The Priority Worship – Honouring God

Personally I love worship, singing praises to God and declaring my appreciation of and love for him. I especially
love what I call freeform worship where we just let our spirit express itself adoring God, Father/Son/Holy Spirit. One
of the problems that the Hebrew exiles had when they returned to Jerusalem from Babylon and Persia, was they
had forgotten the importance of worship and even though they were God’s people, they defiled worship and
dishonoured God in the process; in fact in the book of Malachi God went as far as to say they despised him. The
result was even though they were in covenant with God (as we are Christ) and God had graciously returned them
to their homeland (a “type” of salvation?), they were under a curse.

Consider some of these verses from Malachi (Message Bible):

So if I’m your Father, where’s the honor? If I’m your Master, where’s the respect?” God-of- the-Angel-Armies is calling you on the carpet: “You priests despise me!“ You say, ‘Not so! How do we despise you?’ “By your shoddy, sloppy, defiling worship. (Malachi 1:6-8)

You profane me when you say, ‘Worship is not important, and what we bring to worship is of no account,’
and when you say, ‘I’m bored—this doesn’t do anything for me.’ You act so superior, sticking your noses
in the air—act superior to me, God-of- the-Angel- Armies! And when you do offer something to me, it’s a
hand-me- down, or broken, or useless. Do you think I’m going to accept it? This is God speaking to you!
(Malachi 1:12-13)

If you refuse to obediently listen, and if you refuse to honour me, God-of- the-Angel- Armies, in worship,
then I’ll put you under a curse. I’ll exchange all your blessings for curses. In fact, the curses are already at
work because you’re not serious about honouring me. (Malachi 2:1)

Return to me so I can return to you,” says God-of- the-Angel- Armies. “You ask, ‘But how do we return?’
“Begin by being honest. Do honest people rob God? But you rob me day after day.“You ask, ‘How have we
robbed you?’“The tithe and the offering—that’s how! And now you’re under a curse—the whole lot of
you—because you’re robbing me. Bring your full tithe to the Temple treasury so there will be ample
provisions in my Temple. Test me in this and see if I don’t open up heaven itself to you and pour out
blessings beyond your wildest dreams. (Malachi 3:7-9)

You make God tired with all your talk. “How do we tire him out?” you ask. By saying, “God loves
sinners and sin alike. God loves all.” And also by saying, “Judgment? God’s too nice to judge.” (Malachi
2:17)

I’ll let the verses speak for themselves, for they declare principles still relevant to us who enjoy a new and better
covenant in Christ. A few comments though:

1. We (the church) may be at risk sometimes of over-emphasising the love of God to the point of becoming
   overfamiliar in our attitude; with the help of the Holy Spirit we need to find the right balance between the
   truth of God’s love expressed in Christ sacrifice for our salvation and his holiness, justice and forthcoming
   judgement. As disciples of Jesus we need to respect and honour Him for the blessings we have through
   the cross via faithful worship and humble service.
2. God is not fooled or impressed by pretentious worship that is not from the heart (e.g. bored attendance at
   church or not worshipping at all and claiming to be a disciple of Christ).
   I submit to you that as disciples of Jesus, we also will be accountable for attitudes and lifestyle and need to
   guard against treating worship lightly – to do so is a danger sign in terms of our spiritual health – I commend to
   you Psalm 148 and pray that your joy will increase as you realise the privilege we have in knowing, serving
   and worshipping our marvellous God.

   God bless, Lew