Common sense religion emphasizes the human contributions that are supposed to move the deity. Valid worship always begins with recognition of what God has already done.
Rejoicing is the essence of genuine worship. A sad face (apart from remorse for sin or regret concerning the pain of others) is an affront to a gracious and generous God.
God warned Israel, "And if thou wilt make me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone: for if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it" (Ex. 20:25). To pollute something is to make it ordinary. God insists that any approach crafted by human ingenuity will produce a worship system just like all the pagan systems in the world. In other words, it will be common or profane - just like everyone else's paganism.
We dare not trim stones to make God an altar, for if we do we ruin everything. We would spend time bringing people to the altar and saying, "Look at those beautiful stones we trimmed!" We merely need to accept the work that God has done for us in Christ. The object of His restrictions is to help us see how wonderful He is and to spend the rest of our lives rendering true worship to Him.
The fear of God does not come naturally to human beings; it must be learned through Scripture, worship, and the hard knocks of experience.
The worship practices of the people of God are to be marked by devotion to Him and compassion to the needy.
God not only allowed for joyful worship but also commanded it.
The worship of false gods is always an outgrowth of spiritual deception.
An enriched capacity for rejoicing is an expanded capacity for worship.
Worship is accomplished with the life as well as with the words and attitudes of people. Changed and transformed lives testify to the character and supernatural power of the God of heaven. Closeness to Him produces changes in character and holiness.
Demons lie behind much of the world's pagan worship systems.
Attachments to older forms of worship may be comfortable, but they may contain elements of falsehood that make them unacceptable to God.
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