Joyful Worship

“Worship the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.” Psalm 100:2

We’ve recently been studying about God's Character in Sunday school. It has made my heart full and reminded me how wonderful, holy, loving and mighty God is. He deserves our praise and worship given by all that we are. In fact in Mark 12:30, Jesus tells us to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind and with all your strength.” He stresses every aspect, leaving no question that every part of who we are is to be entirely for God. If we love Him with all our heart, soul, mind and strength as we are commanded, wouldn’t we worship with all our heart, soul, mind and strength?

Psalm 9:2 "I will be glad and rejoice in you; I will sing the praises of your name. O Most High."

Psalm 35:9, 10 "Then my soul will rejoice in the LORD and delight in his salvation. My whole
being will exclaim, "Who is like you, Lord?" (Emphasis mine)

Psalm 86:12 "I will praise you, Lord my God, with ALL my heart; I will glorify your name forever."

Did you notice the word "rejoice" in both the first and second verses? And "with all my heart" in the third?  Our worship time, especially with other believers, should be a joyful time of rejoicing in the Lord and we should praise him with all our hearts. Yes, we may come to church with burdens and heartaches, but worship is about God, not about us. When we lay ourselves aside in order to worship God, everything else fades in comparison to our realization of who we are praising. God is still God, no matter what problems we are facing. He still deserves our praise and worship.

When we come together in worship to sing praises to God, let's prepare our hearts, really listen to the words of the songs and remind ourselves that God is so worthy of our praise. He
deserves our ALL! To prepare our hearts, reading scripture about praise and worship is a good place to start. So is studying about God's character.  Try using the Bible app or other resources to suggest verses to read. When we take our minds off of ourselves or others around us and put our mind on God and his goodness, we glorify him and fill our hearts as well.