Self-will BOWED to God’s will

Brother Paul Sudhakar used to say, “To know the correct meaning of a word in the Bible, we should examine the context of its first occurrence.” The first occurrence of the word “worship” (Greek: Proskuneo) in the sense of bowing down to someone, is in Genesis 22:5 where Abraham almost offers His son Isaac as a burnt sacrifice to God. Words do not suffice to say that he went through a great struggle in bowing to God’s will. It did not come naturally to him.

Contrast that with today’s worship. We will get a totally different opinion of what worship is now. In short, it can be said that today we offer only the sacrifice of thanksgiving and praise, the fruit of our lips (Hebrews 13:15) that perhaps costs us nothing. The author of Hebrews emphasised this form because the Hebrew believers had to be told about the free gift of salvation for which there is no repayment price tag. However, they were asked not to neglect the service of worship (Greek: Latreia; Hebrews 13:16), which they were already familiar with and knew to be divine. In this verse (v. 16) this service of worship is simply written as “doing good and sharing.” One may question, how this doing good and sharing, be called worship? The answer is found in Matthew 25:40 – “To the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.”

It is true that what the Lord has given us is priceless and there is nothing by which we can repay Him back with, except bow down to Him in worship. This Bowing down however, takes three different forms: Verbal, Symbolic and Demonstrative, the greatest being the last. We must grow in our worship and not remain as babes in Christ. If we keep offering only Verbal (Lip Service) and neglect the greater, it will amount to only saying “Lord, Lord.” We know that not all who say, ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter into the kingdom of heaven but those who do the will of God. The will and the command of God is to love and do good to the least of His brethren and share with them. It is worshiping Him!

What is more, when the self-will is bowed to God’s will, such worship becomes acceptable to God. We will live even as the Spirit is honoured and kept from being grieved or quenched because the deeds of the flesh are being mortified through the Spirit (Romans 8:13; 1 Thessalonians 5:19-20).

You see brethren, religion is necessary! Let us not settle for a kind of relationship that does not last.

Matthew Henry commenting on Romans 12:1 writes: “We are temple, priest, and sacrifice, as Christ was in his peculiar sacrificing. The presenting of the body to God implies not only the avoiding of the sins that are committed with or against the body, but the using of the body as a servant of the [Holy Spirit] in the service of God. It is to glorify God with our bodies (1 Corinthians 6:20), to engage our bodies in the duties of immediate worship, and in a diligent attendance to our particular callings, and be willing to suffer for God with our bodies, when we are called to it. It is to yield the members of our bodies as instruments of righteousness (Romans 6:13).”

If we happen to be failing in our religious efforts and not bearing the fruit that we expected, we do not need to worry that we will lose our salvation. Our works may burn up but we ourselves will escape because we have been trying at least (1 Corinthians 3). We can still rejoice in the hope of glory and even take some complacency in that confidence when indeed we are giving Him our best. That alone to me is the peace and rest that Christ gives us individually or corporately.

Caleb Motupalli