why worship (part 2)

(from AW Tozer’s Whatever Happened to Worship?)

But really, my brother or sister, we are brought to God and to faith and to salvation that we might worship and adore Him. We do not come to God that we might be automatic Christians, cookie-cutter Christians, Christians stamped out with a die.

God has provided His salvation that we might be, individually and personally, vibrant children of God, loving God with all our hearts and worshiping Him in the beauty of holiness.

This does not mean, and I am not saying, that we must all worship alike. The Holy Spirit does not operate by anyone’s preconceived idea or formula. But this I know: when the Holy Spirit of God comes among us with His anointing, we become a wor­shiping people. This may be hard for some to admit, but when we are truly worshiping and adoring the God of all grace and of all love and of all mercy and of all truth, we may not be quiet enough to please everyone.

I recall Luke’s description of the throngs on that first Palm Sunday:

The whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen; saying, Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord: peace in heaven, and glory in the highest.

And some of the Pharisees from among the multitude said unto him, Master, rebuke thy disciples.

And he answered and said unto them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out (19:37-40).

Let me say two things here. First, I do not believe it is necessarily true that we are worshiping God when we are making a lot of racket. But not infrequently worship is audible. When Jesus came into Jerusalem presenting Himself as Messiah there was a great multitude and there was a great noise. Doubtless many who joined in the singing and the praise had never been able to sing in the right key. When you have a group of people singing anywhere, you know that some of them will not be in tune.

But this is the point to their worship: they were united in praises to God.

Second, I would warn those who are cultured, quiet, self-possessed, poised and sophisticated, that if they are embarrassed in church when some happy Christian says “Amen!” they may actually be in need of some spiritual enlightenment. The wor­shiping saints of God in the Body of Christ have often been a little bit noisy.

I hope you have read some of the devotionals left us by that dear old English saint, Lady Julian, who lived more than 600 years ago.

She wrote that one day she had been thinking about how high and lofty Jesus was, and yet how He Himself meets the humblest part of our human desire. She received such blessing within her being that she could not control herself. She let go with a shout and praised God out loud in Latin.

Translated into English, it would have come out “Well, glory to God!”

Now, if that bothers you, friend, it may be be­cause you do not know the kind of spiritual bless­ings and delight the Holy Spirit is waiting to provide among God’s worshiping saints. Did you notice what Luke said about the Phari­sees and their request that Jesus should rebuke His disciples for praising God with loud voices? Their ritual rules probably allowed them to whis­per the words “Glory to God!”, but it really pained them to hear anyone saying them out loud.

Jesus told the Pharisees in effect: “They are doing the right thing. God my Father and I and the Holy Ghost are to be worshiped. If men and women will not worship me, the very rocks will shout my praises!”

Those religious Pharisees, polished and smoothed and polished again, would have died right there in their tracks if they had heard a rock given a voice and praising the Lord.

Well, we have great churches and we have beau­tiful sanctuaries and we join in the chorus, “We have need of nothing.” But there is every indication that we are in need of worshipers.

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