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Home Sermons 2011 Worship: Self-surrender (Part 2 of 'Maintaining your relationship with God')
 
Worship: Self-surrender (Part 2 of 'Maintaining your relationship with God') PDF Print E-mail
Written by David Charlton   

Scripture

Hosea 6:6
For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God, rather than burnt offerings.
 Micah 6:6-8
"With what shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? 7 Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my first-born for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?" 8 He has showed you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
John 4:21-24
Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for such the Father seeks to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth."

 

 Summary and Purpose

Summary: Why do we worship? What is supposed to happen as a result of worship? Do we worship to simply give thanks to God and feel good about ourselves or is it much more? What is worship?

Yes, we praise God during worship and this often leaves us feeling good but there’s much more to it than that. If you approach worship with the right attitude, the Holy Spirit will use the worship experience to transform you and make you more like Christ. You will not remain the same. The ultimate goal for worship is transformation.

God grew tired of the worship conducted by the ancient Israelites. They went through the motion of worship but continued in their sinful lives. There was no transformation taking place. They approached worship with the wrong attitude.

Are we like the ancient Israelites? Do we approach worship with the wrong attitude? Do we just go through the motions every Sunday? Are our worship services a time of transformation? Do we approach worship with the right attitude? What is the right attitude?

Jesus described the right attitude when he said, “…the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for such the Father seeks to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." Worshipping in ‘spirit & truth’ happens when we surrender to the Holy Spirit and to Jesus & his teachings. The ‘Spirit’ refers to the Holy Spirit and the ‘truth’ refers to Jesus and what He teaches. So, the right attitude is an attitude of surrender. When we surrender to the Holy Spirit and the teachings of Jesus, the Holy Spirit can then work on our sinful hearts and make us more like Christ.

 So, how is your worship experience? Do you sense God’s presence? Are you being changed in some way? If you answer no to these questions, perhaps you need to more fully surrender to the Holy Spirit and teachings of Jesus.

Purpose: To help the congregation experience a more fulfilling worship experience.  

The Sermon

I. Introduction: My last year of wrestling and just going through the motions

     A. Have you ever been involved in some type of activity or event

  • Your heart just wasn’t in it.
  • You’re just going through the motions
  • Consequently, you’re getting nothing out of the event. You’re not learning anything, improving or enjoying it.
     B. This describes me during my last year of wrestling for the Virginia Military Institute
          (VMI)
  • I wrestled for VMI during my freshmen and sophomore years
  • As a freshman, I tried out for the team. I made the team and worked really hard. There was, however, many upperclassmen who could easily beat me. So, I went to practices but never competed against other schools.
  • As a sophomore, I grew tired of just going to practice. About a quarter into the season I began to simply go through the motions. I didn’t put my all into the practices.
  • Consequently, I didn’t become a better wrestler. I actually got a little worse.
  • By the end of my sophomore year, I decided to quit the wrestling team.
     C. The same thing that happened to me can happen to us with worship. It happened
          to the ancient Israelites.

II. The ancient Israelites simply went through the motions of worship

     A. Consider Hosea 6:6 and Micah 6:6-8

  • Hosea 6:6 - For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God, rather than burnt offerings.
  • Micah 6:6-8 - "With what shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? 7 Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my first-born for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?" 8 He has showed you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
  • God instructed the ancient Israelites to worship in a style that consisted of animal sacrifices. In these verses, however, God says he doesn’t want any more sacrifices because the Israelites continued to live a sinful lifestyle.
     B. Worship is meaningless if it doesn’t result in the transformation of the people
          worshipping.

     C. The main outcome of worship: Transformation

III. Transformation as the main outcome of worship

     A. Yes, in worship we…

  • Praise and give thanks to God
  • This often makes us feel happy
  • If this is all worship does, then we should simply say a prayer of thanks and then watch ‘The Cosby Show’. We would then feel happy.
  • The main outcome of worship is not simply to feel better

     B. As a result of worship, we should expect to be changed.

  • We should expect non-believers to come to faith in Christ as a result of worship
  • We should expect Christians to become more like Christ like as a result of worship
  • People should find themselves forgiving more, hating less and loving more as a result of worship

