8/28/2013 0 Comments A Majestic Name Above The HeavensI often look up to the sky on a clear summers night and seen the bright shining stars and I find myself in complete and utter awe of God and His creation. All of a sudden, in that moment my problems and situations seem a little bit smaller as I've realized that I am a part of something much, much bigger. This is the perspective King David writes from in Psalm 8; praising God for His majestic genius! "O Lord, our Lord, How excellent is Your name in all the earth, Who have set Your glory above the heavens! Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants You have ordained strength, Because of Your enemies, That You may silence the enemy and the avenger. When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, The moon and the stars, which You have ordained, What is man that You are mindful of him, And the son of man that You visit him? For You have made him a little lower than the angels, And You have crowned him with glory and honor. You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands;You have put all things under his feet, All sheep and oxen—Even the beasts of the field, The birds of the air, And the fish of the sea. That pass through the paths of the seas. O Lord, our Lord, How excellent is Your name in all the earth! (Psalm 8:1—4NKJV) Psalm 8 is a wonderful Psalm of praise that declares the majesty and mindfulness of God. God, the creator of the universe is not only mindful of us but He cares for us! What a wonderful thing to celebrate. But, it is important to remember that God does not need our praise and worship? It’s true, He doesn’t. God already has everything He could need without our help. God wants us to praise and worship Him and He deserves all the praise and honor because He is Lord of all the earth; He created everything! The psalmist tells us that the whole span of what we can imagine seeing is held together by God. God is majestic. This means that God is so wonderful, beautiful, and grand. He is superior in all ways. Is it not amazing that a king said this about God? King David was so captivated by God, that he had to praise Him. David may have been a king, but he recognized that God was King of kings and Lord of lords. Our lives are under the command of a loving and just God. If we follow Him and His son, Jesus, then we can have eternal life. We must make Jesus our Lord and nothing else. For this reason, we praise God. For this reason, we worship King Jesus. An important part of what I understand as I studied this passage of scripture is that Christian worship is putting our focus away from our own concerns. That's not at all to suggest that we need to suppress our concerns when we come to worship, but we must realize that worship will put them in perspective. In true worship our own lives are set in proper perspective in relation to others, to the universe, and most significantly to God who is rightly the object of that worship. We can't hold on to small things if we are reaching for the infinite. We need to sit down and just think about God. We get so caught up with our petty little selves and so many trivial things. But when we consider the created universe, the wonders of the natural world. God is everywhere, knows all, all-powerful, utterly holy and pure, knows, loves and cares. ![]() Then consider the unbelievable grace to totally insignificant rebellious people like us, God offered His son up for all of us. (Romans 8:32) and crowned us with glory and honor and gave us dominion and authority over the works of His hands (Psalm 8:5-9). Let these truths sink in. That will take our breath away. What can we do but worship, bow down, and submit? And to think He is our God! Belongs to us, and we to him. What love! How grateful we should be. But we only turn to Him in panic, He blesses us and then we simply ignore Him and carry on with lives without Him. He is just there to be used and then forgotten. Then people insist they are not sinners, not much wrong with them. Let's get things into perspective with this one simple truth, God should dominate the entire life of a believer. God should be the greatest fact in our lives. Getting to know Him should be the most important thing in life. The only thing that matters in life is doing His will and living to please Him. Then promoting His honor and glory, anything less is a waste of a life. If we think deeply about what He has done, whether we are right with him or not, we can begin to truly understand how majestic God is above the heavens and how excellent is His Name!
