Worship: An Emotional Experience

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Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Thursday, November 6th. When it comes to worshiping God, what truly matters is not just what comes from your lips, but what flows from your heart. Today, we continue our series with a biblical view of worship from Isaiah chapter 6.

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When you and I read the scriptures, there’s one thing that is very evident. God wants his people to worship, to bow down, to adore, to learn, to love him. And so much of what he did in the Old Testament, in the tabernacle, for example, why was all of that there? Now, there may have been many reasons, but I believe one of the primary reasons was this, that God wanted to teach men to worship him. He wanted to teach men that he was holy. That’s why he had a holy of holies where only the priests could go after preparation once a year to offer atonement. Why did God do that? He didn’t have to do that. He could have forgiven them without all this paraphernalia and all this, all these robes and all of this, all of this metal and gold and silver and diamonds and jewels and all of the fanfare, all the people getting together. Why was God saying all of that? Because he was using these things to teach men something that he knew was very essential to their hearing and to their seeing and their being able to identify materially with it in order to teach them his holiness and to teach them how to worship him. What is the one thing that all through the Old Testament God forbids over and over and over again? I turn to Deuteronomy chapter 4. I don’t turn to it tonight. But before you go to bed tonight, I want to challenge you to read Deuteronomy chapter 4. It is a beautiful chapter and it expresses one thing that God intended to express to Israel before they went into the promised land. Something about himself. Something about worshiping him. And something about a limitation of their worship. And he names some things in there that I want you to just read over yourself and maybe it’ll hit you like it hit me. It is a worship experience to read that chapter and listen to God get his people ready to go into a promised land. Now, worship isn’t only a religious experience, but I want us to narrow it down to the fact that worship is an emotional experience. It is something we feel in our relationship to God. And it is a feeling that we have that’s going to have a response within us bodily. You see, there will be an emotional feeling toward God. Now, I want us to look at this chapter, and there are five things I want us to notice here about the experience of worship that Isaiah had, because ours won’t be just like his, but the same elements must be there. Beginning in verse 1, he says, In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty, high, and exalted with the train of his robe filling the temple. And the first thing I want us to notice is this. Worship is an emotional experience. It is an experience of the awareness of God. It is an experience of the awareness of God. It is an emotional experience. Listen, when you feel like you’re in the presence of God, you’re going to really feel something. I’m not too sure you can really explain that to anyone else. But you just know that God is here. You just know the Spirit of the Lord is in this place. Or when you’re quietly praying all by yourself. Or when you’re in a small group or a great host of people. The awareness of the presence of God. Now listen, the first step, the first step in worshiping God is to feel his presence. You see, now listen, if you and I are so busy and you and I are so active about everything, if we’re not careful, we’ll miss him. Because you see, you don’t become aware of God. Watch this. You don’t become aware of the presence of God with your mind. You become aware of the presence of God with your spirit. And you see, he wants us to function on this level. If you and I are going to pick up on the presence of God, we’ve got to live down here in our spirits. We’re going to be able to perceive the presence of God. It isn’t where you are. Watch this. It is the condition of your spirit that picks up on the presence of God. The second thing I want you to notice here is this. That when you and I really and truly worship the Lord, we’re going to be awed before the holiness of God. We’re going to be awed in the presence of God. Somebody says, well, what does that mean to be awed in the presence of God? It means to stand in wonder and amazement and inspiration and reverence and fear before him. He’s holy, awed in the presence of a holy God. Listen, what does not awe you, you will not worship. You know why many people don’t worship God? They’re not awed by God. They’re so ignorant of who he is, they think he’s some old rich antiquated grandfather sitting out yonder in space somewhere who’s full of mercy and that’s all. When you get really desperate, call on him. That’s not God at all. You will not worship what does not awe you, what you do not reverence, what you do not see as beyond you completely and totally. Now listen to what happened. Listen. He says he saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty, exalted, with the train of his robe filling the temple. That is, what he saw was that the Lord just totally filled the whole temple. seraphim stood above him now seraphim was an angel a ministering angel seraphim stood above him a fiery ministering angel stood above him above does not mean in position but what he’s simply speaking here of his location not in position for there’s none above him seraphim stood above him this is what he saw each having six wings with two he covered his face in the presence of absolute exalted holiness he covered his face and with two he covered his feet in humility and with two he did fly serving god continuously imperfect tense everything that was going on was going on continuously without end What Isaiah saw, he got a glimpse of the holiness of God. Let me ask you this. When is the last time you ever felt in your relationship to God that you just want to get on your knees and your face and stretch out before God and not say one word? You see, I’m sure that, listen, I want you to listen to this. I’m sure that from my lips that neither I nor anyone else can teach you how to worship God. The only thing I can pray is that the Spirit of the Lord through my spirit would say something to you to prick your conscience, stir you, motivate you to examine yourself to see, Lord, have I been prancing through my Christian life all these years so actively engaged in doing this for you and serving you and teaching and singing and all these things? And have I missed you in all of this? Has my understanding and my estimation and my mental concept of you been such? Has it been so immature like kindergarten? Has it been infantile? Has it been elementary? When here you are a holy righteous God. And in the scriptures when men came in the presence of God. And they knew they were in the presence of the Lord. And God wanted to say something to them. They bowed down before him. They wanted to lie prostrate before God. They understood something of his nature. Listen. And one called out to another saying, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And the foundations of the thresholds tremble at the voice of him who called out while the temple was filled with smoke. Listen. God was present. And Isaiah knew that he was in the presence of the Lord. He didn’t want to say anything. He didn’t want to do anything. You see, when men learn to