“…I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.” Romans 12:1

For many years, both as a pastor and as a member of differing congregations, I have often pondered the question: what should true worship of our God and Father look like. I have been part of the extreme formal and ritualistic part, where candles, burning incense, repetitive prayers and rituals by the priest were considered worship.

I have been part of the extreme pentecostal movement where singing, shouting, and speaking in tongues were considered to be the high points of worship. And I have been part of several denominations that worship was considered to be coming and being part of the Sunday morning singing and preaching. Today, many of the modern churches have defined worship as being all about the music that is presented and played.

And boy, how they have ramped it up. The order of the day, in what many churches call worship, is a production of loud music, accompanied with bright lights, smoke, flashing lights, and gyrating bodies. I have a relative whose full time job at a large church is to oversee the management of the music production on Sunday morning.

I attended a church where ear plugs were available.  In that same church, as they all stood to sing, I picked a seat behind a rather large lady, and sat down to keep the bright lights from blinding me. But for the main, the folks that attend these churches love it, and they call it worship: singing over and over again the same words, and raising their hands and swaying to the rhythm of the music. Is this true worship?

Let it be noted here that the child of God is born of the Spirit and is a new creature in Christ. They have received and been made partakers of the divine nature of God. The kind of so called “worship” I have just described does not in any way edify the new man in Christ; it appeals to and excites the old man: the flesh; it has nothing of true worship in it. It is the truth of God’s word that appeals to and excites the new man in Christ. So, what is true worship?

The Scripture that leads this column could not be any more simple and easy to understand. It is the offering of yourself as a living sacrifice to God: that is the true worship that pleases and is acceptable to God. To stand and sing costs you nothing; to worship God will cost you everything. Let Scripture define the meaning of true worship.

When God told Abraham to take his son Isaac and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on the mountain, Abraham set out early the next morning to do exactly what God had told him to do. When Abraham and Isaac arrived at the mountain, he told his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will WORSHIP and then we will come back to you.” Genesis 22:5

There you have true worship of God defined: it is obedience to God’s word, from the heart, regardless of the cost. Isaac meant everything to Abraham; he was a miracle child, given to Abraham by God; Isaac was the heir to all the promises of God. How could God possibly ask Abraham to do such a thing? And yet, God did. Abraham offered God true worship, not by the sacrifice of Isaac, but by his obedience which came by his faith in God; trusting in God with all his heart, that God was faithful and able to raise his son back to life.

What God ask Abraham to do but didn’t let him do, God Himself did do 2000 years ago. He sacrificed His only begotten Son on Mount Calvary for your sins and mine. When we believe in Jesus as our Savior, and obey His commandments, we are offering God true worship.

Brother Bill is a Bible teacher and can be contacted at bboldham@sbcglobal.net

By William Oldham

Every Bible student should read Ezekiel, chapters 34-39. The Lord gave those prophecies (promises) to Israel roughly 600 years before Christ. They were for the distant future of Israel; a portion of the Lord’s word has literally come to pass in our day; the remainder is yet to be fulfilled.

Chapter 34 begins with the Lord calling out the shepherds of Israel and confronting them with their unfaithfulness to His flock. They had been entrusted with the care of the Lord’s flock, but Jehovah is the Chief Shepherd of Israel, and He never sleeps or slumbers; He was watching how they treated His flock.

The shepherds of Israel were mainly the priests, who were responsible for the spiritual welfare of the people. But, the king and civic leaders had a responsibility for their well-being also. What the Lord was witnessing was their utter disregard for His chosen people. They were a parable of what we are witnessing in the professing church today.

The shepherds were only interested in their own well-being. They exploited the people for their own profit. They had no concern for those who had strayed away from the Lord; they cared less about the faithfulness of the people, or trying to help them; and they weren’t feeding them the word of the Lord. They were worthless and unfaithful. The Lord told them He was against them and was going to remove them.