0 Comments
8/20/2013 0 Comments Ascribe to His Beauty![]() "Splendor and majesty are before him; strength and beauty are in his sanctuary. Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength! Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; bring an offering, and come into his courts! Worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness; tremble before him, all the earth!" ~Psalm 96:6-9 As we close out our month dedicated to Prayer & Worship. I must say that my life and the lives of those who participated in the "Nights of Prayer" has been forever changed. We were able to enter in beyond the veil into the Holy of Holies to offer up a sacrifice of prayer and worship. In the New Testament, we learn that through Christ’s blood and death, God has made a way for us not only into the courts, but also through the veil into the Holy of Holies. We no longer need to bring a sacrifice for sins, for Christ was that sacrifice. Now we bring only a sacrifice of praise and the offering of our lives in response to Christ’s sacrifice on our behalf. It’s not to ensure our right standing before God, but rather precisely because of it. Have you put your trust in Christ’s perfect offering before God? Then you can come into His courts freely as an adopted child of God and praise Him because He has graciously set you free. The Psalms are filled with incredible passages that teach us about worship. Because worship is such a significant part of a believer’s life, it is beneficial to pause and take a look at what scripture tells us about it. Specifically, Psalm 96:6-9 give us wonderful insight into what worship truly is. The passage begins with some very high descriptions of God. Verse 6 says, “ Splendor and majesty are before him; strength and beauty are in his sanctuary” Splendor and majesty are words of royal magnificence, declaring that God is the divine King. Along with this are some attributes of the King - strength and beauty. It is this God who invites His people into His sanctuary. Splendor and majesty seem to point us to God’s kingship and wonderful rule. For as many majestic things we see in this world, they are but a shadow and a reflection of God’s splendor and majesty. He is the source from which all splendor and majesty find their birthing place. His splendor never stutters, and his majesty can't be matched. Strength and beauty is an interesting combination. We surely experienced the strong combination of His beauty and his strength in our "Nights of Prayer". In verses 7-8, we find a threefold call to “ascribe to the Lord”. Verse 6 described who God is, however, verse 7 speaks directly to us and tells us clearly what we are to do. “Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength! Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; bring an offering, and come into his courts!" We don’t often hear the word “ascribe” in our every day conversations. What does it mean? It literally means “to give", which leads to the next question: how do we “give” something to a God who possesses everything? Though “praise-filled recognition or response”. We see his glory and strength, and in turn recognize it and praise it! Our “giving” does not add to that glory, but rather God is glorified when we delight in who He already is. The psalmist calls to the “families of the peoples” to praise this God together, not just alone. There’s such an importance to the corporate dimension of our praises! God has historically called a people to himself, not just individuals. Because of who God is, we are to ascribe to the Lord glory and strength. In other words, we are to tell God who he is. So, when we understand that our God is a God of splendor, majesty, strength, and beauty, then we are to attribute His character back to Him and give Him the respect and honor He deserves - the glory due his name. Verse 8 gets a bit personal, it is where the scripture tells us to bring an offering and come into his courts. In a sense, the psalmist is saying, “you understand who God is and that he deserves our worship, now offer yourself as a sacrifice, and come into His presence.” The idea here is that when we view ourselves in the light of the holiness and majesty of God, then we can come before him with humility and bring ourselves as an offering. It is an act of surrender and God is inviting us into His presence. From this passage in Psalm 96 we can come up with a valuable definition of what worship is. It is simply reflecting back to God the glory of everything that He is with everything that we are. . So, the next time you find yourself praying, or singing out songs that declare the character and supremacy of God, remember that this is what the Psalms tell us to do in Verse 9 Worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness; tremble before him, all the earth. We were created by God to give our worship to Him in prayer, song and through our lives, for His strength and beauty are found in His sanctuary. Jesus, You're Beautiful - CeCe Winans: Part 