Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Thursday 05/13/10)

To Worship You Alone…

Ephesians 2:1-10 (Amplified Bible)

¹AND YOU [He made alive], when you were dead (slain) by [your] trespasses and sins ²In which at one time you walked [habitually]. You were following the course and fashion of this world [were under the sway of the tendency of this present age], following the prince of the power of the air. [You were obedient to and under the control of] the [demon] spirit that still constantly works in the sons of disobedience [the careless, the rebellious, and the unbelieving, who go against the purposes of God]. ³Among these we as well as you once lived and conducted ourselves in the passions of our flesh [our behavior governed by our corrupt and sensual nature], obeying the impulses of the flesh and the thoughts of the mind [our cravings dictated by our senses and our dark imaginings]. We were then by nature children of [God's] wrath and heirs of [His] indignation, like the rest of mankind. ⁴But God--so rich is He in His mercy! Because of and in order to satisfy the great and wonderful and intense love with which He loved us, ⁵Even when we were dead (slain) by [our own] shortcomings and trespasses, He made us alive together in fellowship and in union with Christ; [He gave us the very life of Christ Himself, the same new life with which He quickened Him, for] it is by grace (His favor and mercy which you did not deserve) that you are saved (delivered from judgment and made partakers of Christ's salvation). ⁶And He raised us up together with Him and made us sit down together [giving us joint seating with Him] in the heavenly sphere [by virtue of our being] in Christ Jesus (the Messiah, the Anointed One).⁷He did this that He might clearly demonstrate through the ages to come the immeasurable (limitless, surpassing) riches of His free grace (His unmerited favor) in [His] kindness and goodness of heart toward us in Christ Jesus.⁸For it is by free grace (God's unmerited favor) that you are saved (delivered from judgment and made partakers of Christ's salvation) through [your] faith. And this [salvation] is not of yourselves [of your own doing, it came not through your own striving], but it is the gift of God; ⁹Not because of works [not the fulfillment of the Law's demands], lest any man should boast. [It is not the result of what anyone can possibly do, so no one can pride himself in it or take glory to himself. ¹⁰For we are God's [own] handiwork (His workmanship),recreated in Christ Jesus, [born anew] that we may do those good works which God predestined (planned beforehand) for us [taking paths which He prepared ahead of time], that we should walk in them [living the good life which He prearranged and made ready for us to live].

All too often in the course of my life I have allowed things that I wanted or felt like I needed to become the priority, and I lost sight of the importance of my time of worship. I am not saying that I stopped going to church or stopped participating in praise and worship. I am not even talking about not reading my Bible or praying at home. What I am talking about is recognizing that true worship is a lifestyle and it should spring up out of our souls with no prompting and it should be the essence of who we are. I have a sister/friend whom I love like she is a biological sister. Some years back she had not come to know the Lord and when I would talk about the Lord and His goodness, she would all but scoff at me. The beauty of this story is she gave her life to the Lord and the girl is on FIRE! She can see God’s grace and His goodness in all things, she is filled with so much praise and worship it is contagious, and outrageous. I can only smile at the very thought of her enthusiasm.

But if we can just for one minute think of where we were five years ago, a year ago or for some of us just months ago, we can see the mark difference in who we have become. We see the transformative hand of God in our lives and realize that we are not our own and that we belong to and are created to worship God and God alone. We have such a sense of gratitude that we understand that we owe God all of us, every ounce of who we are. We spend our days and a lot of nights in what seem to be a constant state of worship. We cannot seem to get enough of His presence, bowing down before Him and acknowledging His awesomeness is what we become about. We cry at the very thought of His holiness and being in His presence humbles us to the point of willful submission to the tears and overwhelming joy that seems to flood us.

God has created us to good works, the act and the life of worship. His praise should be no one else’s, it should not belong to a man, a woman, a job, a position, a child or anything else. No one can do for us what God has and continues to do for us. Truly if we just stop in this moment and reflect upon where God has brought us from and all that He has saved us from including ourselves we would realize that our praise, our worship and all of who we are belongs to Him and Him ALONE!