[podcast]http://www.revkwon.com/podcast/come_worship-lifted_hands.mp3[/podcast] Were start going a brand new series titled: Come to Worship. This Christmas season I want us to get in touch with what it means to worship before God. This series will teach us different ways to worship God including lifting your hands, bringing your gifts, pouring our your heart, and bowing before Him. The idea of the series comes from Matthew 2:1-2 and it goes like this: Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, 2 saying, Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him. (Matthew 2:1-2) Everything changed in a moment. When Jesus was born, He gave us the chance to be known, accepted, and forgiven. When we experience His love, we cant help but Come to Worship. You see, when Jesus was born, the purpose for the wisemens visit wasnt solely to give the King of Kings gifts. It was to worship the King of Kings in reverence to Him. Every Sunday we get together as a church and Im going to be honest there are some Sundays, after a long and hard week of work where the last thing I want to do is worship the King of Kings. Its not because I do not revere the King of Kings, it is simply because Im tired and the last thing I want to do is any more work. Im saying this as a pastor, so I can only imagine thats its no different than you. There are some weeks, maybe most weeks that we can barely make it to church, and honestly thats the grace of God and Im glad you came and made it so that we can worship Jesus together with every bit of energy we have within us. However, during Christmas, I believe we need to do more. We need to more intentionally give reverent honor and homage to God with heartfelt worship of who Jesus is in our lives. The three wisemen weren’t seeking God to see what God can do for them, they were coming to God to worship Him. God is not here for us, we are here for God. This morning we are looking at an aspect of worship I call lifting our hands. When you do a google search of the word worship, the first thing that pops up besides the dictionary definition are images like this: [show next slide]. They are images of hands and arms lifted to God. That got me thinking: why do we lift our hands up in worship, to answer this question, were going to Psalm 63.
O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. 2 So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. 3 Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. 4 So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands.
David wrote this Psalm while he was in the wilderness. The wilderness of Judah was not as fruitful and the people werent as numerous. If you remember something about Davids life and history, youll know that this was the the very wilderness where he hid from Saul, as the crown king was trying to kill him. At the same time, this was the very same wilderness, though lifeless and provides for only death, sustains David and gives him life. I want you to understand and see the perspective David is writing this Psalm from. His life was not paradise. All things were not good. He had a bunch of promises from God, and hes eating scraps from caves. He used to be eating at the kings table conquering city states as the general of Israels armies, but now he is lonely, solitary, living in desolate wasteland with the afflicted, wandering and unsettled of life. You can image the people he and his band of misfits were rubbing up against: the people on the periphery of society. The reality here was that David found a place, through his hardship, through all the craziness of life to praise God and lift his hands up in the air to praise God. When I was a critical, non-believing, unsaved pastors kid, I would go to these retreats and revivals and watch people when they sang songs and when the pastor spoke put their hands up in the air. I just never understood why. In fact, the few times I went to these events when I didnt believe and the worship leader asked the people to lift up their hands, I did so, just so I wouldnt be left out of worship, and I can remember, ten seconds into it, my lifted arms got tired, and then they started to sink and come down. But I remember, when I lifted my hands up in the air in my nonbelief, I didnt experience God. We cant experience Gods love, power, and mercy with our hands lifted up if were not willing to receive Gods love, power and mercy. But there is more than receiving Gods love, power, and mercy at stake when we lift up our hands in worship to God. It is a carnal instinct. It is within us to lift up our hands when we worship. All you have to do is look at pictures of people partying at a nightclub or a rave- the people worship whatever it is that theyre doing in cramp, overly tight spacesthey have their hands lifted up in the air. It is carnal. I noticed this over the weekend, when I got to spend a lot of time with babies or infants, when they search for their parents, they lift up their hands. No real father would turn from the lifted hands of his child. God is no different, and He is more loving than any earthly father. You see, because the act of lifting up our hands is the act of drawing near to God. When we draw near to God, God will draw near to you (James 4:8). David is doing just that in the Psalm we just read, he was earnestly seeking God despite the circumstances of his life because do you see this in verse two, [Gods] steadfast love is better than life. The world around you can be crumbling down because inflation is crazy and your finances cant keep up. Your relationships can be falling apart because you messed up or the other person messed up and you cant reconcile. Your life may be amuck and your reality is winter wasteland, but Gods love is better than life and so we lift up our hands longing for God. This is how we come to worship. When there is nothing else in our life, we lift up our hands. Lets go to Psalm 141. I want to look at two verses here because it really shows how lifting our hands is worship to God when there is nothing else we can do.
O Lord, I call upon you; hasten to me! Give ear to my voice when I call to you! 2 Let my prayer be counted as incense before you, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice!
(Psalm 141:1-2)
God loves when we offer him a praise offering as a sacrifice. When send it up our hands in the air, it is with our prayers as incense offered to the name of God, a cry that we need Him more than anything else. David also wrote Psalm 141 when he was being pursued by Saul in the wilderness. It was his lowest point in life, or at least one of them. Do you see how prayer is connected to lifting up our hands to reach out to God. Dont we understand now why babies lift up their hands? We need to be lifting up our hands in worship. The Apostle Paul gives Timothy instructions on worship and they go like this: Therefore I want the men everywhere to pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or disputing. (1 Timothy 2:8) Heres one last thing I want to say about lifting up our hands in worship and it comes from looking at babies this weekend, again. When babies lift up their hands for their parents, its often times because they are battling. Battling the dirty diaper, battling their hungry, battling hurt feelings, battling loneliness, battling for attention, etc. We lift up our hands because we too, are battling something, Ill just call it life. So we reach out to God to offer praise in the battle because thats what lifted hands do. They symbolize our inability to do on our own and offering whatever tools and weapons we have to God to do something with it. Lets go to Exodus 17:8-13, this is where I wrap up. 8 Then Amalek came and fought with Israel at Rephidim. 9 So Moses said to Joshua, Choose for us men, and go out and fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the staff of God in my hand. 10 So Joshua did as Moses told him, and fought with Amalek, while Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill. 11 Whenever Mosesheld up his hand, Israel prevailed, and whenever he lowered his hand, Amalek prevailed. 12 But Moses’ hands grew weary, so they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat on it, while Aaron and Hur held up his hands, one on one side, and the other on the other side. So his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. 13 And Joshua overwhelmed Amalek and his people with the sword. Depending on the posture of Moses hands, the Israelites were winning, close, or losing. We are all in battles or living life in the pits, all of us right now. We need to have our hands lifted up because were losing on our own. Our lifted hands need to be offerings to God that shoot up with our prayers to Him because when God embraces us through the love of Jesus, as He did 2000 years ago, our lives change for the better. But just like this story in Exodus shows us, worshipping alone may be difficult where we are in life. We have church, especially in this time of the year, we need to come to worship together, and have two or three people next to us lift our hands up if we get tired, and we need to lift up our neighbors hands when they get tired. Together, when we come to worship, we come with lifted hands and are embraced by God. Lets pray.
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