Posts tagged: enter in the presence of God

Worship

When you come into contact with, become aware of, or have a revelation of the holiness of God, there is only one appropriate response: worship. Without such a revelation, we cannot really have worship. We can have a song service, but we do not enter into worship until we have a revelation, however inadequate it may be, of the holiness of God. And the holiness of God is not to be explained. It cannot be defined. It can only be revealed.

This is very important because I think many Christians have the idea that holiness is a set of rules about where you may go, what you may do, and how you may talk and dress. That has nothing to do with holiness. Paul was very emphatic about that in Colossians:
Therefore, if you died with Christ from the basic principles of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to regulations; “Do not touch, do not taste, do not handle,” which all concern things which perish with the using; according to the commandments and doctrines of men? These things indeed have an appearance of wisdom in selfimposed religion, false humility, and neglect of the body, but are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.” (Colossians 2:20-23)

This is so profoundly true. The more you focus on the things you must not do, the more power they have over you. You think to yourself, Don’t lose your temper; whatever you do, don’t lose your temper. What is the next thing you do? You lose your temper, because you are focusing on the wrong thing. No wonder many people have decided that they want nothing to do with holiness.

Hebrews 12 speaks about the discipline that God as a Father has for His children: “For they [our human fathers] indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness.” (Hebrews 12:10)

Holiness is not a set of do’s and don’ts. God is not holy because He has a set of rules in front of Him in order to check His own conduct. Rules have nothing to do with biblical or divine holiness. Holiness is the essence of what God is. Everything about God is holy. Thus, in order to have an understanding of holiness, we need to have an understanding of who God is and what He is like.

God is Light: This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:5)

God is Love: He who does not love does not know God, for God is love….And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him. (1 John 4:8, 16)

God is Justice and Judgment: For I proclaim the name of the LORD: ascribe greatness to our God. He is the Rock, His work is perfect; for all His ways are justice, a God of truth and without injustice; righteous and upright is He. (Deuteronomy 32:3-4)

God is Anger and Wrath: God is jealous, and the LORD avenges; the LORD avenges and is furious. The LORD will take vengeance on His adversaries, and He reserves wrath for His enemies. (Nahum 1:2)
Then a third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, “If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand, he himself shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out full strength into the cup of His indignation. He shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever; and they have no rest day or night, who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receives the mark of his name.” (Revelation 14:9-11)
For I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book. (Revelation 22:18-19)

God Is Mercy and Lovingkindness: Have mercy upon me, 0 God, according to Your lovingkindness; according to the multitude of Your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. (Psalm 51:1)
Praise the LORD! Oh, give thanks to the LoRD, for He is good! For His mercy [His lovingkindness, His faithfulness to His covenant] endures forever. (Psalm 106:1)

God is Grace: Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Hebrews 4:16)

God is Power: The LORD reigns, He is clothed with majesty; the LORD is clothed, He has girded Himself with strength. Surely the world is established, so that it cannot be moved. Your throne is established from of old; You are from everlasting. The floods have lifted up, 0 LORD, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods lift up their waves. The LORD on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, than the mighty waves of the sea. (Psalm 93:1-4)

Let me just recapitulate the seven attributes of God: (1) light; (2) love; (3) justice and judgment; (4) anger and wrath; (5) mercy and lovingkindness; (6) grace; and (7) power. I believe God’s holiness is all of that. It is the total being of God. Holy is the only word that is used three times of God in the same sentence, in both the Old and New Testaments. In Isaiah the seraphim cry, Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory! (Isaiah 6:4)
And in Revelation, the living creatures and the elders fall down and cry,
Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come! (Revelation 4:8)

I believe there is significance in the threefold repetition. I think holy is the Father; holy is the Son; holy is the Spirit. And no one else is holy. God is unique in His holiness. And we can only understand or become partakers of holiness insofar as we relate to God.

Worship is our response to the holiness of God. Again, when there is no revelation of holiness, there can be no worship. You can have a nice song service. You can have praise and thanksgiving. But you cannot have worship. For when we know the holiness of God in any measure whatsoever, the appropriate response is always worship.

Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise. (Psalm 100:4)

We thank God because we are grateful for what He has done. When we praise Him, we are acknowledging His greatness, but that is not the end. Many of us stop there. We have entered into the courts, but what are we there for? We are there to worship. If we stop after a praise song, we may have had a good time, but we haven’t really found the heart and the purpose of God. There is something crying out for more. We desire the presence of the Lord. We yearn to be in direct contact with the living God and to offer Him the only thing we have to offer, our worship. So let’s continue our journey and ask the Lord if, by His grace, He will enable us to enter into His presence. For when we are in His presence, we will begin to truly worship.

Thanksgiving

Lets look on Hebrews 12:28, in two different Bible version (NKJV and NIV)

1st. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. (Hebrews 12:28, NKJV emphasis added)

2nd. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe. – Hebrews 12:28, (NIV, emphasis added)

Actually, each one is a correct translation. In Greek, “to have grace”-the key word is charis-is the same as saying “thank you.” There is a direct connection between grace and thankfulness. An unthankful person is a person who is outside the grace of God. You cannot be unthankful and be found within the grace of God.

