We're right in the middle of this series on worship, and we've given it five weeks because it's a big deal. As the subtitle implies that we're learning our purpose. We were created to worship, so we need to get this right. We've been driven by a question. Each message. We started with, just what is worship? Let's come to a clear definition of this. Last week was, why does God deserve our worship? And then this week, the question is, how do you think God wants to be worshiped? And maybe that's not a question we tend to ask too often because it's really easy to kind of flip into thinking about our own preferences and desires when it comes to worship. This is what I want in worship. This is the kind of music I like in worship. I like these songs. I don't like those Songs. I like when it's a big band. I like when it's stripped down. I like, you know, organs and hands. Or I like contemporary word. Like, our preferences, like, we tend to just like, this is what I want about worship. But if you make kind of worship about what you want, it's really anti worship. Like, it's not about you, it's about God. Or think of it like this. I love camping. And I don't mean like car camping or RV camping, where you just like move the neighborhood into nature. I mean, I want to go camping where you don't get cell reception, you don't see other human beings. And it's just. You're just remote and everything you need is in a backpack. I love it. It's bucket filling. I love to get out in nature that way. Marcy's birthday's coming up. She's a firecracker. So June 4th, July 4th. Boy, I'd have missed it then. July 4th is her birthday. It's coming up. What if I just. Because I like camping, her going to the bathroom in the woods, it's not her thing. What if for her birthday, I got her a lot of camping gear? What do you think? I think it'd be awesome. I think it's exactly what she needs, right? No, but who am I thinking of when I do that? Me, right? And sometimes that the way that we approach worship, this is what I like, and I'm gonna give it to God. God, this is how I like to worship. These are the songs that I like. This is the way in which I like to do it. And this is that I'm giving it to you. But we're not really thinking about God in that way. Father's Day. So it's Father's Day, traditionally, or if you haven't, maybe it's a good idea to be like, okay, dad, what do you want to do today? Where do you want to eat? Like, you get to pick the meal, you get to pick the activities. It's your day. It's Father's Day. Well, if our worship is to God, shouldn't it be for God and about God? So what are God's preferences when it comes to worship? Like, what does he want? If we were to ask, hey, I want to get God somebody something really nice. What is he like? Like, how would you. How do you answer that question? And really, I want to look in scripture to say, when God commands worship, what are the specific things that he's asking for? What's on his wish list when he's when he's calling us to worship him, what is he asking for? Or in those places in Scripture. And we've looked at some, and we'll look at some again today where he's critiquing people's worship, saying, I'm not a fan here, this isn't going well. What specifically about their worship is he bothered by? Cause I want us to talk about worship and I want us to get our minds around what are God's preferences, what does he want when it comes to worship. And I got like nine ingredients for God pleasing worship. And you're like, oh, really? Only nine? This is gonna be great. So yeah, I got nine ingredients for God pleasing worship. And normally we kind of anchor in one text and we dig down and we try to understand that. But in this series on purpose, we say we want to look at all of scripture and try to get what is the Bible collectively saying or answering to these questions. So there could be more than nine. I'm sure there's more than nine, but these are nine that I see as standing out. And they're ingredients, they're meant to be mixed together. So don't kind of pick the ones you like and ignore some. We're not serving flour, we're making cake, right? So all these ingredients go together. And hopefully this will help us cook up more God honoring worship for us as a church. And again, there's nine ingredients, so there's no expectation for you to memorize all nine of these. Take notes. If you're not a note taker, maybe this would be a good day to jot down some notes. At least. These nine things, you're gonna kind of make a recipe card, right? And you're not gonna memorize it. But if you cook this up enough, you won't need the recipe card. You'll just know what God honoring worship looks like. And if you need help remembering, I made an acronym, practices. And you're like, what does that mean? I don't know. It's a word that works with all the points that I wanted to make. So if you don't like acronyms, just forget the acronym. It's not important. I just want us to know this. I want us to get it. So practices, those are the nine kinds of. And we'll kind of work through that. But the main thing is like, let's just, let's get it, let's understand it. Let's have it be able to hold onto it and remember it, to implement it in our lives. Because here's the urgency of this. We don't want God to look at our worship and be like, I don't like it. I hate it. It's in vain. Like, is there a shared desire in that? Like, we don't want God to respond that way to our worship. Give me an amen or a nod or. Yep, okay. Yeah, we're