Turn back if you will this morning
the word of God to the book of the revelation Chapter 22 the
book of the revelation chapter 22 And I'd like to read verse
7 8 & 9 verse 7 8 & 9 Behold I come quickly I Blessed is he that keepeth the
sayings of the prophecy of this book. And I, John, saw these
things and heard them. And when I had heard and seen,
I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel which showed
me these things. Then saith he unto me, See thou
do it not, for I am thy fellow servant. and of thy brethren
the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings of this book.
Worship God. Worship God. I preached some time ago a message
on worship, and I announced at that time that I would be preaching,
the Lord willing, another message on the subject. And so this morning
I hope to do that. I hope the Lord will enable me
this morning to bring the things that are upon my heart. Here
in the 8th and 9th verses primarily, I want us to read these verses
and to think about them just a little bit. Notice, if you
will, he said here in verse 8, John does. He's the writer of
this book, and he's in the Spirit. The Lord has blessed him, and
he's had the ability to both hear and to see the things that
the angel of God has been talking about in regards to the Lord
Jesus Christ. And he says, I, John, saw these
things and heard them. And when I had heard and seen,
I was moved to fall down And before the feet of the angel
I was moved to worship before the feet of the angel which showed
me these things. He was inclined to worship as
the Lord had by this angel had been pleased to unfold to him
the mysteries of God and been pleased to unfold to him some
of those things concerning the end times and concerning the
blessings of glory, the blessings of eternal life in glory. He said, I was inclined to worship. I was inclined to fall down at
the feet of the angel, which showed me these things. And then
verse nine, then saith he unto me, that is the angel speaking,
see thou do it not. Now the angel speaks, I believe
here in haste. in that that John is about ready
to do something that is absolutely forbidden, it's wrong, it's not
right for him to fall down before a created being, it's not right
for him to fall down before this angel and worship even though
the message has been tremendously enlightening, it's been of the
glory of God, it's been a tremendous message of Christ, but nevertheless,
the angel says, see thou do it not. just like we would hastily
maybe cry out to one of our children if we saw them about to stick
their hands in the lawnmower or about to stick their hands
someplace where they shouldn't. See thou do it not! See thou
do it not! If there's something that's going
to harm somebody, we would immediately hastily cry out, don't do that!
Don't do that! And so it is with the angel here. He speaks to John and says, see
thou do it not! Don't do that! He said, for I
am not, he says, for I am thy fellow servant. I'm just like
you are. I'm one of God's servants, just
like you're one of God's servants. And of thy brethren, the prophets,
and of them which keep the sayings of this book, I'm on the same
ground that you are. I'm just a servant of God. I'm
a created being. And he would say, you're not
to worship the servant of God, but you're to worship the master.
He said, you're not to worship a creature, but you're to worship
the Creator. And he says, I'm a created being,
and I cannot accept such homage as this. You cannot bow down
before me. I cannot accept this reverence.
I cannot accept your worship, because I'm a created being,
just like you are, and just like the prophets are. And I cannot
take this. Now then, he said, worship God. Your worship is to be rendered
toward God. And Christian worship, my friend,
this morning is the act of paying divine honor unto God. That's what Christian worship
is. It's the act of paying divine honor to God. Now, who is honored
in our services? I thought about these services
this morning. This service this morning is
for the purpose of worship. That's why we're here. We're
here to worship this morning the living God. And all across
the land this morning there are assemblies gathered together
supposedly for the purpose of worship. Is it man or God who
is worshipped in this place? My friend, this morning I make
bold to say that God is worshipped in some few places across the
land this morning, but that man is also being worshipped. The
creature is being worshipped. The creature is being honoured.
