward acts,
00:02:19.000 | are not in worship when they are expressing
00:02:23.000 | what the heart is authentically feeling.
00:02:26.000 | And what is that?
00:02:28.000 | Well, it's not mere willpower,
00:02:30.000 | because these folks had enough of that
00:02:32.000 | because they were doing this lip moving.
00:02:35.000 | "This people honors me with their lips."
00:02:37.000 | They had the willpower to go to church
00:02:39.000 | and move their lips and sing the songs,
00:02:41.000 | and so that's not worship.
00:02:43.000 | Worship is not the willpower to make yourself do stuff
00:02:47.000 | that is religious.
00:02:49.000 | What's missing is spiritual affections.
00:02:52.000 | Their heart is far from me.
00:02:54.000 | They are not the direct product of willpower.
00:03:00.000 | You can't make yourself feel gratitude if you don't feel it.
00:03:04.000 | You can't make yourself feel admiration from somebody you find boring.
00:03:09.000 | You can't just turn it on and off like a switch.
00:03:11.000 | It's not willpower.
00:03:13.000 | These are real, genuine, authentic emotions
00:03:17.000 | that are quickened and awakened by true perceptions of God.
00:03:22.000 | And so here's some examples of what I mean.
00:03:25.000 | "The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit,
00:03:29.000 | a broken and contrite heart.
00:03:31.000 | O God, you will not despise.
00:03:33.000 | I confess my iniquity.
00:03:35.000 | I am sorry for my sins."
00:03:38.000 | So the emotion of contrition and the emotion of sorrow for sin
00:03:42.000 | is a beautiful act of worship because it reflects the value of God
00:03:46.000 | from which we've fallen so short.
00:03:48.000 | And then we mingle with those feelings of contrition,
00:03:53.000 | feelings of longing and desire,
00:03:55.000 | as a heart longs for the flowing stream,
00:03:57.000 | so my soul longs for thee.
00:04:00.000 | And then we mingle with our contrition for sin
00:04:03.000 | and our longing for mercy.
00:04:05.000 | We mingle fear and awe.
00:04:08.000 | I will worship toward the holy temple in the fear of thee, Psalm 5:7.
00:04:13.000 | And then we approach him with fear and trembling,
00:04:18.000 | and he crowns us with his mercy,
00:04:23.000 | and we enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise.
00:04:28.000 | Give thanks to him and bless his name,
00:04:31.000 | and then mingled with all that gratitude and joy is the hope.
00:04:35.000 | Be glad in the Lord and rejoice and shout for joy,
00:04:38.000 | all you upright in heart.
00:04:40.000 | Why are you downcast, O my soul, and why are you disquieted within me?
00:04:44.000 | Hope in God, for I shall again praise him.
00:04:47.000 | So those texts combine contrition, sorrow, longing, desire, fear, awe,
00:04:54.000 | gratitude, joy, hope.
00:04:56.000 | These are the things that are the essence of worship.
00:05:02.000 | These are the heartfelt affections that respond to the beauty of God.
00:05:10.000 | So here's my answer to her question, Juliet's question.
00:05:14.000 | So a worshiper is one who experiences these affections for God and more.
00:05:21.000 | Worship happens when we see God truly and feel him duly.
00:05:27.000 | It's worship in spirit and truth.
00:05:29.000 | Truth shows us true views of God, and the spirit awakens with the kind of
00:05:34.000 | affections that correspond to that truth.
00:05:37.000 | So that's what it means to be a worshiper.
00:05:42.000 | Yes, amen. Thank you, Pastor John.
00:05:44.000 | But, of course, that then raises a perplexing question of its own.
00:05:48.000 | So if I feel no affection for God, can I truly be worshiping him?
00:05:52.000 | We'll tackle that on Monday.
00:05:53.000 | If you have a question for Pastor John, please email it in to us at
00:05:56.000 | AskPastorJohn@DesiringGod.org, and please check out DesiringGod.org to find
00:06:01.000 | thousands of books, sermons, articles, and blog posts from John Piper,
00:06:04.000 | always free of charge to you.
00:06:06.000 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke, wishing you a great weekend of worship.
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