In yesterday’s post we began with a definition of worship. Today we will continue to consider
philosophically what worship is and is not.
Kenneth Osbeck put it quite well
when he defined worship as, “An act by a redeemed man, the creature,
toward God, his creator, whereby his will, intellect and emotions gratefully
respond to the revelation of God’s person expressed in the redemptive work of
Jesus Christ, as the Holy Spirit illuminates God’s written word to his
heart.” The Ministry of Music, p. 177.
So, worship is man's response to the Trinity, and man’s relationship and
adoration to God for who He is and what He has done. It is not about a religious event, what a
worshiper gets out of the worship experience, or a worshipers favorite style of
music.
It is literally a Sacrifice of Praise--The worship experience should be
a sacrifice of praise unto God that gives off a sweet fragrance which will
edify the believers and make sinners hungry to have fellowship with God. Although the sinner cannot truly worship God,
(because he is merely an observer) it is very worthwhile for the unregenerate
to experience believers genuinely lavishing praise upon the Trinity through
musicing. Musical worship has a
spiritual drawing power. The Holy Spirit is able to draw sinners to Christ as
believers music unto God. The experience
of Christians singing and playing worship music will cause the unregenerate to
realize that the Christians are experiencing something he or she cannot fully
enjoy, ipso facto; they are not
believers who have experienced the new birth.
So, we have considered that worship is man's response to God. It is not man centered but rather God
centered. Those who do not know the Lord
as their personal Savior cannot truly worship, but the Holy Spirit is capable
of using their observance of Christians joyfully musicing unto God as a means
of convicting them of sin and making them hungry to have a right relationship
to God.
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