The creature is being exalted in many places, in houses of
worship, even this very day. There are people who surely think
of this little service here, and they think of how simple
it is, and they think of the fact that we seemingly do not
somehow or other get involved in trying to honor people on
certain days and so on and so forth. And most all of you, of
course, are aware that today is Mother's Day, and motherhood
is a wonderful thing, it's a blessed thing, and Scripture says, give
honor to whom honor is due, but my friend, we recognize that
that honor must be given in its proper place, in its proper setting,
and in a church service is not the place to do that. That's
my conviction. I believe that's far falling
down even, and you know here John was forbidden to fall down
before the angel. And certainly we would be forbidden
to fall down before flesh. We would be forbidden to do that.
We're here in honor of the living God. That's why we're here. We're
here to worship the living God. We're not here this morning because
there's some group of people here that the world is honoring
on this day. We're not here for that purpose.
I want that to be understood. Then who is honored in our service?
Is it man or is it God? Now the words used in the Old
Testament Scripture for worship, they speak of a bowing or a falling
down before the Lord, and that's what John here was about to do
before this angel, and he's told, don't do that, but you fall down
and you worship before the living God. Now in the typical worship
service, There is a spirit of exaltation of man, of honoring
man, and this does not suggest, I think, a frame of humility
before the Almighty God. It does not. It does not assist
us. Now, in true worship, only God is praised and the flesh
is abased. The flesh is abased. Now, in
the common worship service, there is little praise for God in the
hymns and little praise for God in the sermons. What we have,
I believe, in the majority of places, religious places today,
is strange praise. It's added to the flesh. It's
given to the flesh in songs, and in promotions, and in entertainments,
announcements, recognitions, and etc. This praise is given,
it's added to the flesh. Worship is the response of the
grateful heart toward God. It's the response of the heart.
One who stands in awe of the reverence and the majesty of
God cannot help but fall down and bow, as it were, in his heart
before the God of the Bible, the august God of the Bible,
and worship at his feet. Now it is very difficult to maintain
such an attitude as this, an attitude of humility and praise,
grateful praise unto God for what he's done for us. when the
service is interrupted. by songs that edify the flesh,
speeches that are aimed at the motivation of the flesh, entertainments
and recognitions for the gratification of the flesh. It's very difficult
for one to maintain this spirit of brokenness and humility before
the living God. Now, a real worship service must
be directed toward nothing but God's glory. When we come together,
when we meet, when we assemble, it's all to the glory of God. Well, how can a church have a
true worship service? Nowadays, is it possible once
again that we could have a worship service? Is it possible we could
come together and truly worship the Lord God of the Bible? Is
it possible that we could render the kind of homage to Him, the
adoration that's due Him, is it possible that we could do
that nowadays? Could it be done? Well, most
certainly it can be done. It certainly can be done, and
let me suggest to you this morning some ways by which we could return
unto true worship unto the living God. Number one, let me say that
we ought to have a whole service of worship, an entire service
of worship, not snatches of worship that are sandwiched between promotions
and frivolities. My friend, many, many times in
churches we have just a little bit of worship that's sandwiched
in between all the other stuff that's going on. We're greeting
the folks, we're having them to stand up and so on and so
forth, and we're greeting the visitors, and then we're having
the announcements, and we're doing this and we're doing that.