together in that. So we need to better understand what God honoring worship looks like. And I want to. I want to turn, like, every one of these nine into its own message, but we can't do that. We only got nine. And I told the other services, like, we're just going to go until we're. Time's up, and if I only get to five, then we'll just stop there and we'll cover the rest on beyond the message. But I got to all nine the last two services, and this is the last service, so I don't care. We're just gonna. We're gonna get all nine of them. It's gonna happen. So let's do this. You ready? All right. Love it. Love it. Number one, God desires to be our priority. Priority. And he is worthy to be prioritized. The Exodus 20, we get the 10 commandments and the first commandment, so you shall have no other gods before me. Like, right away, when God is introducing himself to his rescued people, the Israelites, giving them the Ten Commandments, he's like, this is number one. I'm God. I'm number one. I'm a priority. Don't put anything or anyone above me. And you see Jesus in the New Testament, this is Matthew 10:37. He says, whoever loves father or mother more than me, or son or daughter more than me, is not worthy of me. He's saying, listen, if you're putting me number two, you don't get me. Like, that's not how I work. I am the priority of life. Matthew 6:24. He says, you can't serve two masters. Can't serve both God and money. You can't try to, like, put me of one of many priorities. I'm God. I'm the priority. There's an Old Testament principle of first fruits that God commanded his people. When you get your crops, before you take care of yourself, before you take care of your family, before you take care of your society, you offer to me your first fruits, right? When you have your firstborn, you consecrate it to me. When you get your first harvest in, you dedicate it to me. You offer it to me. I'm first. There's a priority, and there is A critique given to people who worship not in that way. This is Malachi Jesus, chapter one. He says this as a son honors his father and a servant his master. Then I am a father. Where's my honor if I'm a master? Where is my fear? Says the Lord of Hosts to you, O priest, who despise my name. But you say, how have we despised your name? They're like, lost. What are we doing so wrong by offering. Let's just stop right there. They are offering. That is happening. By offering polluted food upon my altar. But you say, how have we polluted you? By saying that the Lord's table may be despised. When you offer blind animals and sacrifice, is that not what. What does he call it? Evil. And when you offer those that are lame or sick, is that not what evil? Present that to your governor. Will he accept you or show you favor? Says the Lord of Hosts. He's like, you're showing more honor to lesser people than me. It's not first fruits. It's like, it's not that you're not offering anything, but I'm not the priority. I'm not the priority in your worship. I'm not the priority in your giving. I'm not the priority in your life. And that displeases God. So when it comes to worship, does it exist? I'm gonna assume yes. And I know there's a lot of people here that you're still trying to figure out the God thing. But the vast majority of people that have gathered here is like, I'm a Christ follower. So when it comes to your worship, does it exist? Like, you believe in God, you seek to honor God, but it's just not the priority. And it's hard to detect idolatry. When something exists, it just exists out of order. Like, you give. It's just after you kind of have obtained the lifestyle you want, and then you give the leftovers, you attend. As long as it doesn't conflict with other things you got going on, you obey. As long as it works in what you already want to do, it's just not a priority. And when it comes to worship, God is saying, first off the bat, I'm a priority, or I'm not a priority. I'm the priority. No other gods and church. This is number one. So it should sting. It should sting. It should kind of make us check ourselves, because it's not like our worship doesn't exist. It's not like we don't believe in God. It's not like we don't gather and it's not like we don't give. And it's not like we don't sing praises. Those things exist. It's just with so much competing for our time and our attention and our devotion and our passion. Is God winning? Not that he's not present, but is he winning? Is he a priority? And let me kind of like culturally press in on this a little bit. Like, you don't have to like me. You can say bad things about me on your way home, but I'm at least gonna give you something to talk about on your way home. Let me press in on families a little bit. It's summertime, Midwest America. You'll miss church or youth group for baseball, but will you ever miss baseball for church and youth group? Like, nevermind the argument. The church should always win. I'm just saying, does it ever win? Does it ever win? And I know we tell our kids, it's like, but you made a commitment to this team and they're counting on you and you gotta follow up. It's like, okay, I get all that, but do you ever tell your kids it's like, but God's people are gathering and it's God and he deserves to be worshiped. And his people are together and this is a call for his people to assemble and it's important. And you made a commitment to Christ. Does it work that way? And, and I can hear the cultural pushback. Cause I've been there. I