10 The Heart of Worship

Romans 6:13Give yourselves completely to God. Surrender your whole being to Him to be used for righteous purposes.

The very center of worship is surrender.The word “surrender” is not a popular word. It suggests that you are losing something, having to give it up. If you are having a fight and the other person is stronger and you are being beaten in the fight, you will surrender. No one wants to lose. No one wants to admit defeat. Surrender means you are weak.

If you are having an argument and the other person is very good with words and ideas you may not win the argument. In our culture today we are taught never to give in or give up. But surrendering to God is the very center of worship. It is the natural response to the love and mercy that God shows us. We surrender to God, not because we fear Him but because we love Him. Remember,1 John 4:19 says, “We love (Him) because He first loved us”.

We have studied many Bible verses that tell us about the great grace that God has shown to us. Let us read what Paul wrote in Romans 12:1 For this reason I make a request to you, brothers, because of God’s great mercy to us, that you will give your bodies as a living offering, holy, pleasing to God, which is the worship it is right for you to give Him.

True worship is bringing God pleasure. That happens when you give yourself completely to God. Look at a very important word in this verse and it is used two times. The word is, “give”. Giving yourself to God is what true worship is. This “giving” to God is called many things: consecration, making Jesus your Lord, taking up your cross, dying to self, yielding to the Spirit. The most important of all these words is not what “giving” means but if you do it. God wants your life, all of your life. There are three barriers or difficulties that block our total surrender to God. These three are fear, pride, and confusion. We don’t understand how much God loves us, we want to control our own lives. We do not understand the real meaning of “surrender”.

CAN I TRUST GOD? Trust is completely necessary to surrender. You won’t want to surrender to God unless you trust Him. You can’t trust Him until you know Him better. Fear keeps us from surrendering to God, but look at this verse. “Such love has no fear, because perfect love drives out all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. 1 John 4:18The more you understand how much God loves you, the easier it is to surrender to Him.

How do you know that God loves you? He gives you much proof:

1) God says He loves you; The Lord is good to all; He has compassion on all He has made. Psalms 145:9

2) You are never out of His sight; 2 You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.

3 You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. 7 Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? 8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. 9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, 10 even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. Psalms 139:2-3, 7-10

3) He cares about every part of your life;God even knows how many hairs are on your head. Matthew 10:30

4) He gives you the ability to enjoy all kinds of pleasure; Their trust should be in God, who richly gives us all we need for our enjoyment. 1 Timothy 6:17

5) He has good plans for your life; For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11

6). He forgives you; O Lord, you are so good, so ready to forgive, so full of unfailing love for all who ask for your help. Psalms 86:5

7) He is lovingly patient with you; The Lord is gracious, and full of compassion; slow to anger, and of great mercy. Psalms 145:8

So you see, God loves you more than you can ever imagine.

The greatest example of God’s love and care for you is the sacrifice of God’s Son for you. But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. Romans 5:8

If you want to know how much you matter to God, look at Christ Jesus with his arms outstretched on the cross. He is saying to all of us, “I love you this much! I love you enough to die for your sins.”

God does not force us to follow Him. He wants us to freely give ourselves to Him. If we give ourselves to Jesus when He calls us to Himself to love us, we find that He is a Savior, a brother, a friend.

ADMITTING OUR LIMITATIONS

Another barrier or obstacle to surrendering totally to God is our pride.Remember what Satan said to Eve in the garden. “You’ll be like God”. Both she and Adam had that prideful desire to be like God or to be in control of their own lives.

Yes, life is a struggle, but we don’t realize that our struggles are mostly with God. We want to be the God of our own lives. We want to decide everything for ourselves, give orders even to God sometimes. That causes us to interfere with God’s work within us.

We are not God and never will be. We are only humans. When we try to be God we become most like Satan, who desired the same thing, to be like God. Because we are not God we make mistakes and we have limitations. These limitations cause us to be irritated, angry and resentful. We want to be more beautiful, have more money, be more clever, have more abilities, more intelligent. When this doesn’t happen we see that others have these abilities and we become jealous, are filled with envy, and have self pity

MEANS TO SURRENDER.

God wants you to sacrifice your life to Him. ” I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God — this is your spiritual act of worship. Romans 12:1God wants us to surrender ourselves to Him so that He may change us where we need to be changed. Surrendering is not for cowards. It does not mean that you stop using your mind and brain. God would not waste the brain He gave you. The personality God gave you He wants to use it to be the kind of person He wants you to be. The more we let God take over, the more truly ourselves we become because He made us.

1. Surrendering to God is best demonstrated in obedience. You say “Yes, Lord” to whatever He asks of you. If you say “No, Lord” is to speak a conflict. You can’t call Jesus, your LORD when you refuse to obey Him. After a night of fishing that failed to get any fish, Jesus told Peter to try again: Simon answered, "Master, we've worked hard all night and haven't caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets." Luke 5:5 Surrendered people obey God’s word, even if it doesn’t seem reasonable.

2. Another view of a fully surrendered life is trust.Abraham followed God’s directions without knowing where it would take him. Hannah waited for God’s perfect timing without knowing when the son would arrive.Mary expected a miracle without knowing how.Joseph trusted God’s purpose without knowing why things happened in his life the way they did.Each of these people surrendered to God not knowing how things would turn out for them.