1Jesus, You're Beautiful - CeCe Winans Part 28/15/2013 0 Comments Greater Is HereWe go through the same routines year after year. We’ve done it long enough that we know what to expect and what is expected of us. It’s called habit (or a rut depending on how you look at it). But this past Friday, in The Sanctuary we came out of the rut and we did something different. We went into a "Night of Prayer & Worship". For ten and half hours we prayed and worship the Great I Am and when the sun broke over that horizon at 6:30 am Saturday, August 10, 2013, we entered into our "Greater". ![]() In the Gospel of Matthew chapter twelve, Jesus tells His audience three times, “Something greater is here”. The implication was that in spite of how they think they have everything figured out that they were missing “something greater”. The truth is Jesus’ coming was so that God could be “with us”, Emmanuel, (Mat 1:23). The problem is we are too often unaware of that. The simplicity of Jesus message was that wherever we are and whatever we are doing there is always “something greater here”. He said, “It is here”, that is, within our grasp. It is near us, around us, surrounding us. We are too quick to settle for mediocrity – to accept that this is all there is when all the while Jesus message is “something greater is here”. Jesus audience was missing it when the “something greater” was standing in their midst. How many times though do we miss the opportunity to experience the "greater"? Just like the audience of Jesus' time, we miss it. We miss it because of feelings, emotions, folks opinions and our inability to step out of comfort zone. Greater isn't found in the creature comforts but in the pressing, crushing and pressing. Prior to our "Night of Prayer" we were instructed to prepare for our "greater". We fasted and sacrificed our bodies and it was without a doubt a shaking, testing and beating and God did a new thing in us. (Isaiah 43:19) And that new thing was manifested that night, the moment we entered into The Sanctuary, our Greater was with us. No, those ten and half hours were not the easiest. We all became a little weary over into the 3:00 am hour. We were challenged but we pressed through and the anointing and the power of God came in great abundace and supernaturally renewed our strength. That night strongholds were shattered, ties were loosed, curses were broken, healing and deliverance took place. Now, we're not just waiting on our greater, but our Greater is Here! 8/7/2013 0 Comments To Worship With A Whole HeartAt sundown tonight, it is done and it is so! Enter into worship with a total praise for all He has done during our period of preparation! We're praising in advance for what He is going to do in our "Night of Prayer". Enter into worship with a Total Praise |
What is Worship?
The Apostle Paul described true worship perfectly in Romans 12:1:
“I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God which is your spiritual service of worship." Worship is first of all an experience. It may express itself through certain forms, but it is not primarily a form. It is an experience. It is a consciousness of the presence of God and a response to that consciousness. Worship expresses itself as an outreach of the deepest emotions of the soul in adoration, reverence, homage, exaltation, and praise to the Almighty. We hope that our Worship Wednesday creates a deeper more meaningful worship experience for you. Visit our other inspirational blog
Daily Dose Monday Meditations Intercession Tuesday Testament Thursday Connect on Social Media
Archives
August 2015
CategoriesAll Are For Your Good! Are You Living In The Spiritual? Are You Operating In Your Gift? Ascribe To His Beauty Atmosphere Of Faith Blessed Assurance Come Clean And Break Free! Flow Giving Is Worship Greater Is Here Great Is Thy Faithfulness Hallelujah! Praise Him In The Hallway! Have Thine Way He Is Faithful! He Is Mine He Takes Our Ashes And Gives Us With Beauty! His Name Makes Things Happen I Need Thee! I Need You…Please Don't Pass Me By It Is Well With My Soul… Just Listen Living For His Glory Look Where He Brought You From Minister To Him Like Anna My Everything Overwhelmed? Cling To The Rock. Pouring Out Praise Quench Your Thirst Saturate Me Singing And Dancing In The Rain And Walking On Water Something Happen Something Out Of Nothing Speak Life Thank You Is The Heart Of Worship Thank You Lord For Everything! The Miracle Of Grace The Name Above All Names The Smile Of God Is The Goal Of Life This Is My Song This Is My Story True Bread ThatLasts! Want To Put A Smile On His Face? When Others Say Where He Is Wholly Surrendered Who Needs A Super Here When He Is There! Will You Worship In The Midst Of The Storm? Withholding Nothing Withhold Nothing Worship Brings A Word In Your Season Worship In Barrenness Worship Into Your Season Worship While I Wait Your Gift Will Look Good On You. Unwrap It. |
FOLLOW AND SHARE THE SANCTUARY
SEARCH THE SANCTUARY SITE
SEARCH FOR ITEM IN THE SANCTUARY STOCKROOM
|