know it. Like, I hear the pushback of like, jake, I don't have to go to church to have a relationship with God. Well, sure, and you can be married and not have sex, but that's not good for the relationship. Like, we would advocate for that. And this is like a. This is an exposure in our culture of taking God lightly. Oh, I worship God in my convenience, in my schedule, when it works for me. And I'll fit him in. And we can manage both. But we need to recapture a prioritizing of God. To prioritize is to express value. You're worth it, you're worthy, you're important. You're most important. You're prioritized. Worship is about showing the worth of God. Let me show you a passage that doesn't mention the word worship, but he's talking about worship. This is Paul in Philippians, chapter one. As it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage. All right, so let me just say this right now. Worship is going to take courage because it's so Countercultural, but with full courage. Now, as always, Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. Paul is wanting to honor Christ and how he lives or how he dies. And he needs courage to do it. And he doesn't want to be ashamed. Now, how would he be ashamed if he fails to honor Christ in life or death? He's being persecuted, pursued, and if he taps, he's like, I'm done. Like I put in the towel, I give up, I don't want it anymore. And then he goes and stands before God and his glory. That's gonna be embarrassing. And I don't wanna be ashamed. I wanna be faithful to the end. I wanna honor Christ to the end, right? And if you live your life and you're more devoted to money or fitting in or lesser pleasures, and then you go and stand before the glory of God, that'll be embarrassing. He's like, I don't wanna be ashamed. I want to honor Christ. And that word honor, or it can be translated exalted, or maybe some of your translations say to be magnified. The word is mega luno. And you hear it in the word, right? Mega, luno, mega, mega. I want to make a mega big deal about God. That's what I'm passionate about. That's what I'm about. I'm going to make a big deal of God in my life and how I live, even how I die. So is that true for you? Is God a big deal in your life? Is he the biggest deal in your life? Because when he's looking for worship, he's saying, no other gods. I'm number one, I need to be prioritized. Number two, God desires our reverence. Our reverence. He's worthy of being revered. And this is commanded in scripture. This is Hebrews, chapter 12. He says, Therefore, let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken. And thus let us offer to God, acceptable. What? Okay, by awkwardly pause, more people jump in. Acceptable. I knew you had it, didn't you? Okay, what is. Let me adjust. What is acceptable worship? How does he color that in for us? With reverence and awe. And the next line is, our God is a consuming fire. And he's calling for reverence in our worship. Now, that word reverence doesn't show up too often in scripture, but the idea of it towards God is all over the place. Probably most commonly communicated with fear. We need to fear God, right? God should be feared. He should be revered. He's God. When Moses, before he was sent on his mission to Rescue the people of God. He has an encounter with God at the burning bush. And what does God tell Moses to do? Take off your shoes or your sandals, right? Like before, I'm gonna send you on mission for me. You need to recognize me. Like, you need to know who you're serving. You need to know who you're dealing with. And this is holy ground, boy. Take off your sandals. When Isaiah, who believed in God before he was commissioned to go on ministry for God, he had to have an encounter with God that sent him trembling. You need to know how holy I am. You need to recognize. You need to know that I am God and all that that means. The disciples, when they were in the boat with Jesus, caught in the storm, and they were terrified, and Jesus wakes up from a nap and calms the storm. Do you know what the emotion that they having after he calms the storm? Was it gratitude? Was it relief? What was it fear? Because who is this that can command the winds and the waves? You better recognize he's God. And there's a reverence to recognizing the godness of God. He's big, he's holy. He's not to be trifled with or taken lightly by any means. When we sing, do you know who you're singing to? And when we pray, do you know who you're talking to? He's God. He's a consuming fire. Now, some of you may have grown up in churches where in the name of reverence, it was like, don't even smile in church, right? If you smile, you probably don't take God seriously. You dress up every Sunday. I mean, there was, like, a strictness to this, and just kind of. That's what reverence meant. Like, often sometimes people can take reverence and connect it to seriousness, which I understand. But then take serious and connect it with strictness. And take strictness and just suck joy out of life, right? When my parents became Christians, we were looking for a church, and we were visiting some churches, and we went to one church and they were singing a song that was kind of groovy. So we started to clap as pagans. We didn't know any better. And there was an older gentleman sitting in front of us who turned around, glared at us. This is our first time there. Glared at us and shook his head like, no, we don't do that. And we're like, oh, I'm sorry. The song asked for