Misusing The Term ‘Worship’
I saw a church sign the other day that said “come to worship, leave to serve.” That got me thinking. Then yesterday I was having a conversation with a friend who made the statement that the ‘worship’ part of their church service (music) was not as good as she would have liked. Again, this made me think. I am concerned that our view of worship and how we use the term ‘worship’ is inconsistent with how it is used in Scripture.
Worship isn’t just something we do at church. It isn’t just the music part of our church services. It is so much more than that. Whenever we make statements like “come to worship, leave to service” we are teaching people that worshipping God is just something that can be done at church. Whenever we refer to worship as the music part of our church services we are limiting it to a very small aspect of what true worship is.
I think that in order to be accurate the church sign I saw should read, “come to serve, leave to worship” or “come to worship, leave to worship.” Worship is a lifestyle not an event. It is what should consume our lives. We should worship God through our jobs, families, church services, and extra-curricular activities…everything! Serving others is not the goal, it is a result of achieving the real goal…worship. When we worship God 24/7 we will serve…we will be evangelistic…we will love…we will disciple…we will live holy. The key is worshipping God in everything we do.
When we focus on worshipping God in everything we do, everything else will fall into place. The need will not exist to do anything out of duty because everything in our lives will be an out-pouring of our worship. Be careful that when you use the term ’worship’ that you are using it in a way that is consistent with Scripture.
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