Saturday May 26, 2012

Spend time preparing for tomorrow’s church service.

Commit it to God in prayer. Ask Him to grant you repentance and decide what you’ll give and how you’ll serve.

Read Deuteronomy 19; Micah 6:8; Isaiah 1:15-17

 

A man stands in church and sings the hymns with gusto. He bellows out at the top of his voice and prays the most eloquent prayer afterwards.  Everyone thinks highly of him and, almost cheering him on, all give a hearty “Amen” at the end of this prayer.

 

Yet in this last week alone, he sealed several business deals by lying about his rivals. He sifted several thousand dollars out of his work partnership account to a false account in Switzerland, having modified the bills presented to him. He flirted openly with the secretary at work and threatened with physical violence and retribution if they squealed on his business dealings.

 

Let me ask you this question. Is this man’s worship of God acceptable to the Lord? Of course not! I hear you cry out. You are 1000% right in what you say.

 

Like Israel, the quality of our worship is determined by the quality of our walk. If we walk along shady paths and hide in darkened corners throughout the week, our worship, at best, will be an exercise of forms and motions. It is impossible to stand before God and worship acceptably in spirit and truth when our walk is fundamentally flawed with deliberate and wilful sin.

 

God will not accept such false worship. God demands that his worshippers walk

in holiness and truth in all of our lives. He demand that we love justice, keep justice and act mercifully all the days of our lives. Christian men are called to lift up holy hands in prayer. Such hands are not called to be holy for the duration of a church service but holy throughout one’s life. These hands are called to be Christ loving, other centred, justice loving, mercy offering hands that reflect the palms of Christ Jesus that bore the sins of the world.

How will you worship Christ tomorrow? What kinds of hands will you lift up to our Lord tomorrow?

 

Prayer:

¥ Pray that Shiloh Church ministries in India has enough resources and finances and personnel to continue ministering and serving the poor and needy. Pray that we would have opportunity to continue supporting them.  Pray for the mission team preparing to head to India. Pray that all preparations go well and that God uses the team powerfully.

¥ Pray the same for the Mustard Seed Orphanages in Myanmar.

¥ Pray for a missionary zeal to infect each person in your local church.