People of His Presence

Do you want to develop a deeper passion for God?

Are you longing for more of His presence in the church?

Have you ever wondered why we do what we do during the first twenty to thirty minutes of contemporary worship services?

If you answered yes to any or all of the questions above, this teaching is for you! The fact of the matter is, God wants to give you a deeper passion for the things on His heart. He wants to increase your awareness of His living presence, and He wants you to discover the truth about praise and worship because that discovery is a key to fulfilling your purpose and unlocking your potential, as a child of the King of kings.

So what exactly is “praise and worship”? Most evangelical believers will recognize the term, which came into use during the Charismatic Renewal of the ’60s and ’70s, and gained widespread popularity during the Worship Movement of the late ’90s and beyond. However, though many recognize the term, few understand all that it implies. Keep reading, because you are about to discover that praise and worship is much more than singing songs during a Sunday morning worship service. True and wholehearted praise and worship will change you from the inside out!

So let’s define praise and worship. In order to understand what it is, we first need to understand what it isn’t.

Emotionalism

In some congregations, we encounter emotionally driven praise and worship. Responses are based entirely on feelings, and the atmosphere seems to be charged with hype. This type of praise and worship easily lends itself to extremes.

Traditionalism or Intellectualism

In other congregations, praise and worship errs on the side of heartless tradition or mental ascent. Traditions in and of themselves are not bad, but when those traditions become meaningless, true devotion is sabotaged. Similarly, we’ve been given the ability to think with our minds, and that is not a bad thing. Still, we must be careful that praise and worship doesn’t degenerate into a mental exercise.

Trivializing Praise and Worship

Another common mistake is to view praise and worship as warm-up music—what we do to get people to realize the church service is starting, so they’ll come in and find a seat. Or it’s musical entertainment—something the people observe but don’t actively participate in. Finally, it can become a preliminary to the “real thing”—the preaching of the Word. Not only is this unscriptural, but it’s like going to someone’s house for dinner and viewing your relationship with that person as secondary and preliminary to getting what you really want—dinner! True praise and worship should actually be seen on an equal plane with the preaching of the Word or reading of the Word for two reasons:

1. Biblical praise and worship is a primary means by which we minister to God as New Testament priests. We were created to glorify Him, not just listen to sermons.

2. Biblical praise and worship should be or be based on the Word of God!

We often hear that worship is a lifestyle—and it is. Let me say, I am grateful for church leaders and theologians who have brought needed balance in this area, causing us to realize that worship is more than what we do in church services on Sunday morning. Nevertheless, I think we can swing the pendulum too far the other direction, and worship can be anything but the musical acts of devotion that are commonly associated with praise and worship. For instance, if I am not a singer, can’t I be excused from participation in praise and worship, and instead, can’t I worship God some other way—through something I’m good at? This is a common argument, but it is certainly not the biblical paradigm, as we will see.

Please don’t misinterpret what I’m saying. If you are a skilled craftsman, you can worship God each time you build something at your workbench. But this doesn’t excuse you from engaging in a very important form of corporate devotion—musical praise and worship.

True, worship was never restricted to musical forms or rituals in Old and New Testaments, but scripture repeatedly linked God-honoring music to worship, and powerful things happened when believers lifted up their voices together in song. Reality is, music touches the soul in ways spoken word cannot, and music is one of the most effective means of bringing a room together. God knew this from the beginning, and that’s why musical praise and worship has been such an important part of our devotion throughout the ages.

Based on descriptions of what praise and worship isn’t, and based on how we’ve demonstrated the importance of musical acts of devotion, we can provide a simplified working definition as follows, which will be the foundation for the rest of this study:

Praise and worship is a living interaction between God and His worshipers, as experienced through musical arts.

Don’t get me wrong. Music does not equal worship, but music is a strategic tool we use to foster a two-way dialogue, to enhance the rhythm of revelation and response, as God is revealing Himself, and people are responding to His presence.

Let me close this chapter with one final thought. I’ve often heard it said that praise and worship is caught more than it’s taught. While there’s some truth to this, I don’t think the statement is entirely accurate. One’s ability to praise and worship the Lord correctly, I believe, is directly linked to (1) exposure and (2) understanding. Yes, we must set a visible example before people and urge them to plunge into the experience. But if people aren’t taught what we are trying to accomplish during times of praise and worship—if they aren’t taught what their God-given role is during those times—then we shouldn’t expect them to do it properly.

So let’s gain the right understanding alongside the right experiences.