it. Are you sure? We don't do that. It can be like, this is what reverence means. But I'm going to get to that in a little bit. But I don't want us to react against that. Then raise our kids in a church that doesn't tremble before the holiness of God. I don't want us to, like, so not want to be that. That we swim the pendulum so far to the other side. That church and God and worship and gathering is just flip it. It's like, come if you want to, don't if you want to wear whatever you want to act. Like, it's just, there's no, there's no, like trembling before holy God. Like, we don't want to raise our kids in that church. And it's a real concern for me probably because I know my personality and I love that we can joke and we can laugh and you can wear jeans, you can be yourself. Like, I love that about us. But I don't want our freedom to not take ourselves too seriously, to ever give the idea that we don't take God seriously, or worse, ever lead to a culture of not actually taking God seriously. But you can be irreverent in a very goofy, flippant way, or you can be irreverent in a really stoic way. Because that was the issue with the Pharisees. I mean, Jesus critiques their worship. Like, yeah, you honor me with your lips, but your heart is far from me and that's dishonoring to God. You don't take God seriously. You take religion seriously. You're self righteous. I mean, you tithe on the herbs and spices like you have all the rules down. But your heart is so far from me. And the work of God in Ezekiel is to take out a heart of stone and to put in a heart of flesh a heart that's alive, that feels, that loves, that's passionate. Reverence is not the absence of joy and gratitude. Reverence is being alive to God. Reverence is taking who God is and all he's done seriously. Not necessarily stoically, but seriously. Meaning the reality of God is real to us. The reality of God's holiness is real to us and causes us to tremble. The reality of God's grace is real to us and causes us to sing and shout and praise Him. The reality of God's kindness is real to us and it leads to our repentance. Like the reality of God, it weighs on us. That's what it means to be reverent and he needs to be worshiped in reverence number three. God desires our affections and he's worthy of our affections. It's interesting that God through his word commands our emotions. And you kind of think like, how can you command emotions? Like you just feel what you feel. But he commands emotions now. He commands emotions because he gives truth that if you believe in those, produce emotions. So it's not absence of emotions, it's just truth kind of leading to emotions. And you know what the two emotions that are commanded in Scripture the most? The first one is fear. You better recognize I'm God now. I need to be revered. The second one is rejoice to be joyful. When you understand who God is and what he's done, it's both fear and joy that gets produced. But when God's looking for worship, he's looking for our affections, not just our actions to be involved in our worship. And that was Jesus critique. You honor me with your lips like you're doing the thing. But your what is far from me? Heart. Your heart is far from me. You see, it's in the greatest commandment. What is the greatest commandment? Love the Lord your God with all your heart. Right? Man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart. It's where he's looking. He's looking for people that genuinely love him, that have a genuine affection for him. So does your worship of God involve your heart? Is there genuine affection or are you just going through the motions? Attending services, singing songs, giving money? Because you can do all of those things and they're not worship. Worship involves the heart. Do you know what the first petition or request is in the Lord's Prayer? Hallowed be your name. It's not a proclamation. Sometimes we read that as just a proclamation, like hallowed be your name. Like we're telling everybody, hallowed be youe. It's not, it's a request. It's the first request of the Lord's Prayer. Hallowed be your name. Like make your name hallowed in my heart. Hallowed means greatly revered God, make me revere you. That's the first request because it's most important. I want, I want to love you and church. Would that be true of us that we love God with all our heart? Amen. Number four. God desires our contrition and he's worthy of our contrition. And this may be more counter to our kind of therapeutic, self centered culture. But it's so important for worship. So if it's a bit abrasive, like lean in on this because it's important for our worship. Contrition is a remorseful feeling that leads to different actions. It's not just feeling Bad. A lot of people feel bad, and there's a lot of reasons for feeling bad. Contrition is feeling bad in a way that leads to change, that produces something different. If repentance is the action, contrition is the emotion behind repentance. And God loves it. He loves it. This is Psalm 51. David's writing about his sin with Bathsheba. He says, for you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it. You will not be pleased with burnt offerings. Now pause there. David's speaking hyperbolic because God is delighted in sacrifices and he is pleased with burnt offerings. But what David is saying is, it's not just sacrifices and burnt offerings you're looking for. If that were the case, I'd just kill a lot of bulls and we'd be done with it. But you wouldn't be