worship God, it affects their whole life. And what happened in this particular case is that Isaiah saw the Lord. And you know what he did? He recoiled. That’s what Moses did. He backed off. He took off his shoes. God said, take off your shoes, Moses. You’re standing on holy ground. Let me ask you something. Has there ever been a time in your life when God so wrapped you up in his presence that you didn’t want to say anything? You didn’t want to move. You don’t want anything to happen. You just want to stay right there. I can remember the first time that I believed God, that I ever was so aware of his presence that I was frightened. I remember exactly where I was. I was in seminary. I was in the music building, and I had a little prayer room. I was over there one Tuesday evening by myself. I’d been praying for quite some time, and I just felt something that I’d never felt before. It’s just like God filled that room up. And I was praying. And the longer I prayed, the more of his presence I felt. Until it just got so full that I have to admit, I got so scared. I just quit praying and told God, please take care of me. I didn’t see anything. I was too afraid to open my eyes. I probably wouldn’t have seen anything if I had. It was an emotional experience. I believe Isaiah was afraid. I believe he was standing in absolute awe and reverence as he stood in the presence of a holy God. And the fiery angelic beings were crying out, Holy, holy, holy Lord God of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. Isaiah heard something. He saw something. But most of all, he felt something that he never got over. Now, I say that to you to say this. Listen to me. I don’t know how to say this. Don’t live your life making money, building a business, carrying on church activities, being religious, serving God by activity, and miss. God don’t do that. Because one of these days when you stand in His presence… If we have not sought Him above all other things, we’re going to be so disappointed. Because in spite of all that we do, if our object is not the Lord, it’s like sawdust. And you put that in the ground. Let me ask you a question. Do you really want God to make himself evidently known to you? Well, something must happen before that. The third thing I want you to notice is this. His adoration of the majesty of God. Listen. seraphim stood above him each having two wings with two he covered his face with two he covered his feet with two he flew here he is looking upon the throne of god high and loft and lifted up out of reach out of touch but evidently there he saw a heavenly scene he had an emotional experience of worship in humility he bowed down before him Odd, but what? Adoring the Lord God. To adore the Lord is to love him. God our Savior, we adore thee. And yet I wonder how many of us know how to love him, how to adore him. Now, I want you to turn to Psalm 95 for just a moment. Psalm 95, and there’s a little scripture here that’s so beautiful. Listen to what he says. Come, let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker, for He is our God. When I read that and I talk to some people, they say, no, I don’t want to accept Jesus Christ as my Savior. I want to live my life just like I want to. You want me to tell you something? The more you and I understand who God is… the more we’ll have to pray for God to give us patience and tolerance and compassion and love toward people who despise the one we love the most. If I adore him and love him, I’m going to express it with my total life. Well, something happens. Now watch this. beginning in verse 4. The foundation, the threshold, trembled at the voice of him who called out while the temple was filled with smoke. Then I said, woe is me, for I am a man of unclean lips. I am undone. I am ruined. That is, Isaiah saw himself for the first time like he really and truly was. Which brings me to the next thing, and that is, when you and I are worshiping him, And we really mean business. We’re going to accept the declarations of God about five things. I’m going to accept what he says about himself. Now watch this. I’m going to accept what he says about his son. I’m going to be able to accept what he says about the Holy Spirit. I’m going to be able to accept what he says about sin. I’m even going to be able to accept what he says about me. Listen, if you are not in agreement with what God says about himself, you’re not in agreement with what God says about his son, you’re not in agreement with what God says about the Holy Spirit, you’re not in agreement with what God says about sin, and you are in disagreement with what God says about you, you can’t worship God. No way. No way. You see, now watch this. It’s so simple. You can’t worship someone you disagree with, can you? No way. And you see, it may be that the reason we don’t know how to worship is because we haven’t gotten fit to worship. Maybe that’s it. If you are not in agreement with what he says about himself, that he’s the sovereign God, if you’re not in agreement with what he says about his son, He must be the Lord of your life. Not in agreement with what he says about the Holy Spirit, total dependence upon his empowering work. Not in agreement with what he says about sin, all sin. It destroys, wrecks, ruins, mars, cheats God out of his glory. Not in agreement with what he says about yourself. Sinner, saved by grace, kept by the power of God. You will not worship a God with whom you disagree. One last thing. Worship is an emotional experience, and I want you to see what happened. Listen. He said, Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Of whom shall I sin? Who will go for us? Now up to this point, the only thing Isaiah had heard and seen, he had seen the Lord. High, lofty, lifted up. He’d heard the voice of the seraphim saying, Holy, holy, holy Lord God of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. He had not heard anything about a need. He had not heard anything about a mission. But the next thing he hears is the voice of God saying, who will go for us? And Isaiah, listen, you know what he did? He said, here am I, Lord, send me. You know why Isaiah was willing to say that before he knew where he was going? Why he was going? How he was going to get there? To whom he was going? And what was going to be required of him when he got there? Because Isaiah had such an experience with God. It didn’t really make any difference where, when, how, or to whom. You want to know how you and I know that Isaiah loved God? Because without even knowing the answer, he said, here am I, send me. Now listen to me, with all of my heart get this. How many of you are waiting to obey God after you get the details? You’re waiting for details. When a man knows God and loves the Lord and is devoted to Him and has at least gotten a little bitty, itsy glimpse of what it means to worship the Lord, He’s ready to go and He doesn’t require details. He knows whatever the requirements, Almighty God is sufficient to meet the need. That’s why He wants us to learn to worship Him. And once we learn to do that, we won’t have to worry about the work, workers, money, gifts, places of service. Once we get the worship down, everything else will come. And I want to ask you one more time. How many of you are waiting for the details? Listen. Get your eye off the details and get them on God and you will find out the details don’t really matter.

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Thank you for listening to An Emotional Experience. If you’d like to know more about Charles Stanley or InTouch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.