Three of the world’s Romance languages, those based on Latin, all retain a direct connection between grace and thankfulness. In French, grace a Dieu means, “thanks to God.” In Italian, the word for “thank you” is grazie. In Spanish, it is gracias. You cannot separate thankfulness from the grace of God. When we say “grace” before a meal, we are really saying “let us be thankful.”

There is a beautiful passage in Psalm 95 that depicts the progress into worship. It begins with loud, jubilant praise-a lot Louder than some churches normally would be comfortable with.
Oh come, let us sing to the LORD! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. (Psalm 95:1)

Thanksgiving and praise. There is no other way into the presence of God.

I think that if there is one thing that is hard for God to accept, it is halfhearted praise. Scripture says, “Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised” (Psalm 145:3). In fact, if you are not prepared to praise Him greatly, don’t do it at all.
“Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving; let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms.” (Psalm 95:2)

Notice again the two stages of access: thanksgiving and praise. There is no other way into the presence of God. The next three verses give us the reason why we should praise and thank God. The Bible is very logical. It does not just ask us to thank and praise God; it tells us why.

– For the LORD is the great God, and the great King above all gods. (Psalm 95:3)

– In His hand are the deep places of the earth; the heights of the hills are His also. The sea is His, for He made it, and His hands formed the dry land.
(Psalm 95:4-5)

– Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD our Maker. (Psalm 95:6)

The only response to a revelation of the holiness of God is worship.

So we come to Him thanking Him, praising Him for the marvels of His creation. But that is only our way of access. In verse six we come to worship. Praise and thanksgiving are really our way of approach into worship. Then notice, as soon as we come to worship, it is an attitude. Here we have passed from utterance into attitude. We began with praise and thanksgiving, but that wasn’t the end or goal. When Christians stop with praise and thanksgiving, they have really missed the goal: true worship-which is not an utterance but an attitude.

Thanksgiving and praise are utterances, but worship is an attitude.

Praise

Praise runs like a golden thread throughout the entire Bible, from beginning to end. Praise is eternal; its origin is in heaven. It is the ceaseless occupation of all the glorious and eternal beings that inhabit heaven, where they enjoy close and uninterrupted access to God Himself. Uninterrupted access calls for uninterrupted praise. Praise is also associated with the earth since its beginning.

In Job 38, God challenged Job with this question: Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth ?…When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? (Job 38:4, 7)

What a beautiful picture of the beginning of the earth! it is the responsibility of God’s people on this planet to see that praise continues to mark its course until heaven and earth are no more.

Praise is the appropriate way that we relate to God as King on His throne.
Yet Thou art holy, 0 Thou who art enthroned upon the praises of Israel. (Psalm 22:3 NASB)
When combined with thanksgiving, praise gives us access to God. We see this in Psalm 100 where the psalmist said:
Enter His gates with thanksgiving, and His courts with praise. Give thanks to Him; bless His name.
(Psalm 100:4 NASB)

Here are two degrees of access. First, through God’s gates, and then, through His courts. The psalmist indicates that it is thanksgiving that brings us through the gates, but praise brings us into the courts.

God dwells in a place of perfect peace and tranquility. Not only is there no violence or destruction, but there are not even the sounds of violence or destruction. But notice the way of access: all the gates are praise. In other words, the only way into the place of God’s presence and dwelling is through praise. Without praise, we do not have access into the outer courts.

Worship is one of the main themes of the Bible and something of tremendous importance in the life of the believer. Yet, most Christians do not have a clear grasp of the nature of worship. When most churchgoers talk about worship, they are referring to their Sunday morning worship service. They speak of hymns and choruses, and of the congregation standing and singing the planned music for the day. Unfortunately, in many of these churches very little worship is taking place. If this is the only frame of reference on the subject for the average believer, then they haven’t even begun to worship.

we will learn worship by looking beyond actions and behavior to where worship really takes place: within the heart. We will define concepts like praise, thanksgiving, and worship. We will identify the things that can hinder our worship. And we will describe the progression that will lead us, step by step, into the very presence of God where we may hear His voice and find rest in His arms.

Our Offering
Whenever we come into God’s presence, He requires that we bring Him various gifts or sacrifices. These include, but are not limited to, money and material possessions. But, on a higher level, Scripture speaks of various spiritual gifts or sacrifices that God requires His followers to bring Him.

These spiritual gifts are thanksgiving, praise, and worship. When we come into God’s presence, He requires that we bring gifts.

– Thanksgiving relates to God’s goodness.
– Praise relates to God’s greatness.
– Worship relates to God’s holiness.

worship is the most difficult of these three gifts or sacrifices for the believer to offer in a way that is acceptable to God. Thanksgiving and praise are primarily utterances of the mouth, but worship is primarily an attitude.

We can talk about the wisdom of God because we know wise people. We can talk about the greatness of God because we know great people. We can talk about the power of God because we have seen demonstrations of great power. But, apart from God, there is no earthly example of holiness-it is something unique to God and to those who have received it from Him. I believe that worship relates directly to God’s holiness. But because it is hard to understand His holiness, it can be hard to fully understand and enter into worship.

Thus, it is important to have an understanding of these three terms if we are to be able to make them part of our offering to God.