satisfied with that because you don't want actions detached from emotions in my heart. What you ultimately want is my heart expressed in these actions. So he's getting to something deeper. He's saying, the sacrifices of God are what? Broken. It's like, does God want me to be broken? Yes, he does. Broken spirit and a what broken and what contrite heart. O God, you will not despise. David knows God, and it's like, I know what you love, and if I come to you in brokenness and contrition, you'll receive me. I know this about my God. This is in Joel, chapter two. The nation is sinful. There's. They're being called back to God, and they're still, even in their wickedness. There's repentance as possible cause, he says, yet even now, declares the Lord, even now, return to me with all your heart. Okay, how do we do that? Or what does that look like? With fasting and weeping and mourning. Wait. Is God commanding me to be sad? Yes. Yes, he is. And render your hearts and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. And he relents over disaster. He's saying, this is what's true about our God. You come to him broken over your sin, and our God is gracious to receive. That's the character of our God. So if our sin offends a holy God, do you know what he wants to see from us? A genuine hatred of what hurt him. And isn't that what you want to see when somebody hurts you? Communicates? I want you to be bothered by what you did or how you hurt me or how you sinned against me. And isn't that part of the reconciliation? Doesn't that express love and care? Like, I don't like how that went. Contrition is an important part of worship. And can you see how offensive worship is without contrition, if we just kind of jump into worship and it's like, we're not gonna address how we hurt you. We're not gonna address how we sinned against you. We're not gonna address that. Like, let's not talk about that. Let's just get into the good stuff. Like, how would you feel if you were sinned against and somebody wanted to jump in, like, everything is okay with you and then haven't dealt with how they have sinned against you? Listen, church, and this is important because I think it could really bring deeper meaning to your worship. But a hatred of your sin needs to be a part of your worship. A hatred of your sin needs to be a part of your worship. There needs to be contrition, penance. And if you're like, I don't like thinking about my sin. It makes me feel bad about myself when I think of my sin. Well, isn't that you thinking about you? And what makes you feel good? And isn't worship about God and not you? Because what if you feeling bad about your sin makes God feel good? You ever think that? And listen, God's grace is sufficient. It's sufficient we don't stay in our guilt. But if we don't start there, that dishonors God in our worship. He's wanting contrition and brokenness over our sin. And we've pointed this out before, but I think it's seen most clearly in Nehemiah chapter 8, where they're rebuilding the city walls. And in their kind of reconstruction project, they discover the book of the law. And they read it. And you know what they discover when they read it? We're not doing it. We're not following God's law. And they come to this realization of their own sin, and they rip their clothes, and they're just mourning and weeping. And you know what their leaders do? They say, no, no, no, no. This is a good day. Let's throw a party. Let's have a feast. Let's celebrate the celebrations. God commanded us to. And it says, eat the fat portions. Like, let's enjoy life. And it's like, wait, what's going on here? They're saying it's a good day. You know why it's a good day? Because you feel bad. You feel bad. About things you should feel bad about. Let's rejoice that you feel bad about what you should feel bad about. We don't stay in contrition with the gospel, but if we don't start there, we have problems. Is your contrition, or is contrition a part of your worship? Number five. God desires our thanksgiving, and he is worthy of our gratitude. This isn't hard to sell, but let me give you some verses here. First Chronicles says. Yep. Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. His steadfast love endures forever. Here's another 1. Psalm 100:4. Enter his gates with what thanksgiving? And his courts with praise. Give what thanks to him, bless his name. First Thessalonians 5, 18. Give. Give what? Thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Like, he comes right out and says it. This is God's will. This is what he wants. Like, God, just tell me, what do you want? Okay, I'll tell you what I want. This is my will. I want you to be thankful. How often? All the time. All the time for me. Like, express gratitude for God and who he is and what he's done. That's the posture he's looking for. Now, parents, maybe you've experienced this, or maybe one of your kids wants something from you. Maybe it's a little thing, maybe it's a big thing and you don't give it to them. Or you can't give it to them and their disposition towards you just changes. Like, don't you even love me? Why can't you just do this? Why won't you just do this? And part of you as a parent might be like, how about thank you? You've had three meals today. You have a bed to sleep in. You got a roof over your house. Like, how about some gratitude here, right? Is it possible that maybe we've slipped into that same disposition with our Heavenly Father? Cause there's the things we want from