The Big Diehl

God is love.

Love is blind.

Ray Charles was blind.

Ray Charles is god.

Hey everyone remember to make your clocks SPRING FORWARD one hour tonight when you go to bed! Daylight Savings Time begins tonight/tomorrow EARLY morning.

“I believe in God and all that Christianity stands for — I believe it. I’ve asked Jesus in my heart several times. I’ve followed Christ, I’ve fallen away, I’ve rededicated my life — but I’ve never felt any different. Nothing has ever changed. I followed Christian thought for years – but anymore I’m not really even interested in searching for God.” -A friend of mine.

What encouragement might you have for my friend?

My church is gearing up for the Risen To Reign series. It’s a service series unlike any other New Hope has ever seen. Here’s the layout:

March 17-18 “How’d It Start?”
We’ve heard the Easter story before — Jesus came to the earth and died — but just how did it start?

March 24-25 “What Was Finished?”
This week we’ll look at Jesus’ famous words, “It is finished” and we’ll figure out exactly what was finished – what really finished.

March 31-April 1 “Where is He?”
This week we’re discussing what Jesus’ death and resurrection has to do with us.

April 7-8 “EASTER!”
On Easter weekend we will celebrate the resurrection of Jesus.

There has been some “buzz” about how this year’s Easter services will be different than anything we’ve done before. That’s no secret. But exactly HOW it will be different will remain somewhat a surprise. This series will be jam packed with some of the best arts elements New Hope has experienced. You don’t want to miss these!

Every Easter people come out of the woodwork and pack out church buildings across America. People are more open to attending church during this season. This series has a huge “salvation” emphasis and is geared towards non-Christians. I encourage you Christians to follow my lead and invite those unbelievers you have contact with to come with you church during the “Risen to Reign” series. I have a list of 4 specific names of people I will invite in the next two weeks. There are lots of people that aren’t going to church anywhere – let’s bring them in!

I went to the YMCA the other day and visited the proverbial weight room. (I still haven’t figured out if they call it a weight room because you lift weights or because you’re in there to loose some of it). I did a variety of exercises that worked out many different muscles: my bis, tris, quads, and quints.

After my body-building session I made my way back to the locker room to grab my clothes. As I walked in, I heard a loud banging noise – as if two junior high kids were bouncing a basketball against the lockers – which is exactly what it was. They also had radio headsets from the YMCA that they were playing with. I said a few friendly words to them (which was responded with disrespect), grabbed my stuff, and headed to the front desk to pick up my membership card.

The lady at the front desk had a concerned look on her face. “Are those two boys behaving?” she said, “I had to kick them out last night for their destructive behavior.” I explained what I saw. She told me that they weren’t supposed to have those radios back there. The conversation went something like this:

I said: “Want me to go get the radios from them?”

“Well, I don’t want to . . .”

“I don’t mind.”

“Well . . .”

“Do they need kicked out? I don’t mind doing that eitherrr . . .”

“Adam, you really want to go get them, don’t you?”

You see, I was looking forward to going into that locker room and showing those disrespectful junior highers who the boss was. I wanted to flex those muscles I just spent an hour working on.

Right about at the time of my glory, in came the boys’ uncle or something and he picked them up. I never got to do any muscle flexing. But I still worked hard for the muscle – and when I need to flex it, I know they’re right beside me: my bis, tris, quads, and quints. All of them. Grrr!!!

Can we worship incorrectly? Yes, we absolutely can. This is a blog series discussing for examples of how our worship can be screwed up. The final example is called . . .

The Plight of Israel.

Amos 5:20-27

Will not the day of the LORD be darkness, not light—pitch-dark, without a ray of brightness?

“I hate, I despise your religious feasts; I cannot stand your assemblies. Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them. Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps.

“But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!

“Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the desert, O house of Israel?
You have lifted up the shrine of your king, the pedestal of your idols, the star of your god which you made for yourselves.

“Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Damascus,” says the LORD, whose name is God Almighty.

***

Let me recap what just happened. Israel worshiped. God basically told the worshipers, “Get out of my face.”

Why?

The worshipers were going through actions, doing their “thing.” They were basically going through the motions of being a worshiper, but they were not worshiping with their life. Their acts of worship were nothing more than acts – there was not genuine worship in their heart – just the acts of worship. There was no basis for their worship. We can do this same thing today.

True worship is internal, at least at the start. Here are some steps to help grow your heart of worship:

1) Be certain your heart is right. There needs to be worship inside of your heart first. Understand that God is seeking true worshipers. When you understand his unmatched worth – worship will occur in your heart.

2) In your heart, collect the worship you have for God.

3) Express your worship to Him. Through music. Through dancing. By lifting your hands to Him. By shouting out. By standing quietly. Whatever. JUST EXPRESS IT TO GOD!

You see, the “motions” of worship aren’t wrong. Its when you jump to the motions without checking your heart that your worship gets screwed up. We must check our heart first – then do the motions (the EXPRESSIONS) of worship.

God wants our worship so much that he’ll take whatever we give him, right? Not quite. Our worship to God can become defiled. Inspired by a teaching I heard from Jack Hayford, “Screwing Up Worship” is a four part series of blogs explaining four instances where our worship can become defiled. Part three is called . . .

The Lucifer Syndrome

Lucifer was a glorious angel in heaven who had the job of directing all of the worship from the angels and all of creation towards God. Imagine that. All of the worship the angels offer to God. Plus all the worship that mankind offers to God. Plus all the glory in all of creation (planet Earth being only a small portion) offered to God. All added together, that’s A LOT of worship. Lucifer was a magnificent worship leader.

As Lucifer directed all of God’s glory towards Him, pride entered his heart. Lucifer told God that he would rise up and become like God — sort of as His equal.

God didn’t like that. God kicked Lucifer out of heaven. We know Lucifer today as Satan. The only person to ever get kicked out of heaven was a worship leader.

I don’t think that God waited until Lucifer actually walked up to God and said, “Yo God-dawg! I’m dissing you – I’m gonna hold the same position that you hold! And my peeps be backin’ me up, too!” I don’t think it was quite like that. I think it was more of an internal moment. Lucifer had pride in his heart – just pride. He didn’t actually do anything wrong yet. It was in his heart. The pride was an intention of rebellion within him.

But God saw it – even through the worship.
And God sees our hearts today as well.

True worship occurs when the sought (that’s us) realizes the unmatched worth of the seeker (that’s Him). At that moment — our worship occurs. Anything less than that isn’t really worship. Worship is all about Him. That phrase gets overused and its easy to read it quickly without realizing the significance of that. Pause for a moment and think about it this paragraph. Read it again if you need to.

If you’re someone who leads worship services – be extra careful of pride. Pride can slip in – little by little. So slowly you hardly notice it. If you think you’re a worship leader – yet there is the slightest bit of pride in your heart – you are no worship leader. You are leading songs, not worship. Leading worship means you’re directing worship towards God – and you can’t do that with pride in your heart.

Our worship is screwed up when our hearts are not focused on the unmatched worth of the Creator. That’s the Lucifer Syndrome.

If you are not a private worshiper, you will not likely be a public worshiper. You may go to church, and go through all the motions. But you will not likely really worship. Trying to worship publicly, not having worshiped privately is like the dry heaves: you are trying to bring up something you don’t have in you. -Paul Faulkner