In as much as worship is important in our lives as Christians, the way it must be done is equally important. Many of us do a lot thinking it is acceptable worship but never look out for the right way it must be done. For Jesus Himself to talk on this topic and show the right way it must be done shows the importance of it not to Him (alone), but the father who is seeking for those who would worship in this prescribed way.
Because Jesus knew how we can please the father (in our worship) better than any of us, He talked on the subject of worship in John 4. He also went ahead to reject some of the ways some people in His days were going about it and thinking it was acceptable.
Paul, who became one of the greatest apostles and was recorded to have said “learn from me as I learnt from Christ”, found out that some of the people in his day were also going about this in the wrong way. He also confronted them as Jesus did.
What I am also doing simply is that, I am not in a position of rejecting anyone’s worship (because I am not a worship expert and even dare not) but I am humbly presenting us four groups of worshipers that any of us can fall in, and the need to re-examine our worship (based on these case studies) and get it done in the acceptable way.
- The first group is the VAIN WORSHIPERS:
These kind of worshipers were described by Jesus in Matthew 15. He said
“7 You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you: 8 “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. 9 They worship me in
vain; their teachings are merely human rules.” (NIV)
We become this kind of worshipers when our heart is not in what we are doing but we are merely going through the motions. We may sing songs, play music, jump about and a whole lot, but if our heart is not in whatever we are doing, we are nothing but
vain worshipers who are following human set rules and getting our way through to worship but not seeking to please the father.
- The second group is the IGNORANT WORSHIPERS:
These group of worshipers know not what they worship as Jesus told the Samaritan woman in John 4 “22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know…”. Paul also made mention of these kind of worshipers in Acts 17:
22 Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: “People of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. 23 For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship—and this is what I am going to proclaim to you.”
Whenever we worship without understanding what we are doing, we become ignorant worshipers. Paul once said “I worship with my spirit and I worship with my understanding…” This means our intellect and whole minds must be involved in our worship, so that we don’t do anything we don’t understand, focusing on other things than God-as we worship.
- The third group is the SELF-IMPOSED WORSHIPERS:
These are also known as willful worshipers. Paul once again described such worshipers in Colossians 2.
22 These rules, which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use, are based on merely human commands and teachings. 23 Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.”
This group is made up of those who do what they think is prudent and wise to do forsaking the right way. They run on their human wisdom and pretend to be doing the right things as a result of following traditions but are satisfying their individual desires.
We should not come to worship with our own presumptions or assumptions, thinking God will gladly accept it. It is a good thing to worship the father, but it is best to do it His way. If we try to do it based on our will, then would have been better off not to have done it at all.
- The fourth and last group is the TRUE WORSHIPERS:
Much may not be said about this latter group, since we might have heard about them a lot of times. But, these were the group described by Jesus in John 4, and even added that the father was in search of them to worship Him. This is to say that not only do they worship in the right way, but also they were being sought for by the father to worship. Is it not amazing that God Himself, as all-sufficient as He is, would be seeking for a particular group of worshipers to worship Him? Jesus clearly stated in John 4:
23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.”
These are “the kind of worshipers the father seeks”. This means by extension that, there are other kinds of worshipers (possibly some of which have been described earlier) which He is not only displeased with but does not also seek for.
The choice is yours to decide today what kind of worshiper you would become.
I desire to be a true worshiper-the one the father seeks and not any other kind of worshiper.
What kind of worshiper are you?