You know you are surrendered to God when you allow God to works things out in your life. Sometimes we try to control others and force upon them our desires. We try to control the situation. You don’t always have to be “in charge”

The Bible says, “Surrender yourself to the Lord, and wait patiently for him. Do not be preoccupied or worried with an evildoer who succeeds in his way when he carries out his schemes.” Psalms 37:7

How do we know that we are surrendered to God? When you don’t react to criticism and rush to defend yourself is a sign that you are. Surrendered hearts are seen best in relationships. You won’t be pushing yourself before others or demand your rights, or are self-serving.

The most difficult area to surrender for many people is their money. Many have thought, “I want to live for God but I also want to earn enough money to live comfortably and have lots of money for when I become old."No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.” Matthew 6:24

The best example of self-surrender is Jesus. The night before his crucifixion Jesus surrendered Himself to God’s plan. He prayed, “Abba, Father," he cried out, "everything is possible for you. Please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine." Mark 14:36

Jesus already knew that God could do anything. But He prayed, “God, if it is your will to remove this suffering, please do. But if it carries out your purpose, that’s what I want, too.”

Real surrender says, “Father, if this problem, pain, sickness, or this thing that is happening to me is needed to complete your purpose and glory in my life or in another persons life, please don’t take it away.”

This kind of surrender requires maturity and maturity does not come easy. Even in Jesus’ case, He suffered so much over God’s plan for Himself that He sweat great drops of blood. Surrender is hard work. In our lives, it is powerful warfare against our self-centered nature.

THE BLESSING OF SURRENDER.The Bible makes it very clear about the benefit of fully surrendering your life to God.

First: You will have peace. The Bible says, “Submit to God, and you will have peace; then things will go well for you.” Job 22:21

Second: You will experience freedom. “Don't you realize that you become the slave of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obey God, which leads to righteous living.17 Thank God! Once you were slaves of sin, but now you wholeheartedly obey this teaching we have given you.18 Now you are free from your slavery to sin, and you have become slaves to righteous living.” Romans 6:16-18

Third: You will experience God’s power in your life. Those stubborn temptations and great problems can be defeated by Christ when given to Him.

POWER AGAINST THE POWERS OF EVILEphesians 6:10-11 “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11 Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the

devil's schemes. Ephesians 4:27 Do not give the devil a foothold.

POWER TO SERVE GODEphesians 3:7 I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God's grace

given me through the working of his power.

2 Timothy 1:7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.

POWER IN WEAKNESS2 Corinthians 12:9-10 “He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my

power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.

10 That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I

am strong.

POWER in the ROLE of FAITH AND PRAYER

Ephesians 3:16- 18 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may

dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power,

together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ.

GOD’S POWERFUL TRIUMPH OVER EVIL

1 Corinthians 15:42-43 So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in

dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power;

1 Corinthians 15:24-26 Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion,

authority and power. 25 For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26 The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

Remember Joshua, as he came near the biggest battle of his life, he met God. He fell and worshipped before Him. He surrendered his own plans. That surrender brought him a great victory. There are times when victory comes through surrender. Surrender doesn’t weaken you; it strengthens you when you surrender your will to the will of God. You don’t have to fear. A great Christian man once said, “The greatness of a man’s power is in the measure of his surrender.” It means, if you surrender much to God you will gain much.

THE BEST WAY TO LIVE

Everyone surrenders to something or someone. If a person doesn’t surrender to God, they will surrender to people’s opinions or what they expect of you. Or they will surrender to the power of money and things. They may surrender to fear or pride or

anger or lust. We were made by God to worship Him. If we fail to worship Him, we will create other things that become idols to us and worship them. We are free to chose what we will surrender to but we will not be free from the results of that choice.

Surrender is the only way to live because it is the best and nothing else works. Everything else leads to disappointment, and self-destruction. Romans 12:1 Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.

Sometimes it takes years to surrender to God. When you do you will discover that the greatest hindrance or obstacle to God’s blessing in your life is not other people, it is yourself. It is your own self-will, your own fears, desires, and pride. You cannot fulfill God’s purposes for your life while wanting to do your own plans.

If God is going to do His best work in you, it will begin with this…surrender. So give it all to God. Put Jesus Christ in the driver’s seat of your life and take your hands off the steering wheel. Philippians 4:13 “I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.”

Surrender must be a daily act of the will. Luke 9:23 Jesus said to all of them, "If people want to follow me, they must give up the things they want. They must be willing to give up their lives daily to follow me.

When you decide to live a totally surrendered life, that decision will be tested. Sometimes it will mean doing something when it is not convenient for you. It may be unpopular with your family and friends. It may cost much or it may be doing something you feel is impossible.

A great Christian leader of our time formed a group called Campus Crusade for Christ. The group wrote a tract called Fours Spiritual Laws and wrote and made the film, JESUS. That film has been seen by over four billion people and more than 150 million people have come to Jesus Christ and are following Him. When asked why God blessed his life so much this is what he said. “When I was a young man, I made a contract with God. I literally wrote it out and signed my name at the bottom of the page. It said,‘From this day forward, I am a slave of Jesus Christ.’”

Remember…the heart of worship is surrender. Romans 6:13 Offer (surrender) to God. Offer the parts of your body to God to be used in doing good.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXIULING 8-17-12 FINISHED

LIUYUN 9-10-2014 FINISHED