A Series on Worship (Part 12) - The Conclusion

This has been a fairly long journey through my understanding of what worship is supposed to be.  As I wrote all of these things I realized that this has never happened perfectly, this has never been the complete state of man, but it is what we should aim for as we gather as believers.  We must always remember that our faith and our worship of God is not about us, we must remember that God acting in the world and in our lives is not about us, it is about the Kingdom of God that is growing, it is something much larger than us, so we must always look outside ourselves and seek to love God and those around us.  We must participate in the worship of the local church in which we find ourselves with all of our heart for the glory of God.  This is not limited to the singing; this is not limited to talking; this is not limited to serving; this is not only when we are asked; this is not only when we enjoy what we are doing.  We ought to fully engage those around us in every aspect of their and our lives and seek to grow them closer to God for His glory and honor.

I have thrown a lot out there in this series of posts, so here I will wrap it all up in one sentence:

My picture of worship is a united group of believers, freely gathering around the work of God in salvation, laying their hearts out before each other and before God, encouraging each other with the words of God through song and spoken words, resulting in lives lived for the glory of God and the salvation of lost souls.

(This series of posts came from a paper that I wrote for my pastor on my picture of worship.  This paper can be accessed by clicking the link at the top of this blog that reads "My Picture of Worship (A Paper)")