Purpose Driven Life Day 13
Home Group Meeting – October 5, 2005
You were planned for God’s pleasure!! (continued)
Brief Review of last week
Day 10 – The heart of worship
Although the word “surrender” carries a negative meaning in most contexts, this is truly the heart of worship. The story of Joshua’s victory in Jericho (Joshua 5:13-6:21) shows how surrender actually leads to victory. By surrendering, we do not stop what we are supposed to do. Instead, we do those things with even more strength and confidence.
Days 11 and 12 – Becoming best friends with God
The difference between a servant and a friend is that a servant does not know his master’s business, but a friend does (John 15:14-15). God wants us to be His friend and demonstrated this by dying for us. The ball in now in our court: how can we become friends with God?
Day 13 – Worship that pleases God
Read Mark 12:30 (Matthew 22:37, Luke 10:27) and Deuteronomy 6:6-9.
1. Which is easier for you – public or private worship? What kind of worship makes you feel closer to God?
2. What does “God’s worshippers must worship in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24) mean to you?
In John 4:24 Jesus meets a Samaritan woman and teaches her what it means to “worship in spirit and truth”.
Worship in spirit
To fully understand Jesus’ words here we must look to the context. When Jesus said we must worship in spirit this could mean several things. First, the location of where one worships is not important. Jesus said (in verse 23), “… a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem”. Therefore what this means for us is that you don’t need to be at church to worship. You could be doing it at home on the weekend, or even on the way to church.
This teaching is also consistent with what Paul said in Romans 12:1, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, … to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship”. As you may remember we covered this a few weeks ago. The important point about worship (or, being a “living sacrifice”) is that it is a continual thing. That is, to be done anywhere and everyday, not just at church on Sunday.
Second, when we become Christians, God fills us with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit first came to new Christians on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2) just as Jesus promised. Now that we are with God in Spirit (unlike the Old Testament times), we should also worship in the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Worship in truth
This statement also has many layers of meaning.
First, we must again look at the context in which Jesus made this statement. When Jesus told the Samaritan woman to “Go, call your husband and come back” (verse 16), the Samaritan woman replied that she did not have a husband. She was telling the truth to Jesus that she replied that does not have a husband at that that moment, but on the other hand her response was misleading because she previously had 5 husbands and the person she is with now is not her husband. The fact was that she was living in sin. In this context, when Jesus says that we should worship in truth, it could mean that we should face God truthfully. That is, if we are presently living in sin (eg there is somebody we hate), or if we have not fully surrendered our lives to God (eg we can’t let go of materialism), this is not being true to God (or to ourselves). And accordingly, we are not worshipping in truth.
Second, worshipping in truth also means that we should know what we worship. We shouldn’t worship who we think God is! The God as revealed in the Bible is the true God. The God whom we image in our minds (without learning from the Bible) is a god created by our imagination. Again, looking at the context, Jesus said, “you Samaritans worship what you do not know …” (verse 22). Historically, the Samaritans were originally of Jewish descent but became mixed in enthicity as a result of years of conquest by neighbouring nations. In addition, their faith also became distorted through the influence of foreign religions and idols. As a result, although they believed in God, their knowledge of God was distorted, that is, their faith presented an “untrue” God. Therefore, when Jesus commands us to worship in truth, we must learn who God is from the Bible and not from who we “feel” God is.
Day 14 – When God seems distant
“I go east, but he is not there. I go west, but I cannot find him. I do not see him in the north, for he is hidden. I turn to the south, but I cannot find him. But he knows where I am going. And when he has tested me like gold in a fire, he will pronounce me innocent”. Job 23:8-10
3. Did you ever feel God being distant from you? What did you learn from that experience?
A background into the story of Job’s was discussed.
The story of Job is particularly important when we talk about “worship”. Why? This is because many of us quite easily fall into the trap of thinking that when we worship, we wish to feel good when we do it. That is, we wish to feel God’s presence and the work of the Holy Spirit. This is all well and good, and when we do worship (in spirit and truth), we often will feel these things. However, we must be very clear that worship is not about us. We worship to please God, not ourselves.
When we encounter difficulties in our lives, when things are not going as expected and worst of all, we can’t feel God’s presence during these hard times, there is a risk that we could turn away from Christianity or resent God. The reality is that God is always with us even if we can’t feel that He is. We should learn from Job, who through all this suffering in losing his family, health and wealth, he never failed to continue trusting and worshipping God.
One of our members also shared that he often reads Psalm 139 because it shows how intimately God knows and guides us, even in times when He seems distant.
5. What does this mean: “offer your bodies as a sacrifice”? What would our lives look like if we truly lived in this way?
Being friends with God means that we have an intimate relationship with Him. As Jesus stated, a true friend would die for his friends. This is the extent of our intimacy with God.
