Rochford Community Church

Each of these pages about prayer form part of a series of Worship Seminars. To that end we hope that they will be used to stimulate worship and not merely provide information.

On this introductory page we will look at some basic verses about worship to establish what it is.

In following pages we'll expand our view of what the Bible says and look at more verses from the Old and New Testaments respectively and then we'll start considering the subject more widely, including modern practices and things we could all aim for.

If you are concerned about New Testament practices you may wish to go directly to Page 5 which considers 1 Corinthians 14 gatherings, or if you wish to consider basic ways of expressing meaningful worship using the Old Testament model, go directly to Page 6. These first pages seek to consider a wide range of verses from Old & New Testaments in order to focus on just what worship is.

To start with, here, we'll take five sets of verses and draw some simple conclusions to start our study of what the Bible has to say about worship.

Mt 4:8-10

8 Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour. 9 "All this I will give you," he said, "if you will bow down and worship me."

10 Jesus said to him, "Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ` Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.'"

Notes:

1. Satan sought worship from Jesus.

2. Jesus maintained it could only be given to God

3. Most commentators suggest Jesus is quoting the sense of Deut 6:13, but that starts out: “Fear the Lord your God”

4. It is suggested therefore, that worship is about awesome reverence for God .

Exo 34:5-8

5 Then the LORD came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the LORD. 6 And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, "The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation."

8 Moses bowed to the ground at once and worshiped .

Notes:

1. The Lord revealed Himself to Moses and Moses' instinctive response was to bow and worship

2. These were signs of reverential acceptance of God's greatness and superiority .

2 Chron 20:18

18 Jehoshaphat bowed with his face to the ground, and all the people of Judah and Jerusalem fell down in worship before the LORD.

Notes:

1. Prophetic revelation of God's strategy to deliver them, had come.

2. The automatic response was to bow and worship.

3. Again signs of reverential acceptance of God's greatness and goodness .

2 Chron 29:28

28 The whole assembly bowed in worship , while the singers sang and the trumpeters played . All this continued until the sacrifice of the burnt offering was completed.

Notes:

1. There are some interesting elements to this verse.

2. The whole people bowed in worship.

3. While they did that others contributed other aspects of the worship:

singers sang – word music to declare God's greatness
musicians played – to provide the backing
others sacrificed – the offerings to God presented on the people's behalf.

4. Thus we see that although worship is specifically bowing before and acknowledging God's sovereign greatness, worship may be accompanied by other things that contribute towards that awareness.

Psa 95:6

Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the LORD our Maker ;

Notes:

1. Here is worship spelt out as simply as possible: bowing down, kneeling before God.

2. Why? Because He is our Maker. He is sovereign, He is all-mighty, He is the Lord.

3. To worship is to have a right response to who God is .

Part 1 : The Fact of Worship