Planned For God's Pleasure
October 3, 2004
Mark 12:30
World Communion Sunday
Galena-Warwick United Methodist Charge
Warwick & Galena, Maryland
Rev. Dr. Lawrence D. Jameson
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Love the Lord your God
with all your heart
and with all your soul
and with all your mind
and with all your strength. Mark 12:30
In Mark chapter 12 the Bible says
that Jesus was questioned
by one of the teachers of Israel.
The man who spoke to Jesus was a respected leader.
He had studied the Scripture
and spent his whole life
teaching people about God.
The teacher asked this question:
"Of all the commandments, which is the most important?"
Jesus didn’t miss a beat.
He knew the answer
and he shared it without hesitation.
Jesus recited the Shema:
Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.
Love the Lord your God
with all your heart
and with all your soul
and with all your strength.
According to Jesus, the greatest commandment
describes the most important purpose
in our lives as Christians.
There is nothing more important for us
than to love God
with all of our
heart, soul, mind, and strength.
Christians have a word for that!
What is it called
when you obey the words
of the Shema?
It is called WORSHIP.
Worship is an important word for us.
Unfortunately,
a lot of people have messed up the definition.
When you hear the word “Worship”
what do you automatically think?
Sermon, Hymns, Scripture Lessons,
Testimonies, Prayers, Silence, Candles,
Organ music, Stained glass windows,
offering plates, communion, baptism.
Actually, those things are just small parts of the bigger picture.
Real worship is simple, honest, and powerful.
What is Worship?
The term worship
comes from the English term “Worth - ship”
Since God is worthy of our
love and obedience
we worship him.
A great verse
that helps us to define worship
is found in Romans 12:1
Therefore, I urge you, brothers,
in view of God's mercy,
to offer your bodies as living sacrifices,
holy and pleasing to God
– this is your spiritual act of worship.
This isn’t hard to understand.
God loved us first.
He took the first step.
He took the initiative.
God was merciful to us FIRST.
Now in view of God's mercy
we get to respond
we get to do something back
we get to show God how much we appreciate his love.
THAT IS WORSHIP.
Here is your thumbnail definition:
Worship is:
us loving God back
with everything we’ve got.
Love the Lord your God
with all your heart
and with all your soul
and with all your mind
and with all your strength. Mark 12:30
If you break Mark 12:30 down,
this is what you get:
We get to love God
Passionately
Thoughtfully
Practically
1) PASSIONATELY with my heart & soul
Heart and Soul
I’ve got to tell you,
this is my weak area.
I’ve never fully trusted God with my emotions.
I’ve always been taught
“to tone it down”
“keep it proper”
“not let things get out of control”.
And do you know what?
That strategy has held me back.
Let me tell you about my first experience
of passionately worshiping the Lord.
It was at Promise Keepers.
The guys in our men’s group
put me in a car
and took me to several Promise Keepers rallies.
There were tens of thousands of men
swept up in a tidal wave
of sincere appropriate PASSIONATE worship.
But when I got back to church,
I didn’t preach any differently.
I was the same old conservative Larry Jameson.
Why is that?
My brother Carl recently pointed this out to me.
Thank you Carl.
He said,
“Man, you’ve got some excellent content
in your sermons.
but what I don’t see is passion.”
So right here, I want to confess
that I need help in this area.
God, I want to be able
to trust you more with my emotions.
I want to shout when the Spirit says, “Shout”.
I want to feel your truth with the full range
of the emotions you built me to have.
It’s funny.
Our culture says
we can go to a football stadium
and scream and stomp and get all worked up
when our team scores a goal
but when God’s life-changing truth is lifted up
or when the Holy Spirit calls on us to testify
we sit back and we clam up.
Well dear ones. Worship is supposed to be PASSIONATE.
Worship touches our feelings.
It takes our breath away.
It grabs us where we live
and shows us beauty, power, and love.
In Exodus 34:14
the Bible says:
He is a God
who is passionate
about His relationship with you.
We really don’t get that.
We really don’t understand
HOW MUCH God loves us.
Rick Warren told the follow amazing true story.
Liz Curtis Higgs was one of the best-known disc jockeys in America, and she
lived quite a wild life. A really wild lifestyle without God. In fact, Howard
Stern was the a.m. show,
and Liz Curtis Higgs was the p.m. show.
One day Howard Stern said to Liz,
“You know, you need to get clean up your act.”
Now, that really says something if Howard Stern is saying it, okay?
I mean, she was a little on the wild side.
Because Liz Curtis Higgs had been burned by so many men
her heart had been broken over and over,
so she became a militant feminist.
But she had a Christian girlfriend who kept inviting her to church. So one day
after a long, long time, she said,
“Okay, I will go to church one time and ONE TIME ONLY.”
So she went to church one time with her friend.
And that week, the pastor just happened to be teaching
on the Bible verse that says
“Wives submit yourselves to your husbands.”
Now, that’s not exactly a good verse
to start with a militant feminist.
She got a little uptight, a little ticked, a little angry.
