Worship

Today I want us to focus on Worship. There are a couple of misconceptions about what we think Worship is that we might not know about and to truly see what Worship is biblically.

The first misconception that is very common in the North American church is that “Worship equals singing”. We think that worshipping and singing praises to God are fundamentally synonymous terms with one other. To reduce worship to just singing is being grossly irresponsible and shrinking down the huge biblical concept of Worship into one part of the whole that is by no means the whole of what Worship is and what Worship should be.

The second misconception about Worship that is equally as troubling is the idea that Worship is something we do at specific occasions and only happens when we gather together at church on Sundays. Worshipping God cannot be reduced to just singing on Sunday mornings.

To solve this, what we need is a more biblically based view of what Worship really is. To do this we will be looking at a couple of Hebrew words in the Old Testament and Greek words in the New Testament to help understand what Worship is.

The first one is the Hebrew word Shachah and the Greek word Proskuneo.

Shachah and Proskuneo, both basically have the sense of “Bowing down”. To worship is to bow down, to literally prostrate oneself and to be on one's face before another, either before Royalty or before a Deity. So, in many respects, this fundamental word of worship reminds us that worship is about bowing down, prostrating and laying ourselves low before someone that is mighty, that is powerful, that is awesome.

The second one is the Hebrew word 'Avad and the Greek word Latreuo, both essentially meaning “To Serve” just like a slave is serving his master. You can see that there is relationship between the words Shachah and 'Avad; Bowing down and serving, being a servant. If we put these terms together in our minds we can picture a servant who is bowed at the master's feet waiting for instructions. So bowing down and serving are two key fundamental ideas that should be at the Heart of our Worship.

Worship is bowing down all that we are to our God and serving Him with our whole heart, mind and soul. He has blessed us with our talents, our gifts, our money, our energy, our hearts and our lives, so our reaction to worship should be one of awe, gratitude and service.