Come, Let us Worship and Bow Down

[Christsfreeservant]

Is it True Worship?
Psalms 95:1-5 ESV

“Oh come, let us sing to the Lord;
let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!
Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving;
let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!
For the Lord is a great God,
and a great King above all gods.
In his hand are the depths of the earth;
the heights of the mountains are his also.
The sea is his, for he made it,
and his hands formed the dry land.”​

I like it here that it doesn’t say we must have a great singing voice. I used to when I was younger. I began singing solos in church when I was but a child, and I took voice lessons, and I ended up majoring in music in college, and I sang all the time lots of different places with various groups. But then as I got older my voice began to go, and now I make a joyful noise unto the Lord or I sing in my head and in my heart but not with my lips.

For, the whole point of singing to the Lord has to do with what is in our minds and in our hearts and it is not dependent on what we do with our lips. For our lips may praise him in song and it may mean nothing because we are not praising the Lord and giving him glory with our lives. Worship is first and foremost done by giving our lives to the Lord as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, before it can be true worship with our lips.

I know that singing is part of our worship of God, but if it is all about performance and how good we sound or how modern sounding the songs must be or how perfect the performance must be, then is it true worship? So many church gatherings focus so much on the performance that they mistake singing songs of worship for true worship of God. If we aren’t walking in obedience to the Lord, lip service in song is not true worship.

Let Us Kneel
Psalms 95:6-7 ESV

“Oh come, let us worship and bow down;
let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker!
For he is our God,
and we are the people of his pasture,
and the sheep of his hand.”​

Now we are getting to the crux of what it means to worship the Lord. It isn’t about performance at all. It isn’t about how good our voices sound or how modern the songs are that we are singing. It has nothing to do with all the instruments being perfectly balanced and the sound system perfectly executed or even what key the song is being played and sung in. Is it nice if it sounds good? Yes! But that doesn’t mean it is worship.

Worship means we bow down to the Lord, that we kneel before him in submission to him as Lord (owner-master) and in surrender of our lives to him to do his will and to obey his commands. We humble ourselves before the Lord, repenting of our sins, forsaking our idols, and we choose now to follow him with our lives. We choose to no longer walk in sin but now to walk in righteousness in the power and wisdom of God.

For, Jesus said that his sheep listen to him, but not just with their ears, for he also says that they follow him, which means they obey him. They do what he says to do and they go with him where he goes and they follow his lead. And he said that if we want to come after him we must deny self, take up our cross daily (daily die with him to sin and to self) and follow (obey) him. For, if we don’t, then we don’t have the hope of eternal life (Lu 9:23-26).

If You Hear His Voice
Psalms 95:7-11 ESV

“Today, if you hear his voice,
do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah,
as on the day at Massah in the wilderness,
when your fathers put me to the test
and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work.
For forty years I loathed that generation
and said, ‘They are a people who go astray in their heart,
and they have not known my ways.’
Therefore I swore in my wrath,
‘They shall not enter my rest.’”​

So, this is the counsel in all of this. Don’t let your worship of God be fake. Don’t let it be with lip service only. Don’t get caught up in the emotion of “worship songs” thinking you are worshiping God when the mere act of singing does not naturally translate to worship of God at all. Don’t let performance take the place of true worship of God. And don’t judge true worship by how well someone sings or by the emotions of the moment.

If you hear God’s voice, if you hear Jesus speaking through his word, do not harden your hearts against what he is saying just because it may not agree with the modern feel good messages you are used to hearing. Don’t shut off the Spirit’s voice because he is saying what you don’t want to hear and what you don’t want to believe. Don’t automatically hit the reject button in your minds or on your computers just because the message is not pleasing to your ears. Listen prayerfully, and let the Spirit speak truth to you.

Do not go the way of the world. Do not let humans be your Bible. Study the Scriptures in context. Read them word for word, verse by verse. Read the whole book. Don’t just cherry pick the Scriptures you like while you ignore all the rest that you don’t like. God’s word is true whether you accept it or not, and what he says he will do will happen whether you believe it or not. So, listen up when the Lord speaks, and follow Jesus.

Don’t be like the children of Israel who rebelled against the Lord and ended up wandering in the wilderness for forty years. For they ignored God’s commands and they did what their evil hearts decided to do instead. They were adulterers and idolaters who chose the way of the flesh over the way of the Spirit, and even though they claimed to be God’s children, they resisted God and many of them died in their sins and did not inherit eternal life.

So, don’t be like them. Worship the Lord God in spirit and in truth. Deny self. Die daily with Christ to sin and to self and follow Jesus in obedience to his commands. Go with him wherever he leads you and do whatever it is that he leads you to do according to his perfect will. And you will be blessed. Then sing songs of praise and worship to the Lord consistent with how you are living your lives for his praise and glory and no longer for self.

The Prayer

Written by David Foster, Carole Bayer Sager,
Alberto Testa and Tony Renis

I pray you'll be our eyes
And watch us where we go
And help us to be wise
In times when we don't know

Let this be our prayer
When we lose our way
Lead us to a place
Guide us with your grace
To a place where we'll be safe.

I pray we'll find your light
And hold it in our hearts
When the stars go out each night
Remind us where you are.

Let this be our prayer
When shadows fill our day
Lead us to a place
Guide us with your grace
To a place where we'll be safe.

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P.S. This is not an endorsement of the singers other than as musicians