Him. And maybe it's a little thing and maybe it's a big thing, but for whatever reason, he hasn't given it to us. And we can fall into this disposition of like, do you even love me? Or do you even care about me? And can't you see God's posture in that of, like, how about a thank you? Like, you're breathing right now. My grace is upon you. I've died on the cross for you. Your sins are forgiven. Like, how about some gratitude? You want to give something to God that He would really enjoy? How about Genuine gratitude, like from the depth of your heart. It's like, oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. Like, he asked for that. And if you're like, well, I thought we were supposed to feel bad and now I'm supposed to feel grateful, like, which is it? Yes, right. Remember, they're ingredients. And we're not serving flour, we're serving cake. And these need to go together. But both fear and joy, both gratitude and contrition, they need to come together. Cause if you skip contrition, hear me now, if you skip contrition, our gratitude is weak. Like, how thankful can you be if you don't really know the depth of what you're being saved from? But if you never get out of contrition to gratitude, then you're ignoring the gospel. And usually it's just self centered pity. But both are needed. When we go through contrition to gratitude, that's the flavor of worship. Number six, God desires our intellect or he's worthy to be worshiped with our minds. In John chapter four, when Jesus was having this conversation with the woman at the well, they were having a debate on worship. Like, where's it gonna happen? Jesus says God's seeking, so he's seeking worshipers. So right off the bat tells us, what's God looking for? Worshipers. He wants people to worship him. But he says worshipers, who will worship him in spirit and what truth? Like, truth matters. The Bible is God revealing himself to us. He wrote this book, like, I want you to know me. I want you to know me, like throughout the Bible, so that they will know that I am the Lord, so they will know that I am the Lord, so they'll know that I'm the Lord. Like, he's revealing himself to us. He wants to be known. Jesus Christ, Emmanuel, God with us. It is God revealing himself to us in flesh. You want to get to know me better? Look at Christ, a manifestation of God. It's God in flesh, like he wants to be known. So our adoring of God is offensive if it's not accurate. You get me when I say that our adoring of God is offensive if it's not accurate. It doesn't matter how passionate you are about it or how emotionally you are involved in it. It doesn't matter if, like, I feel so good and my hands are raised and I'm excited and I just feel at peace. If it's not accurate, it's offensive, right? Cause I could go to Marcy, my wife, with all the passion that I have, and be like, Babe, I love your green eyes and your dark brunette hair. And we're gonna have problems, right? Cause she has blue eyes and dark blonde hair, right? It doesn't matter how passionate I come at her like that, if it's not true, it's offensive. Our worship of God needs to accurately represent God. Truth is an essential part of worship. Don't think that. Worship is all about feelings and not thinking. Worship starts with truth and then the feelings follow that truth. They come out of that truth and the connection is faith. God is holy. Do you believe that? Because if you do, it produces fear. God is gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love. Do you believe that? Because if you do, it produces joy, right? You get that? But it starts with what is true. Number seven. God desires our consistency and he's worthy of our consistency. This is probably the main critique God gives His people about their worship. Seeing worship as an event and not an all of life thing. Like, I can go and bring my sacrifices, and then I can go and live however I want. Like I can come to church, I can sing the songs, I can serve a nursery, put something in offering, check the box. And then I can go and live however I want. He most often critiques this. Let me give you some passages. It's Isaiah, chapter one. Bring no more vain offerings. Incense is an abomination to me. New moon and sabbath and the calling of convocations I cannot endure. And iniquity and solemn assembly. Like, those things don't go together. You're like willful, sinful lifestyle. And yet you still gather and celebrate all the feasts and do all the things I've asked you to do. Those don't go together and it's making me sick. Your new moons and your appointed feast, my soul, what hates. Guys, you gotta get the language that God used. When he's talking about his people worshiping him, he's like, I hate it. They have become a burden to me. I am weary of burying them. When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you. Think of that. Guys, get that language. You're here at worship like God, I love you. You're worshiping him. This is your posture and this is God's posture. Oh my goodness. Right? I will hide my eyes from you. Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean. Remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes. Cease to do evil, Learn to do good, seek justice, correct oppression, Bring justice to the fatherless. Plead the Widow's case. He's saying your life has to line up with your worship. That pleases me. Here's another one. This is the amos5 I hate. I despise your feast, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. And the peace offerings of your what now? Fattened animals. Like you're not just skimping on me like in Malachi, giving me the sick and lame ones, you're bringing the fat ones. You're doing that, and I still hate it. Why? I will not look upon them. Take away from me the noise of your songs to the melody of your harps. I will not listen. But let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like ever flowing streams. You can't have a disconnected life and honor God. You. Here's another one. This is Matthew, chapter five. Cause you're wanting more of this. I get it. So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there, remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go first. Be reconciled to your brother and then come and offer your gift. You can't have this compartmentalized life where it's like, me and God are great here, but I have all this dysfunction with brothers and sisters in Christ. It doesn't work that way. God's like, I don't want that. I want a consistency in worship. Here's 1 Corinthians 6. He says this. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? What's the answer to that? Never. And we just got done with 2 Corinthians, so you know the context there. What he's saying is like, you can't come to church and take the Lord's Supper and be a part of this community and then leave here and participate in temple prostitute worship and think you're okay because your attendance record's good, you took the Lord's Supper. You checked these boxes. You can't have this inconsistency. So if you're living a life of embraced sin and you have no contrition, there's no, like, I hate this. I'm leading to change and repentance. I want you to hear me. God despises your worship. Don't think that you're okay because you can articulate good theology. Don't think you're okay because you attend church. Don't think you're okay because you participated in an event. God hates your worship. All of life is all for Jesus. We don't compartmentalize worship. Like, this is my church time, and this is my work time. This is my friend time, and this is my me time. We honor God with consistency and we dishonor God with inconsistency. All of life is all for Jesus. So how is your worship when it comes to all of life? Number eight. God desires our expression, and he's worthy of our expression. Sometimes when the importance of heartfelt worship is emphasized, which it should be, we make a wrong conclusion. We conclude that the eternal life is all that matters because God looks at the heart. So as long as the heart's okay. But can you imagine telling your spouse who's looking for some affirmation of your love, well, I love you on the inside. Well, how about a date then? Or some help with the dishes? Like, if it's in you, it should come out of you. And Scripture commands us to sing and to clap and to shout and to play instruments and to play them loud and bang the cymbals and blow the horns. Like, to take inward realities and let them out, right? The deep theology of the kids song. If you're happy and you know it. What? Clap your hands, right? If you're saved and you know it, your face will surely show it. Like, there is this, like, connection of, hey, if you know the truths of God, you let them out. You should express them. God desires that. There are over 250 explicit commands to praise God. I don't remember who said it, but one pastor said that God made music because some things are just too wonderful to only talk about. It's like, we can't just keep talking about it. Like, somebody play an instrument, somebody shouts, somebody whistle, somebody sing, somebody clap. It's gotta be an overflow of expression and expressing joy in God honors God. If you come here and you sing and you clap and you whistle and you're all excited, but then you go out there and live however you want. God hates that. He hates that. But also, if out there, you're trying to be the best husband you can be, the best wife you can be, the best employee you can be, you're trying to honor God in all that you do. But then you come in here, stand and stoically cross your arms and don't sing anything that doesn't honor God either. It's certainly not obedient to him. And I get it. I'm not a guy who's like, hey, let's just get together and sing songs I don't feel like that's out of my comfort zone, certainly out of my skill set. But when I think that way, who am I thinking of? Me, and what I'm comfortable with and what I want to do. But God loves it when we express our joy and satisfaction in him. So when he commands us to sing, that applies to people who can't carry a tune. It's all of us. Some just should be quieter than others, but everybody should do this way. Number nine. God desires our sacrifice and he's worthy of our sacrifice. There's a story, you guys know where Jesus is watching people give. It's like, does Jesus watch people? Yeah, he did that. And a lot of people were giving, and a lot of people were giving a lot. And the way that they were giving let people know that they were giving a lot. But he saw one widow give two mites, and he got excited about her giving. He didn't get excited about the other people's giving. He got excited about her giving. He calls the disciples over and he points it out. And it's interesting in the story. Like, Jesus is genuinely honored and excited about her giving. And the explanation he gives is he says, the other people gave out of their abundance, but she gave out of her poverty. It's like, yeah, they gave and they gave a