There are amazing prophecies (promises) given to Israel by the Lord through many of the prophets. But in chapter 34 of Ezekiel, I find the key to the certainty of all of the Lord’s promises to Israel. In removing the faithless shepherds, the Lord God says, “Behold, I Myself will search for My sheep and seek them out. As a shepherd seeks out his flock on the day he is among his scattered sheep, so I will seek out My sheep and deliver them from all the places where they were scattered on a cloudy and dark day.” Ezekiel 34:11-12

In this passage, Israel is given the reason for the absolute certainty of their future and complete restoration. Jehovah will be their Shepherd. Their being scattered to the four corners of the earth, and being hated by all nations, was the severe chastisement for the rejection and crucifixion of God’s Son. But through it all, Jehovah remains their Shepherd.

The Lord God promised Israel that He Himself would be their Shepherd. In the remaining 20 verses of chapter 34, the Lord emphatically says 21 times, “I will”, and tells them in particular what He will do. I will address those next week, the Lord willing.

600 years after the Lord God said He Himself would be their Shepherd,  He appeared in the Person of His Son Jesus Christ. And Christ confirmed exactly what the Lord had said. In contrast to the unfaithful shepherds, here’s a portion of what Jesus said about Himself:

“I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep…I am the good shepherd, and I know my sheep and My own know Me…I have other sheep which are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will hear My voice; and they will become one flock with one shepherd…My sheep hear My voice, and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of my Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” John 10

Roughly 600 years before Christ, we find this compelling prophecy regarding Jesus’ oneness with the Father and His crucifixion.

“Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd, against the Man who is My Companion.” Zechariah 13:7

The crucifixion of Christ was God’s plan for our salvation; here the Lord God calls Jesus “My Shepherd” and “My Companion.” In the mind and heart of God, the Good Shepherd will round up ALL of God’s lost sheep: there will be one flock and one Shepherd.

Brother Bill is a Bible teacher and can be contacted at bboldham@sbcglobal.net

“To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ…” Ephesians 3:8

It is impossible to calculate the worth of the riches that believers in Christ have. As a matter of fact, I feel insufficient to even write about them. But since Christ has chosen to place His treasure in these earthen vessels, I believe and so I write.

In considering the unsearchable riches in Christ we have been given, we must first look at the condition of the sinner man. He is dead in trespasses and sin. His life is one of disobedience to God. He spends his days chasing after his own desires and doing the evil things that godless people enjoy—their immorality and lusts, their feasting and drunkenness and wild parties, and their terrible worship of idols. 1 Peter 4:3

God says we have all sinned, we all fall short of His glorious standard. In speaking of the sinner man’s condition, Paul said, “I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. I want to do right, but I can’t. I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do wrong, but I do it anyway…Oh what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord.” Romans 7:18-25

This brings us to the unsearchable riches in Christ. They first appear at the cross where Christ was crucified. The Scriptures tell us, both the Old and New Testaments, that the crucifixion of His Son was God’s plan—purposed before God ever created the heavens and the earth. In love, God purposed to bring the man He created into the full image and likeness of Himself.

The unsearchable riches of God’s love towards the sinner man are fully demonstrated at the cross.

“When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. Now, most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good. But God showed His great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.” Romans 5:6-8

There at the cross, “…[Jesus] was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, everyone, to his own way; and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” Isaiah 53:5-6

Jesus’ shed blood on the cross purchased for everyone the unsearchable riches of God. On the cross, Jesus not only took away the sin of the world, but He took our place in the condemnation and judgment that sin had brought upon us. What that means to those who believe in Him is this: we live in the presence of God as if we had never sinned; we have been made right before Him, clothed in the righteousness of Christ.

Through His death and resurrection, Jesus became the Author of life to all who would believe on Him. “…We believe that Christ died for all; we also believe that we have died to our old life. He died for everyone  so that those who receive His new life will no longer live for themselves. Instead, they will live for Christ, Who died and was raised for them.” 2 Corinthians 5:14-15

In a word, Jesus Christ is the fullness of God’s unsearchable riches. If you turn from your sins and call on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, you will become an heir to God’s unsearchable riches.

This is part 1. Hopefully more is to come next week.

Brother Bill is a Bible teacher and can be contacted at bboldham@sbcglobal.net