If you followed the link in yesterday’s Motivation for No Worship, No Rain, here is the follow-up from that Motivation. If you did not, here is the link again: https://www.anewthingministries.com/no-worship-no-rain/
No Worship, No Rain Follow Up
“And it shall be that whichever of the families of the earth do not come up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, on them there will be no rain.” Zechariah 14:17
After yesterday’s motivation, I had numerous questions emailed to me about worship. First, I must say, I am so glad you asked.
Since the Lord dealt with me about worship and I began to worship more, even when I worship by faith, I have seen amazing changes, and it has only been 3 days. Secondly, I would say, if you don’t have a revelation on worship, don’t stop pursuing God until you get the revelation, it will change your life.
I know many ministers have a different view of praise and worship. Let me share my insight with you.
This is how the Lord has taught me and I hope it helps you in your pursuit of Him.
Praise means to rejoice, give commendations, applause, approval, endorsement and acclaim. Through this definition, we understand that we praise God for what He does. We praise Him when He answers our prayers. We praise Him when He delivers our children. We praise Him for His mighty acts.
David was a man of praise, He even said in Psalm 71:6, ‘Your praise shall continually be in my mouth.’ What made David a man of praise? He had seen God do such mighty acts right before his face. King David had seen God deliver him so many times, he couldn’t help but become a praiser. We see King David’s praise all though the Psalms.
David knew about praise, he even praised God when he didn’t feel like praising God as we see in Psalm 43:5, when David said ‘why are you cast down O’ my soul? Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise Him.’ Now, that is a praiser!
The Bible teaches us that praise causes the enemy to stop in his tracks. We further find in 2 Chronicles 20:22, when they praised God, He set ambushments against their enemy. Praise is a powerful weapon in the hand of a believer. Keep in mind, praise is to give applaud or approval. I am sure when your children do things correctly, you praise them, this is the same kind of praise.
Praise is all about what God has done for you or someone else, worship on the other hand is a whole different story.
To worship means to bow down, to reverence, to give worthship to. The Vines dictionary says that worship also means to come forth and kiss, thus denoting to worship is an intimate act. And that it is. In my opinion, worship is the closest intimacy you can get with God as long as we are on this earth.
Psalm 132:7 says Let us worship at His footstool. If you do a word study, footstool literally means three feet or three paces from God. That is how close you must be to worship.
Worship is a human response perceived when the divine touches the ordinary. Any time people came close enough to God in the Old Testament to worship, they would build an altar and call it a holy place. When you worship, it is a holy act.
If praise is telling God about all the wonderful things that He has done and declaring His mighty works, then what is worship? Worship is all about God, it has absolutely nothing to do with you. And it has nothing to do with anything He has done. We should worship God based solely on who He is. We worship God because He is God. If He did absolutely nothing for me or if He answered none of my prayers, He would still be worthy of my worship, simply because He is God.
A true worshiper will worship God no matter what is going on around them. Why? Because regardless of the circumstances, God is still God. I am reminded of a time a few years ago, I had been praying for a breakthrough and no breakthrough had come. I was in the kitchen that morning washing dishes at the sink, I had stopped for a moment and raised my hands to worship God and sing to Him from my heart.
My husband walked in, he said ‘what are you doing?’ I said ‘I am worshipping God.’ He asked why I was doing that when it appeared God had let me down. I answered him and told him that the facts had nothing to do with my relationship with God and He was still worthy to be worshipped.
You have to come very close to God to become a true worshipper. I promise you, if you draw near to Him, you won’t be able to keep from worshipping Him. William Barclay said ‘it is the law of life that if a man thinks on something often enough and long enough, he will come to the stage where he can’t stop thinking about that thing. His thoughts will be quite literally in a groove out of which he can’t jerk them.’
That is the truth, if you think on God and how amazing and awesome He is, if you think on it long enough, you can’t help but worship Him.
As with everything, I can only speak from my experience. From my experience, praise stops the enemy from working against me, every time. Worship brings forth the blessing of God, every time. That’s how it has been in my life.
One of our readers asked me – “Where do I begin to worship?” If you don’t know where to start, that is a good question. As I have said, worship is all about Him and who He is, a good place to start is by telling Him who He is to you. I often call out the names of God and their meaning to Him, without fail, His presence always shows up and leads me into an intimate time of worship. If you don’t know where to start, start there. Just tell Him who He is, He will become the very person you are calling Him, and He will become that to you in a very intimate way. Taste and see, He is so good.
