Worship Talk

This is pretty much what I said when I gave a talk on worshipping with out lives at a service taken by my youth group (Pulse) at church. The bible verse is one that I just thought really applied to the service as a whole.


“Not to us, O LORD, not to us
but to your name be the glory,
because of your love and faithfulness.”
Psalm 115:1


Ok, I'm going to talk about a kind of worship that you might not normally think of. Different people have different ideas when they think of worship, but most generally agree that it is something particular that you do from time to time. But what I want to tell you is, that worship isn’t just something that happens once a week at church or whatever. Worship is not a part of your life – it is your life – it’s a lifestyle. In his book, ‘The Purpose Driven Life’ Rick Warren said “anything that brings pleasure to God is an act of worship.”

So what’s that then? What can you do to bring pleasure to God? Well one thing that pleases God is when you follow his guidelines and live the way he told you to. So you worship when you give to someone who needs it even when that means you have to go without your favourite chocolate bar; when you work hard at school even if that means you get labelled a swot; when you refuse to lie even when that makes things uncomfortable for you; when you don’t get drunk, even though you really want to and everyone else around you is. Every time you make the decision – consciously or unconsciously – to obey God rather than do what’s easy – that is worship. That is what makes God smile. And that is what will mark you out from everyone else who is not a Christian.

The truth is, everything you do in your daily life can become an act of worship if you want it to – you’ve just got to have the right attitude. Washing the dishes can be worshipping. Doing your homework can be worshipping. Taking the dog for a walk can be worshipping. All those boring tasks that you do throughout your day – and also the fun stuff as well – all that can be turned into an act of worship when you do it for the praise, glory, and pleasure of God. The bible says: “so whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.”

You’ve simply got to do every task as if you were doing it for Jesus. Another quote from the bible: “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.” If you do that you will begin to see things in an entirely new light.

Sometimes you can do something practical to help people…for example at the moment, pulse are preparing to do a sponsored fast to raise money for children orphaned by AIDS. As a group we also sponsor a child in Ethiopia.

You have to remember though, that you don’t necessarily have to do anything special to please God. Sometimes you simply have to be you. God made you and he made you with special skills and abilities that he wants you to use. So to worship God with your life you need to live a full life – you need to give everything your all and always try to do your very best – that means working hard at school and at work, but it also means the other areas of your life – whether that be a sport, music, drama – whatever you spend your time doing. When you use your skills and abilities, that pleases God – he wouldn’t have given you them if he didn’t want you to use them!

A funny though occurred to me when I read a book about this sort of thing – it said that God enjoys watching every detail of your life…and I kinda thought…nah…surely not every detail?! I mean…its not exactly riveting stuff sometimes…but then I remembered the day when I brought my first ever pet gerbil home. I just sat for hours watching it – everything it did fascinated me and made me smile – even though it was just going about its normal gerbil activities. In the same way God loves watching you just simply being you.

So basically… be real, be yourself, be the best that you can be – and whatever you do, do it for God. Then worship shouldn’t be just something that happens on a Sunday – it should begin to leak out into the rest of the week!