The Sunday morning church service is often called the “worship service,” which is made up of music, teaching, and giving. But these are only elements of worship and do not represent the sum total of what it truly is. Worship is far more than songs, sermons, and offerings—it is the posture of our whole lives before God. From the Old Testament to the New, Scripture makes clear that worship means honoring God alone (Exodus 20:3), loving Him with all our heart (Deuteronomy 6:5; Matthew 22:36-38), living in awe of His holiness (Isaiah 6:1-5), and walking in obedience rather than empty ritual (John 4:23). True worship is expressed in reverence, gratitude, humility, and love, whether through sacrifice, prayer, service, or surrender of our daily lives. Jesus taught that worship is not bound to a place or ceremony but must be “in spirit and truth,” offering ourselves as living sacrifices to God (John 4:23; Romans 12:1). Earthly worship ultimately points us to the eternal worship of Christ, the Lamb, around His throne.
Worship is more than the singing of five songs, a thirty-minute teaching, and the passing of brass collection plates; Rather, it is a spirit bowed in reverence, awe, love, gratitude, and humility to the Lord. Worship is an attitude of the heart and the mind, not limited to a church pew.
Worship is a state of heart and mind expressed in a posture of:
Reverence: While God is approachable and desires friendship with us (John 15:15), we must never forget that He is God, and we are not. Referring to our Heavenly Father as “the man upstairs” or making nonsensical jokes about Him is irreverent. Spiritual flippancy shows a lack of proper reverence toward our Maker.
Awe: Human beings have some pretty amazing accomplishments to our credit, but among the eight billion or so inhabitants on this planet, no one has yet to speak a universe into existence. The Dutch painter Van Gogh’s Starry Night is a breath-takingly beautiful canvas, but God has been in the business of making real starry nights since the dawn of creation (Psalm 19:1). We should stand in awe of our Creator who, unlike us, is not subject to time and can exist outside of His creation (Isaiah 40:28; Colossians 1:16).
Love: Those who do not love God do not know God, for to truly know Him is to love Him. We, who are created in His image, should love Him with every fiber of our being (Mark 12:30). He loves us, and it is only right that we should reciprocate His love (I John 4:19). Besides that,all good gifts come from Him (James 1:7). Finally, despite our sinful nature and inability to save ourselves, He offers us a way of salvation through His Son Jesus Christ (Hebrews 2:3; John 3:16). Had He abandoned, we could not rightfully fault Him, but rather than leaving us in the mire of sin, He chose to rescue us from the wrath to come.
Gratitude: We often look back upon our lives and can see how the hand of God was at work. We worship God when we respond to what He has done both to save us and in other specifics with gratitude. The Apostle Paul taught, “Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.” (I Thessalonians 5:18 NLT) We all do well to follow the advice of hymnwriter Johnson Oatman: “Count your blessings, name them one by one; count your many blessings, see what God hath done.”
Humility: The Scriptures frequently warn against pride, the worst of all sins: “Pride goes before destruction, and haughtiness before a fall” (Proverbs 16:18 NLT). No one with a proud heart or a haughty demeanor can properly worship the Lord.
May we, the redeemed, worship the Lord in spirit and in truth.
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