Last Sunday, Hannah Allan gave a great talk on worship as a weapon... My title of my tonic is Worship is a Weapon and I have taken some inspiration and the title from a message by the worship leader Tim Hughes. And you can get this on you tube if you want to hear the whole thing. And I have added some of my own bits that spoke to me after I heard it. But I wanted to talk about how worshipping God can be the key to overcoming situations and challenges in our lives. Shifting our focus off the problem and putting our lives in line with Him. I know there are lots of aspects of worship e.g our whole lives need to be an act of worship..however I will mostly be talking about the time you set aside to honour God through singing and speaking His praises. 2 Chronicles verse 20. Its long so I am going to jump around a bit. This chapter has an account of a Godly king called Jehoshaphat who was about to be attacked by a massive army. It says that he was terrified by the news and gathered the people to fast and seek God. Then God spoke through one of the men and if you start from verse 15 God said , “Listen, all you people of Judah and Jerusalem! Listen, King Jehoshaphat! This is what the Lord says: Do not be afraid! Don’t be discouraged by this mighty army, for the battle is not yours, but God’s. 16 Tomorrow, march out against them. You will find them coming up through the ascent of Ziz at the end of the valley that opens into the wilderness of Jeruel. 17 But you will not even need to fight. Take your positions; then stand still and watch the Lord’s victory. He is with you, O people of Judah and Jerusalem. Do not be afraid or discouraged. Go out against them tomorrow, for the Lord is with you!” Then is says… 21 After consulting the people, the king appointed singers to walk ahead of the army, singing to the Lord and praising him for his holy splendor. This is what they sang: “Give thanks to the Lord; his faithful love endures forever!” 22 At the very moment they began to sing and give praise, the Lord caused the armies of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir to start fighting among themselves. I find these verses so exciting. The fact that they chose to put the people who were the worshippers ahead of the army. They didn’t choose the biggest toughest axe wheeling fighters... the people who could physically battle. They chose the people that had taken what the Lord had said about His protection and that had trusted Him and trusted His word and they weren’t even going in with an attitude of fighting they were just worshipping. Give thanks to Lord his faithful love endures forever. They could say this with this massive army stretched before them. 1. They worshipped before they had won the victory in the physical sense. There’s no way these people weren’t scared. You would have to be crazy to run out in front of three armies that were about to kill you and all you have got is a tambourine. You can feel scared by your circumstance but still trust and step out. Worshipping is stepping out. It’s an act of trust on God. Paul and Silas worshipped in prison before their chains broke. There focus was not on their surroundings but almighty God. Corrie Ten Boom who spent years in a concentration camp said when we look at the world we get distressed, when we look at ourselves we get depressed, when we look at God we are at rest. 2. Something I found interesting is that there is research done by Harvard University that an open body language like putting your arms in the air releases the hormone testosterone and lowers your cortisol levels. This increases your level of bravery and courage compared to a close stance. Even blind people from birth celebrate a victory by putting their hands in the air without ever seeing anyone do this. So worship is good for you! At the same time it’s got be about the heart. Ted Baranski at the Baptist youth meeting last week said something that struck me..the last place you should have peer pressure is church. If God telling you to kneel..kneel.. It is not what everyone else is doing but your heart focussing on God. 3. These people didn’t have to lift a sword...when their focus was on God he did the fighting for them. Some people here may feel so knocked down by their circumstances or stuff that is going they feeling tired of fighting..you feel like your swords got heavy. And worship shouldn’t be another thing we HAVE to do in a long list of being a Christian. You might have heard all this before and say to yourself..I am really trying to worship...but still be battling at the same time. I am trying to trust God and speak his praises but the emphasis is still on you doing and trying and striving. But what does it say that the battle was not there’s but the Lords. They were worshipping from a place of rest. You can’t earn Gods love and grace with worship. It’s not a task. We are actually invited to partner with heaven as they sing Holy Holy Holy...its a gift. Worship is fun! The young people at were disappointed that the worship ended and the fancy dress party started! 4. A barrier to worship is believing that your circumstances, sin, your past, guilt, if you going through tough times that you are some how separated you from God. You know that lie..who are you to worship God..who are you to come in to His presence..these things that pop into your head just when you are about to worship. Where is God in this circumstance? And then you start worrying and trying earn your way back to God so you can feel like you are close to him. But if that’s you focus before you worship on Romans 8 verse 35 35 Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? 36 (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”[o]) 37 No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. Paul and Silas still knew they had victory in prison. 38 And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[p] neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. 39 No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord. John Ortburg story The Bear. John Ortburg tells this story from a film called The Bear. Its about a tiny bear cub whose mother dies. But he gets adopted by a massive father bear. This father bear protects the cub from everything, however one day the cub gets separated from the father. Using this opportunity a mountain lion comes to attack the little cub. The little cub tries to remember every thing his father taught him. He growls and lifts his tiny paws but his voice is still a frightened squeak and his efforts look a bit pathetic compared to the fierce mountain lion. Then the mountain lion suddenly looks filled with fear and backs off. What the little cub cant see is that behind him the father bear has silently stood behind him and is standing on his massive hind legs and is showing his teeth. Bad things in your life may insinuate that you have done something wrong to separate you from God. But his story describes how God is with us. He’s got our back. We might not feel our efforts are good enough to win the victory. But the battle isn’t ours.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Mar 2014 18:42:21 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015