But she continued to listen
and she actually heard the second part of the verse,
which nobody ever talks about.
The second part of the verse says
“and husbands - you sacrifice yourself;
you give yourself for your wives
just as Jesus Christ sacrificed Himself for the church
and died for her.”
People seldom ever hear that second part.
Who is asked to give their life up?
The husband or the wife?
The husband. The husband.
Well, when Liz heard that part,
she leaned over to her friend and said with a little cynicism,
“well, shoot, I’d gladly give myself to any man
if I knew he would die for me.”
And her friend leaned over and said,
“Liz, there is man
who loved you enough to die for you.
His name is Jesus Christ.
That’s how much He loves you.”
It was not long after that
Liz dropped her guard,
surrendered her life to God in love,
became a believer.
Today she is a well-known Christian author and speaker.
Dear ones,
God is crazy in love with you.
We don’t fully realize how passionate his love is.
When we do realize
the depth, the power, and the passion
of God’s love for us
IT BECOMES APPROPRIATE
TO GET EXCITED!
2) THOUGHTFULLY with my mind
Love the Lord your God
with all your heart
and with all your soul
and with all your mind
God wants you to grow and mature
in your ability to worship.
That involves both your emotions and your intellect.
I love the simple teaching
Rick Warren gives in this area.
Rick calls it “focusing my attention” on God.
God is already focused on us.
In fact, the Bible says that God never stops thinking about us.
Psalm 139:1-3 says:
You have looked deep into my heart, Lord,
and you know all about me.
You know when I am resting
or when I am working...
You notice everything I do
and everywhere I go.
Since God is always thinking about us,
it is appropriate for us
to pay attention to him
a little bit
every day.
Here’s my advice.
Thoughtful worship is like a good salad.
It’s got to be fresh.
It’s got to have a little crunch.
Every now and then,
you change up your salad dressing.
Or you throw in some garlic croutons.
Keep it fresh!
God designed your mind
to respond to training and exercise.
When you think new thoughts about God
YOU ARE WORSHIPING.
That’s right!
If reading the Purpose Driven Life
is getting your mental juices flowing
and if you are learning something new
God is honored by that!
Every serious professional person
has to get Continuing Education.
You pay your money,
buy your books,
sit in the lecture hall,
and when it is all over
you get a certificate.
When was the last time
you took a class
on God’s word the Bible?
Let’s see some hands out there!
We need crunch for our minds.
We need to honor Jesus Christ
by learning something new
every day.
If your Christianity is all emotions
then there will not be much depth
to your discipleship.
Conversely,
if all you do is think,
what kind of Christian is that?
3) PRACTICALLY with my strength
Love the Lord your God
with all your heart
and with all your soul
and with all your mind
and with all your strength. Mark 12:30
Can you worship God with your hands
with your skill
with your effort?
YES!
That’s part of what worship means.
You see,
worship isn’t passive.
It’s active.
In Colossians 3:23
the Bible says:
Whatever you do,
work at it with all your heart,
as though you were working for the Lord
and not for people.
If we let it,
this verse can revolutionize
our jobs.
I have a little book
written by a monk named Brother Lawrence.
The book is called
Practice the Presence of God.
Brother Lawrence turned lemons into lemonade.
Some monks were sent to preach on the street corners.
Others monks got to serve communion in the sanctuary.
Brother Lawrence was given his assignment too,
to wash dishes in the kitchen.
He decided that he was going to
wash dishes for God.
As a result, his life became a powerful influence.
Hundreds of people
found their way
into the back of the kitchen
just to talk with Brother Lawrence.
He wrote his book
because so many people
wanted to know what his secret was.
He did his work for God
and he simply practiced the presence of God
while he was working in the kitchen.
Worship isn’t just for church.
It is for everything we do.
The Message paraphrase
of Romans 12:1 says,
“Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and
walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering.”
That’s worship!
Let’s summarize
God was merciful to us FIRST.
Now in view of God's mercy
we get to respond
we get to do something back
we get to show God how much we appreciate his love.
Worship is:
us loving God back
with everything we’ve got.
1) PASSIONATELY with my heart & soul
2) THOUGHTFULLY with my mind
3) PRACTICALLY with my strength
I like to end by reading
a prayer by Rick Warren.
“Dear God, I wouldn’t even exist if it weren’t for you.
Forgive me for all the times I think and act like You don’t matter. Today I’ve
realized You made me to love me
and that the first purpose of my life is to know and love You back. I’m amazed
that You long for a relationship with me
and I’m amazed You’re interested in the details of my life.
But most of all, I’m amazed You would
come to earth to die for me.
I don’t understand it at all. But I say wow!
Please forgive me, God, for not worshiping You.
I want to learn how to focus my attention on You throughout my day. I want to
turn my work into worship.
I want to learn to love you with a love that You deserve,
thoughtfully with my mind,
passionately with my heart and soul
and practically with my abilities.
When I go back to work on Monday,
I’m going to be working for You,
doing my job as if You are the boss.”
In the name of Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.