PRINCIPLES OF WORSHIP
A strict definition of the word worship (Proskuneo) is: "Bend and prostrate before the presence of someone and kiss him (kiss his feet), as a dog licks the hand of his master."
Does it sound humiliating? It really is not when you understand the principle behind this definition.
I have a dog (A German Shepherd), which I got when I was just a puppy. Days after having obtained it we realized that he was sick, and in fact several of his cubs brothers died. A veterinarian friend of mine, came home to see him, and he began to give him a treatment until he recovered, now he is a huge German shepherd that frightens half the world, but he really is a good-natured one.
My dog constantly licks my hand. Every time I go out to play with him, every time I come back from a trip, and every time I feed him I can see the gratitude on his face and his way of expressing it is by licking my hand. He knows that I am his master, he knows that I am the one who feeds him and takes care of him, he knows that I would not hurt him, I take care of him since he was a puppy! For my dog I am the source of his all that is why he treats me that way.
Do you understand the definition now? Adoration is an attitude of our heart; is to recognize the mercy and grace of God for us, is to recognize what God is and what he has done for us. It is to understand that without it we would be lost. In this sense, worship is a way of life.
That is why the best worshiper will always be the one who recognizes where the Lord brought him from and who is lost without him, who remembers his past and knows that sitting at the Lord's table is an undeserved privilege. The best worship will always come from a grateful heart.
Worship is not singing?
It may sound strange that as a director of praise he says that worship is not singing. But I say it intentionally because many people have limited the worship of singing. For many the adoration is the 20 minutes that the "b" side of the praise and worship recordings last. For others to worship is to sing slow choirs after praise and before the preaching comes, and this is tragic. Worship is much more!
Worship is an attitude that should affect all areas of our life, that's why worship is much more than singing. Maybe there are people who sing every Sunday in the place where they congregate, but they have never worshiped God.
For me the best way to express adoration is through singing, but it is only one way. How does one who has no voice worship? Or hands? Or feet ?, It does it with the heart, there is the source of our adoration.
This leads us to consider other important points about worship.
Adoration is total surrender.
The word worship also means to offer, and through the scriptures we find the word worship as synonymous with the word "sacrifice" or offering. In the old testament the most common offering was the burnt offering. In this type of offering the animal offered in sacrifice was consumed totally by fire, and unlike other types of offerings, with this, neither the offering nor the priest could eat of the meat, because it was totally consumed. The burnt offering was a type of the sacrifice that Jesus was going to offer for us. He gave himself completely for you and for me on the cross (Hebrews 13: 11-12).
Referring to the burnt offering and the sacrifice of Jesus, the author of Hebrews says that "Therefore, let us always offer to God, through him, a sacrifice of praise, that is, the fruit of lips that confess his name" Heb.13 :fifteen.
In the same way that Jesus gave himself completely for us, so we must surrender ourselves to adoration. There can not be half adoration. God detests things by halves. Jesus said that the first and greatest commandment is: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul with all your mind and with all your strength." The common denominator in this verse is "Everything." As the offering that was consumed "All", God wants everything, God wants a total sacrifice, a total surrender. This is true worship.
In adoration I not only give my song, I also give my body, my will, my whole being, all that I have and what I am. The true worshiper is one who has given himself totally to God, without reservations, without measures.
When God has our heart he has everything. When God does not have our heart there can be no adoration. That's why Samuel said: "Certainly obeying is better than sacrifices (Adoration) and paying attention than the fat of lambs"
- I Samuel 15:22
God tested Abraham to see if he really was a worshiper, to see if he was willing to surrender everything. The true worshiper surrenders everything because he trusts fully in his Lord, so he can obey in everything.