You were planned for God’s pleasure!! (continued)
Brief Review of last week
Day 10 – The heart of worship
Although the word “surrender” carries a negative meaning in most contexts, this is truly the heart of worship. The story of Joshua’s victory in Jericho (Joshua 5:13-6:21) shows how surrender actually leads to victory. By surrendering, we do not stop what we are supposed to do. Instead, we do those things with even more strength and confidence.
Days 11 and 12 – Becoming best friends with God
The difference between a servant and a friend is that a servant does not know his master’s business, but a friend does (John 15:14-15). God wants us to be His friend and demonstrated this by dying for us. The ball in now in our court: how can we become friends with God?
Day 13 – Worship that pleases God
Read Mark 12:30 (Matthew 22:37, Luke 10:27) and Deuteronomy 6:6-9.
1. Which is easier for you – public or private worship? What kind of worship makes you feel closer to God?
2. What does “God’s worshippers must worship in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24) mean to you?
In John 4:24 Jesus meets a Samaritan woman and teaches her what it means to “worship in spirit and truth”.
Worship in spirit
To fully understand Jesus’ words here we must look to the context. When Jesus said we must worship in spirit this could mean several things. First, the location of where one worships is not important. Jesus said (in verse 23), “… a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem”. Therefore what this means for us is that you don’t need to be at church to worship. You could be doing it at home on the weekend, or even on the way to church.
This teaching is also consistent with what Paul said in Romans 12:1, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, … to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship”. As you may remember we covered this a few weeks ago. The important point about worship (or, being a “living sacrifice”) is that it is a continual thing. That is, to be done anywhere and everyday, not just at church on Sunday.
Second, when we become Christians, God fills us with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit first came to new Christians on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2) just as Jesus promised. Now that we are with God in Spirit (unlike the Old Testament times), we should also worship in the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Worship in truth
This statement also has many layers of meaning.
First, we must again look at the context in which Jesus made this statement. When Jesus told the Samaritan woman to “Go, call your husband and come back” (verse 16), the Samaritan woman replied that she did not have a husband. She was telling the truth to Jesus that she replied that does not have a husband at that that moment, but on the other hand her response was misleading because she previously had 5 husbands and the person she is with now is not her husband. The fact was that she was living in sin. In this context, when Jesus says that we should worship in truth, it could mean that we should face God truthfully. That is, if we are presently living in sin (eg there is somebody we hate), or if we have not fully surrendered our lives to God (eg we can’t let go of materialism), this is not being true to God (or to ourselves). And accordingly, we are not worshipping in truth.
Second, worshipping in truth also means that we should know what we worship. We shouldn’t worship who we think God is! The God as revealed in the Bible is the true God. The God whom we image in our minds (without learning from the Bible) is a god created by our imagination. Again, looking at the context, Jesus said, “you Samaritans worship what you do not know …” (verse 22). Historically, the Samaritans were originally of Jewish descent but became mixed in enthicity as a result of years of conquest by neighbouring nations. In addition, their faith also became distorted through the influence of foreign religions and idols. As a result, although they believed in God, their knowledge of God was distorted, that is, their faith presented an “untrue” God. Therefore, when Jesus commands us to worship in truth, we must learn who God is from the Bible and not from who we “feel” God is.
Day 14 – When God seems distant
“I go east, but he is not there. I go west, but I cannot find him. I do not see him in the north, for he is hidden. I turn to the south, but I cannot find him. But he knows where I am going. And when he has tested me like gold in a fire, he will pronounce me innocent”. Job 23:8-10
3. Did you ever feel God being distant from you? What did you learn from that experience?
A background into the story of Job’s was discussed.
The story of Job is particularly important when we talk about “worship”. Why? This is because many of us quite easily fall into the trap of thinking that when we worship, we wish to feel good when we do it. That is, we wish to feel God’s presence and the work of the Holy Spirit. This is all well and good, and when we do worship (in spirit and truth), we often will feel these things. However, we must be very clear that worship is not about us. We worship to please God, not ourselves.
When we encounter difficulties in our lives, when things are not going as expected and worst of all, we can’t feel God’s presence during these hard times, there is a risk that we could turn away from Christianity or resent God. The reality is that God is always with us even if we can’t feel that He is. We should learn from Job, who through all this suffering in losing his family, health and wealth, he never failed to continue trusting and worshipping God.
One of our members also shared that he often reads Psalm 139 because it shows how intimately God knows and guides us, even in times when He seems distant.
5. What does this mean: “offer your bodies as a sacrifice”? What would our lives look like if we truly lived in this way?
Being friends with God means that we have an intimate relationship with Him. As Jesus stated, a true friend would die for his friends. This is the extent of our intimacy with God.
posted by 潇湘客 @ 5:06 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home