And every once in a while we'll sandwich in between all that
other stuff that's going on just a little bit of worship. But
what I'm saying is, let us have a whole worship service. Let
God's glory be the theme from the first hymn to the final benediction
that's rendered. Let God's glory be the entire
theme of the meeting. And let's not just be sandwiching
a little bit of worship in between everything else. Number two,
let us eliminate all excess baggage. Anything that interferes with
the worship of God must go. Anything that would interfere
with our being of a right mind, a state of mind, anything that
would cloud our minds must go. I call it excess baggage. Now
if we have a great deal of announcements and we don't have here, I think
we probably ought to print a bulletin. We don't have that many announcements,
therefore we don't need a bulletin. And then if a church does have
all these announcements, and I know there's a lot of churches
that print bulletins, and then they insult the intelligence
of the people that come by getting up and reading, taking the time
out of the worship service to read the bulletin unto these
people. Now, we don't have to spend,
also, we don't have to spend, I'm talking about this excess
baggage that people have in their churches. We don't have to spend
a lot of time trying to let visitors know that they're welcome. Now,
as I mentioned earlier, in some churches, they have the visitors
to stand up so they can be recognized. We want to recognize these visitors,
you see. Well, my friend, that is flesh
worship, is what that is. Strangely enough, I believe that
visitors know whether or not they're welcome before you sing
them a special song, or before you shake their hands at a special
time in the meeting, everybody moving around shaking their hand,
or before you hand them a card to sign. I think people know
whether they're welcome or not. I just believe they know whether
they are or not. I don't think we need to spend all this time
in recognizing flesh. It don't make any difference
whose flesh is there. The important thing is, it's
got there, and the important thing is, do I know why I'm there?
And if I know why I'm there, then my friend, I'll know that
my business is to be there with a humble attitude, bowing in
my heart before Him who is the living God. Well, somebody says,
well, won't enthusiasm die, creature, if we do not promote and build
it up? Won't enthusiasm die for the
things of God if we don't pump it up? We got to pump it up,
and if we don't keep it pumped up, it'll surely just die out. Well, spiritual enthusiasm, all
of it we need is to be found in the gospel. It's to be found
in the gospel of God's free grace. and it's of the Holy Spirit. I'm talking about spiritual enthusiasm,
the kind that is glorifying and honoring to God is of the Holy
Spirit, and it's toward Christ, and it's all to God's glory,
all to the glory of the God of heaven and earth. Now, a smile
on the face does not necessarily produce or reflect a smile in
the heart. It is not necessarily. Now some
people say, well, if you just smile, everybody's going to feel
better. Well, there's nothing wrong with
smiling. I'm not against that at all. But when it comes to
worship, and when it comes to enthusiasm, I'm telling you the
only enthusiasm that enables people to worship the living
God is that which is born in the heart by the Spirit of God,
which is toward Christ. That is toward the glory of God.
Now listen to me. Mark it down. Enthusiasm. faithfulness or generosity that
is stirred by any other means, but the gospel itself is not
genuine and will sour and not enhance true worship. Now you
mark it down, friend, I'm telling you the truth. You can pump people
up, you can do anything you want to. You say, I want them to be
faithful, I want them to be generous, I want them to stand true, and
I want them to be enthusiastic people, and we're trying to make
them that way. My friend, you better leave that business with
God, because God's the only one that can produce these things
in the people of God by His Spirit. It be true, it be genuine. Now then, in the next place,
stick to the gospel. Stick to the gospel now. I know that we've been there's
lots of people that would browbeat and I've heard other preachers
being browbeat who preach the gospel and they Are called, you
know, they say that they're that they've made Jesus Christ an
item because all they do is preach Christ. I Too much gospel, too much gospel,
too much Christ preached there from me. I don't want that. I
want some other things. Well, my friend, you're not a
worshipper of the God of the Bible. God would have his son
to be honored. We honor Christ and they honor
God who honor his son. And if you don't honor Christ,
you don't honor God. You're not worshiping God unless
you hear the gospel, unless you know the gospel. Now stick to
the gospel. And error in music is as bad
as error in doctrine, error in preaching. And you hear a lot
of songs in some circles that are not scriptural at all. They
are not scriptural, and they're not saturated with the gospel.