lot, but it didn't cost him anything. It doesn't impact them at all. But she gave in a way that impacts her. It was a sacrifice. There was a time David was going to build an altar to make sacrifices to the Lord, and somebody out of the goodness of their heart tried to just give him the land for free and give him the animals to do the sacrifices for free. But David insisted on paying full price, saying, I'm not going to offer burnt offerings to my God. That cost me nothing. But is that what we try to do today? Like, worship is in my comfort zone, in my convenience, the way that I want it. But God honoring worship doesn't always fit nicely in our schedules or fall conveniently into our preferred lifestyles. We don't get to honor God above everything else and still make every tournament and still watch every show and still wear whatever clothing and still talk however we want, still do whatever we want, still spend however we want. It doesn't work that way. You gotta make sacrifices. Something has to give. It doesn't go both ways. Still, in worship, things need to be put to death. Sacrifice is not just an Old Testament thing. Sure. Like Jesus is our final sacrifice in the sense that we don't have to Bring bulls and goats to offer for the forgiveness of sins. But Paul tells us in Romans 12 that we are to be what, living sacrifices? He's saying the way that you live your life is a sacrifice to God. So do you still make sacrifices? Are there things in your life where it's like, I want to do that, but I didn't for you, I wanted to say that, but I didn't for you, I put those words to death right here and right here before they ever made it out. I wanted to go there, but I put that desire to death. I killed it. I didn't want to do that, but I killed that selfish desire, and I did it. Like, are you making sacrifices? Church we make worship about God by considering what he wants in giving it. And we can talk, and we will in a couple weeks about kind of corporate expressions in worship. But the Bible is. Gives a lot of room for styles. I mean, there's a lot of different cultures that express worship in a lot of different ways. But this stuff transcends culture and time. That God desires to be prioritized, and he's worthy of being number one. He desires to be revered, and he's worthy of our reverence. He desires our affections, that we should love him. He desires our contrition, that we should hate what hurts him. He desires our thankfulness and gratitude. He desires our intellect, that we should get God right and be accurate in our worship. He desires our consistency. He desires our expression, that we should praise him, and he desires our sacrifice. Those are the ingredients of God honoring worship. So what's the flavor of your worship like? Like, would God spit it out of his mouth? Are there any ingredients that are missing? As a church, we're going to fumble a lot of things. Kids check in, parking, coffee lines, communications. We're going to fumble it. But by God's grace, would we never fumble worship? Would we be a group of people that have a heart for God and his holiness? But you know what we don't like when we come to the realization of our failed worship? We ought to hate it. We ought to hate that we prefer lesser things than God, that we're more devoted and committed to lesser things than God, that we get excited about lesser things than God. We ought to hate that. And we come to the realization of our failed worship. Do you know what we need to hear? He was pierced for our transgressions. His body was hung on a cross. His blood was shed. He established a new covenant in his blood. And his grace is sufficient for us. Because as Paul argues in Romans 5. Nobody's going to die for a wicked man. I mean, somebody might, might die for a good person maybe. But nobody dies for a wicked person except who God. And we're the wicked person. And in our failed worship, when we treasure lesser things and chase after lesser things, you know, he says us, I still love you. My grace is sufficient for you. And as we remember by looking at some cracker and juice, the sacrifice of Christ, you know what? That should be a worship leader to us. Who is this God that persists in his love and persists in his grace and is continuing there, calling us back even now? Even now. Return to me with your whole heart. Weep and mourn and repent and our God will meet us. Forgive us. Let's pray. Father, I pray that by your spirit, the elements of your supper that represent your body and your blood would be our worship leader. That it would lead us to prioritize you, it would lead us to revere you. That what kind of God goes to a cross for wicked people. It would lead us to love you, it would lead our affections that we would be in love with you. It would lead our contrition, that we would hate the things that hurt you. It would produce in us thanksgiving that we'd be so grateful for your grace. It would lead our minds that we would know that you truly are the Christ, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world. It would motivate our consistency that we would not just be in this moment, but we would want all of our lives to honor you. It would lead our expression of you, that you would motivate us to sing and praise you, that we're saved and we know it. And we'll clap and we'll shout in your honor. And if we're embarrassed by that, it would lead our sacrifices that we would put any self centered thought to death for you. We pray this in your name. Amen.