     C. If people are not changed as a result of our worship services, we should…

  • Stop paying for the electricity it takes to cool the sanctuary and turn on the lights
  • Stop paying the pastor’s salary
  • Close the church
  • We are wasting our time if people do not become more like Christ as a result of worship.
     D. Worship will result in the transformation of the participants if we approach worship
          with the right attitude.
  • Quitting after my 2nd year of college wrestling was the wrong choice. Now I’ll never know how good I could have been.
  • Instead of quiting, I should have changed my attitude. I should have decided that it didn’t matter if I never make 1st string. I’ll still wrestle as hard as I can at each practice to push the 1st string wrestlers and make them better.
  • The same is true for us at church. We must have the right attitude towards worship.
  • So, what is the right attitude?

IV. The right attitude towards worship

     A. Jesus explained the right attitude when He said, “…the true worshipers will
          worship the Father in spirit and truth, for such the Father seeks to worship him. 24
          God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." (John
          4:23-24)

     B. Worshipping in ‘spirit and truth’

  • The ‘Spirit’ refers to the Holy Spirit and the ‘truth’ refers to Jesus and what He teaches. (Jesus is the truth)
  • Worshipping in ‘spirit & truth’ happens when we surrender to the Holy Spirit and to Jesus & his teachings.
  • So, the right attitude is an attitude of surrender.
  • The primary thing we each need to surrender is the ‘self’.  
  • When we surrender ourselves to the Holy Spirit and the teachings of Jesus, the Holy Spirit can then work on our sinful hearts to make us more like Christ.

V. What it looks like when we approach worship with an attitude of self-surrender

     A. You prefer the contemporary (9AM) service but you oversleep and miss that
          service.
  • An attitude of selfishness: I don’t like the music at the traditional (11AM) service so I’ll just miss church today. (How can you expect the Holy Spirit to make you more like Christ with that attitude?)
  • An attitude of self-surrender: I’ll go to the traditional (11AM) service and see what God wants to tell me through the traditional hymns. (This gives the Holy Spirit something to work with.)
     B. There are two versions of the doxology. You prefer one over the other.
          The choir, however, keeps playing the version you don’t care for.
  • An attitude of selfishness: Every Sunday you get angry because the choir keeps singing the wrong version. During the sermon you keep thinking how the choir does it wrong, so you miss the sermon’s message. (How can you expect the Holy Spirit to make you more like Christ with that attitude?)
  • An attitude of self-surrender: You don’t even notice what version the choir is singing because you are so overjoyed with the privilege of singing praises to God. (This gives the Holy Spirit something to work with.)
     C. A few years ago, you had a bad experience with a Baptist church. Some
          members of that church treated you very unkindly. While on vacation your Baptist
          mother-in-law invites you and your family to attend church with her.
  • An attitude of selfishness: At first, you refuse to attend a Baptist church with your mother-in-law. Then your spouse forces you to go. During the service you think of nothing but how you were treated the last time you attended a Baptist church.  (How can you expect the Holy Spirit to make you more like Christ with that attitude?)
  • An attitude of self-surrender: You think, God wants me to forgive those who mistreated me the last time I attended a Baptist church. They are my brothers and sisters in Christ. I wonder if God has a message waiting for me at this Baptist church? (This gives the Holy Spirit something to work with.)

VI. Conclusion

     A. How is your worship experience? Do you sense God’s presence? Are you being
          Changed? Are you becoming more like Christ? Are you better able to love God,
          yourself and others as a result of worship? 
     B. If you answer no to these questions, perhaps you need to more fully surrender to
          the Holy Spirit and teachings of Jesus.
  • Examine your attitude prior to worship
  • Go to God in prayer and ask God to give you an attitude of self-surrender prior to worship
  • During worship, focus on the worship service. Don’t think about what you are going to eat after church or what errands you need to run. Look for the message God is trying to give you.
  • After worship, pray, review the Scripture lessons, review the sermons, review the song lyrics.

     C. This attitude of surrender will carry over to the rest of the week.

  • With the ‘self’ surrendered to God, you don’t have to worry about how people treat you. That becomes God’s problem.
  • You can focus on doing what God wants you to do when you surrender the ‘self’ to God because you are no longer worrying about how you will take care of the ‘self’ or how others treat the ‘self’. All that becomes God’s concern.

     D. So, have you surrendered the ‘self’ to God lately?
 
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