A hymn or special music that is not thoroughly consistent
with the gospel is out of place in Christian worship. Now, I
mean what I'm saying here. I love music. But if it is not
sound music, if it's not in harmony with the gospel of redeeming
grace, then, my friend, that music is out of place in a Christian
church. Anything short of the gospel
of free sovereign grace does not belong in a worship service. It don't belong there. Now, just
to illustrate my point here, most all of you have heard of
Charles Haddon Spurgeon, pastor of the Metropolitan Tabernacle
in London, England. Charles Haddon Spurgeon had a
congregation of over 6,000 people. He never would preach a funeral
sermon. never would have or have anybody,
they wouldn't bring a body into that tabernacle and him preach
a funeral sermon. Every member of that church that
died was buried without a funeral sermon being preached. Now here's
what he said, and it's very important, and I believe my own self. Now
you do what you want to do when you die, when you pass away,
you do whatever you want to, but I don't want anyone having
me or having a funeral service as such for me. I don't necessarily
want anybody to come and preach I mean, I feel like I've preached
my funeral sermon, I've preached all my years. That's what I've
been about. I've been preaching and preaching
and preaching and preaching all these years, and not only have
I preached by what I've said, but I've preached by the way
I've conducted myself and the way I've lived. And that's where
I stand on that. Now, you do whatever you want
to, but in my own conviction, And like Brother Spurgeon said,
he thought that you ought never to say anything about the dead
but what is good. You ought to say, if you're going
to talk about the dead, say good things about the dead, folks. And the best place to say that
is somewhere else besides the church because you don't talk
good about flesh In the church. That's not where we eulogize
people is in the church. When we are having a meeting
in the church, it's to glorify God, exalt God, and to abase
the flesh. We preach God up and men down
in the church. Now I'm talking about worship.
That's what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about you gathering
around the casket and talking about how good somebody is. I'm
not, I'm not talking about that. That's fine. That's fine. That's
all right. You talk about how good folks
are anywhere else, but not in a worship service. We don't exalt
flesh in a worship service. John couldn't even worship an
angel. He was forbidden to do it. And
we're not, we're, as far as I'm concerned, we're way below the
angels of God. Now that's the way I see it myself,
but nevertheless, we're not to worship flesh and eulogize flesh. My idea of a correct funeral
service would be you take the body out to the graveyard, open
up the Word of God and read, let the brethren stand around
and read the Word of God and sing a hymn of praise unto God
and commit that body to the dust of the earth. But my friend,
there is nothing settled in a funeral sermon. Nothing is ever settled
there. It's settled before you get to
there, and if you don't, if you're not right when you get there,
then my friend, ain't anything can be said to help you. But
I say, and I agree with what Brother Spurgeon said, he said
he didn't think God was in it, and I doubt seriously the Lord
is in it. But now if you want me to preach when you die, if
you want me to preach a sermon when you die, then you just ask
me to do it, and I will do it. But I'll preach just like I always
do. I won't eulogize your flesh.
I won't be there for that purpose. I'll be there to honor and extol
the God of heaven and I'll preach the gospel of redeeming grace.
I'll honor Christ. I'll exalt Christ. And now if
you want that, if you want that, then that's exactly what we'll
do. But your flesh will not be eulogized in any worship service
because I don't believe in exalting flesh or eulogizing the flesh. I don't believe in doing it.
The Bible said no flesh shall glory in his presence. Now that's where I stand. And
so even my friend, the prayers that are offered should be filled
with the gospel. They should be filled with Christ.
We're here in honor of Christ. Now it is amazing what the pure,
unadulterated gospel will do for men when it is the sum and
substance of their worship. It's amazing what it'll do. And
a lot of people don't believe it'll do anything because they've
always been doing something else besides honoring the gospel and
preaching Christ and lifting him up. Not interested in that. Well, the next thing is this.
I'm suggesting to you how we can have a worship service nowadays.
Let worship have life. Let it have life. Now, not the
artificial kind mentioned before, But it is the war with which
the Spirit of God often stirs the heart of true worshipers. And we must wait on Him for it.
