What is the heart of worship?

What is worship when we strip away the music?

When we strip away the songs?

When we strip away the instruments?

When we strip away the lighting?

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Worship is not for us, it’s for God. I think it’s sometimes easy to forget that worship is not just something we do, before your Pastor preaches a message. Worship is not just music, it’s a lifestyle! The way we live our lives, is continually how we continue to worship God. Worship is in the way we give, in the way we love, in the way we serve.

In fact, worship literally translates into, “worth-ship.” The word worship means to ascribe or give worth to something. Are we DAILY living our lives as though we’re ascribing worth to Him… or are we living life as though to only ascribe worth to ourselves?
What does worship mean to you?

On June 11, 2009, Electronic Arts (EA) held a mock Christian protest for the launching of their new game, Dante’s Inferno. They hired a bunch of actors to stand on the street and hand out cheesy flyers for church websites while wearing cardboard signs telling people they were going to Hell. Some of the signs took shots at Christian culture by saying, “Turn your Playstation into a Praystation” or “My High Score is in Heaven.”

Now, am I upset? No, I’m saddened. But definitely not for the reason you’re probably thinking of. E.A. hit the nail right on the head…they got the Christian stereotype down pat! The sad part is NOT the fact that they did this. The sad part is that THIS is how the world perceives Christians. When people think of Christians, they imagine people protesting outside, yelling at them, telling them they are going to Hell.

This is what Christianity is coming to. This is why 3 different magazines in the past months have called Christianity a dying religion. Now, the stereotype is not always the way that true Christians are. In fact, more and more Christians are starting to realize that they need to change the way the approach people and presenting the Gospel, if they ever want to bring people to Christ. However, until that minority of the Christian faith stop acting like hate-mongering, judgemental, “Christians”, I don’t see too much of the world’s perspective of Christians changing.

Christians need to start loving as Christ did, and need to stop judging. Let’s leave the judging to God since He’s perfect, and worry about loving on the broken, hurting, society we live in. Sometimes we forget that we are to hate the sin…. NOT the sinner.

Person 1: “I’m going through this tough time. ”

Person 2: “I’ll pray for you…”

I’m gonna go ahead and call out the big elephant in the room. At one point or another every Christian has said, “I’ll pray for you.” Chances are, you’ve said it multiple times this week! BUT, how often do we say those very words… and never mean it. How often do we say those words and the truth is, we just want an easy way out of the conversation. We really don’t want to hear anymore about the subject, and out of habit say, “I’ll pray for you”… and never actually pray?

I’m guilty of it. Shoot, I still struggle with it on a day to day basis. However, that’s not right! Don’t tell someone you’re gonna pray for them, unless you actually mean it. Don’t take prayer lightly. Don’t take it so light, that it’s your escape button out of a conversation. “I’ll pray for you” should NOT be the easy button out of a conversation!

If you tell someone you’re going to pray for them… actually do it.