Saturday May 12, 2012

Prepare yourself for worship tomorrow by reading         Deuteronomy 16, by praying and committing the day to the Lord.

 

Read Deuteronomy 16:21-22

 

A married man meets a girlfriend for lunch. They laugh, joke and flirt with each other over the table. After lunch, they both ring their respective bosses and take the afternoon off so that they can have some uninterrupted time together. Then as usual, in the late afternoon the man goes home to his wife and family.

 

As he’s greeted at the door he kisses and hugs his wife saying, ‘Hi honey. I missed you so much today. I love you’. Freeze the frame right there!  I hope you can see something terribly wrong here. I hope you can see the injustice and the utter lie that has just been spoken. The actions of that man, even though they were secret and behind closed doors, betrayed him and showed his hypocrisy. One has to question if he did miss his wife and if he really does love her. One has to question his heart and his true intentions.

 

It was no coincidence that God refers to idolatry as adultery. Israel was to be pure and reserved for God alone. She was not to commit spiritual adultery by prostituting herself to other gods and statues. She was not to pray to these statues and wooden Asherah poles. She was not to worship the sun, moon and stars. She was to worship God and God alone. Her actions would betray her and show the true state of her heart. God would not accept the worship of a divided heart.

 

When we come together before the Lord, let us make sure that we are not also committing spiritual adultery. While I doubt that any of us would carve a statue and then bow down to worship it. I doubt that any of us would worship the sun, moon and stars. But we might read the stars and plan our day accordingly. God hates that! We might spend all our energy Monday through Friday grasping at the mighty dollar bill, hungering for it and pursuing it relentlessly. We might adore and worship our car above and beyond God. We might crave sexual fulfilment (legitimately or illegitimately) and make that our god for the week. We might be pursing fame and fortune at any expense. Maybe unforgiveness has become the  idol we’ve placed in our heart of stone. Maybe we’ve put ourselves on God’s throne and lived as though we are God. God still won’t accept the worship of a divided heart.

 

Israel was warned about living separate or compartmentalised lives. She was not to live for herself and then perfunctorily  appear before God, simply going through the motions. She was to live for God each and every single day. Coming before God was to be a culmination of the joy of being near God moment by moment. New Testament believers are the same. Our week is to be lived for God and in God’s presence. We are to relate to God and be intimate with God each and every moment of each and every day. The culmination of this is when we gather together in each other’s and more importantly, in God’s presence. Coming before God together is to be the highlight of our week, bringing joy, motivation and fulfilment of all that we’ve longed for.

 

Anything else is simply perfunctory and is NOT glorifying to God.

 

Prayer:

¥ Pray that God would accept our worship tomorrow because it comes from an undivided heart. Pray that God would grant repentance and change where needed and that he would continue to purify us with his Holy Spirit.

¥ Pray that our Kings Kids teachers and helpers would be energised and given great creativity to teach the kids, to enthuse them and to model true Christ-likeness to them. Pray that the children grow in their love for God, their commitment to Him and their ability to live for Him and Him alone.