Life. Well, I love to be in a service
where there's spirit life. It is the Spirit which give us
life. which has always stirred true
worshipers will finally get around to you. The Lord will finally,
he'll stir your heart too one of these days. He'll stir your
heart. And that's what we want. It will come. It will come. Now, deliberate deadness is also
bad or worse than false enthusiasm. I went into some places where
they said they were places of worship which felt more like
a funeral parlor than it did a church. I mean, it was all
death. Worship cannot be measured in
decibels, many are few, but it is expressed and it's to be expressed,
religion is, and the gratefulness of the heart, the praise of the
heart is to be expressed with vitality Listen, the truly grateful, the
thankful heart speaks forth with exuberant praise, but that is
with genuineness. It's not with false enthusiasm
or with deliberate deadness. Life. Now, the tunes in the church
certainly need not to be somber. And the words need not to be
hard to pronounce and hard to understand. The spirit of the
meeting need not be subdued. I've been told that if you raise
your voice in a worship service that you kill the spirit. My
friend, that's a bunch of foolishness. Kill God, can you? No, you can't
do that. I believe that there should be
life in the service, in the worship service. The gospel deals with
vital union, not a sad face. A vital union. It deals with
a man, a woman. It deals with a soul being joined
to Christ. That's what it deals with. and
a lifeless spirit is out of place in a true worship service. There's life. Let there be life. There's a remarkable difference
between life and death, don't you agree? And if there's one
place where there's life, it's in the New Testament church where
the Spirit of God is coming. Folks have been born from above
and they're alive unto God. They're joined to Christ, the
living vine, and they're alive unto the Lord. Now this is why
we here at this church sing some well-selected hymns
full of the gospel, read from the word of God, and pray earnestly
and genuinely, preach the gospel, and leave off everything else. Just leave it off. Let the worship of God go uninterrupted
from the start to the finish. Why do we have to stop and pass
the plates? Why? Why can't we just worship
God from the start to the finish? What have we got to do anything
else for? This is the reason why we come together as we do.
Worship will take on new meaning, I believe, and significance to
all. when they discover that that's
what we're here for. That's what it's about. That's
what it's all about, is worship of God. Oh, that men will worship
God, both privately and public. Which is the most important?
Private or public worship? Which is the most important?
Well, I've studied this some, and I've thought about it a great
deal. and i'd like to say that there is and i know there's a
lot of fault that people who say that if you don't meet god
outside the church you'll never meet him inside well that's uh... that's uh... sounds awful good
it sounds awful pious but i don't know so much about that i believe
that all who trust the living god ought to worship him daily
and i believe they do I believe they do worship Him daily, privately. And all who follow Christ, I
say, let them walk in the path of faith in the solitary place
of private prayer. Let them pray privately in their
closet. I believe that's important. And
I believe that every believer is a priest of God and ought
to offer daily the sacrifice of praise unto God every day. I believe they should. I believe
that's right. I believe they will. But there
is something about this business of public worship that I think
that makes it most important, probably the most important aspect
of every believer's life, this public worship. in the assembly
of the saints of God. Now I know and recognize that
such talk as this is contrary to the popular opinion of religious
people. It's contrary to the idea, you
know, this idea of public worship being every bit as important
or maybe even more important than private worship. is certainly
unpopular when religious people hear you make that statement
a lot of people like to think you know that they're just as
religious as they can be and they don't ever go to church
that they worship god just as much and and just as i mean they
worship god as much out at the lake as they do in the house
of god where the gospel is being preached that they worship god
looking up at a cloud as much as they worship god listening
to the preacher and so on and so forth well that's that's but
i believe that the idea is inconsistent with the Word of God and the
experience of God's people. I believe that public worship
is more important. It's the most important aspect
of your life. Public worship. And there are
five facts which I want to give you this morning that demonstrates
this to me. I'll give you this in closing.
Five facts that demonstrates to me that public worship, the
coming together, As we have stated here this morning, as we've been
talking about all morning long, to worship God is more important
than just simply private worship. Now let me give this to you.
Number one, I want to say that God meets with sinners in saving
mercy in the assembly of his saints for worship. Now if you
would turn back in your Bibles to the book of Acts. The book
of Acts chapter 2 and notice verse 1. Acts 2 and 1. And listen
to what the word of God says here. It says, And when the day
of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord
in one place. Now, if you would just look at
the end of this chapter, and sometime you could read from
verse 37 down through verse 41, you'll see in verse 41 that there
were those that gladly received his word and were baptized the
same day there were added unto them about 3,000 souls, when
they were all together in one place, in one accord. Now, my point is this. that generally
God saves his sheep in the place of public worship where the gospel
is being set forth, where the gospel is preached. Sinners in
need of mercy should seek mercy where it is always found and
mercy is to be found under the sound of the gospel in the assembly
of the saints. So my point is this, that God
meets with sinners in saving mercy in the assembly of his
saints. That's the first reason I give
as to why I believe that public worship is more important, more
necessary than private worship. Now the second thing is this,
that the public assembly of the church is the gathering together
of the family of God. It's the gathering together of
the family of God. I want you to turn in your Bibles to the
book of Ephesians chapter 3 and I want to read verse 14 and 15.
For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named.
The whole spiritual family, the family of God is named. Now let
me say this, that every true local church is a family of saved
sinners, is what the church is. And family members need each
other. They need each other. They need
to comfort each other and help each other because There is a
love, there is to be and ought to be, and certainly there is
among the family of God a love which binds them together, and
they have this love for each other, and they desire to be
with each other, and they desire to be in the fellowship of each
other. Now, the whole family, this is the assembly, the gathering
together of the family. This is my family. This is my family. This church,
this is my family. This is the people of God. And
we feel that, do we not? Toward each other. We desire
the fellowship of each other. So my friend, just like it's
very important, necessary for members of the family to go to
be with the family and go to be with other members of the
family, their own individual families. So it is so important
that we gather together to fellowship with our spiritual family, the
church. Now thirdly, the Lord Jesus Christ
meets with his people when they assemble in his name. He meets
with them. And you know that classic verse
in Matthew 18 and 20 where Jesus said, where two or three are
gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst. Think about it. Think about it. The Lord Jesus Christ comes to
the worship service. He comes and meets with his people,
like Simeon of old, God's people, come together seeking Christ. You remember Simeon who came
into the temple looking for the baby Jesus, looking for him.
And when he saw Christ, he said, mine eyes have seen thy salvation.
And so we come together, we come together seeking Christ. Don't
come here to see me. Don't come here just because
I'm here. You come here because Christ comes. He comes where
His people meet in His name. And they always find Him in the
house of God, the assembly of those who worship Him. If our
heart attitude is right and we're bowing before Him, then He is
there. Christ is there. He walks the
aisles of His church. He fingers the heart of the people
in His church. He speaks to them. He visits
them in the church. And that brings me to the next
thing, the fourth thing. The assembled congregation of
the Lord is the place where God deals with men. where God speaks to men. Now,
each local congregation of believers is the house and the temple of
God. It's the house of God. We're told that in 1 Timothy
3 and 15. Now, what I believe, and what I'm saying is that the
church is where God reveals His will, where He gives out His
word, where He shows His glory, where He reveals Himself, makes
Himself known. where he instructs his people
and where he bestows blessing upon his people. I'm telling
you that the church is where God meets with his people and
where God deals with his people. I'm talking about his children.
God deals with his people there. And you can't afford not to be
there because that's where God's going to grow his crop is in
the church. That's where God's going to fertilize.
That's where God's going to cultivate is in the church. That's where
he's doing his business. The church is God's husbandry. Have you ever read that in the
Bible? You know what that means? It means the church is God's
farm. That's what it means. It means
that's where God tends his crop is in the church. That's what
it's about. that's why all this talk about
this worship business this morning this is where god does his business
is in the church now that brings me to the last thing and i believe
this to be true and i gotta give it to you the neglect of public
worship public worship is the first step toward total apostasy
and i want you to turn with me your bibles to the book of Hebrews,
the book of Hebrews. Now these are familiar verses
to some people, others they're not. And there are some things
in connection with this that many people have never been,
I think, been pointed out to. But I want you to see this this
morning. I begin here with the 23rd verse of Hebrews
chapter 10. Let us hold fast the profession
of our faith without wavering, for He is faithful and promised.
And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good
works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the
manner of some is, but exhorting one another, and so much the
more as you see the day approaching. For if we sin willfully, after
that we have received the knowledge of the truth, There remaineth no more sacrifice
for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment Fiery
indignation which shall devour the adversary he that despised
moses law died without mercy Under two or three witnesses
of how much sore punishment verse 29 Suppose ye shall he be thought
worthy who have trodden underfoot the son of god counted the blood
of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing
and had done despite under the spirit of grace Now those who
willfully neglect the assembly of God's saints, though they
may be thoroughly orthodox in doctrine, tread underfoot the
Son of God and count the blood of the covenant a useless thing
and despise the spirit of grace. And their forsaking of public
worship, I believe, is their proof that they never knew Christ. They never knew it. I'm talking
about people that just say, I will not worship. I'm not going to
public worship. I'm not going to go to meet with
God's church. I'm not going to do it. I turn
it out of my life. I'm not going to do it. Now,
there's a verse over in 1 John. It's 1 John chapter 2 and it's
verse 19. Let me read it to you. And John
said this, this is my proof of why I'm saying that a person
is forsaken. A public worship is proof that
they never knew Christ. They went out from us, in verse
19, 1 John 2, but they were not of us. For if they had been of
us, they would no doubt have continued with us. But they went
out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. They went out, said away with
this public worship business, I'm not going to worship God,
I'm not interested in public worship, I'm not interested in
just coming together to pay homage. to the lord jesus christ i'm
not interested in this business of the cost and just coming together
in all the price to worship god the father god the son and god
the holy spirit i'm not interested in that i want to bow down before
the angels and i want to bow down before i want to render
a little homage i want to go someplace where they are where
they are paying a little attention to people i want i want to go
where where people are being honored So on. Well, you please
yourself. Suit yourself. But I'm telling
you what worship is. I'm telling you about worshiping
God. That's what I'm telling you about. I'm telling you about
a worship service. And about how to have it. If
you're interested in having a New Testament worship service, then
that's what this is about. That's what this is about today.
And the importance of it. That's what all this is about
this morning. i hope that god is giving you some help i hope
i haven't offended anybody hurting i hope i haven't somewhere now
that bursted somebody's balloon this morning in any way most
of you people are aware of the fact that that what this church
is about is it it's here honor christ as long as we got breath
as long we got straight it's here to preach the gospel of
redeeming grace that's what it's about but you know i feel that
this these things need to be said over and over because Satan,
you know, he can just very easily sidetrack people and get them
to think that worship has a whole lot more to do than what that
New Covenant Baptist Church ever thought it was. There's a whole
lot more involved in worship than that. And you know we've
got to have a little bit of something here to sandwich all that in
when you know we've got to make it palatable to people. We just
can't give them a full steady diet of that. It's got to be
a little something else. I'm just trying to tell you what
the Bible teaches about what worship's all about. And that
angel, as it were, grabbed John quickly and said, see thou do
it not! You worship God. Don't bow down
before anybody else. You worship God. Worship God. Father, thank you for the privilege
we've had this morning of preaching your word. I pray that this message
will not fall on deaf ears. I pray that we might all, this
morning, receive light and instruction, and that all of our hearts would
be moved toward a right mind humble heart humble attitude
toward thee the living God and we would truly worship every
time we meet together we would worship and we would have the
presence of the lovely Lord Jesus Christ in our midst father receive
glory receive praise you're so good to us we love thee thou
art our God in Jesus name amen