As politically incorrect, unpopular and old fashioned things go, the subject of repentance would have to be right up there near the top of the list. Repentance? What the blazes does that mean anyhow? Who even talks that way anymore these days? Give me a break!

When I come across a subject like repentance (and I’ll explain what I think that word means in a moment) I tend to think about how I viewed religious jargon before I became a Christian. I remember some nutter standing on a milk crate in the local mall waving a Bible in one hand and shouting, “repent, repent” and thinking to myself, “yeah right, now there’s a message the world wants to hear, idiot.”

I was driving a pretty expensive car back in those days, living in a luxury house, pursuing a business career. Life was, on the surface at least, pretty darn good. So who needs repentance? Ever felt yourself thinking along those lines? The problem is that left to our own devices we have a tendency of making a hash out of our own lives.

Now the average born again atheist would take issue with that, the average born again atheist out there is thinking to themselves, “here they go again these religious nutters telling us that we’re no good, telling us that we can’t make it on our own” and to be completely honest with you, that’s how I used to think.

I thought of myself as smart and successful and I was driven to work hard and to achieve so the message of repent, which I guess most people associate with turning away from sin, (boy there’s another incredibly unpopular concept these days – sin).that message was not something that I was ready to hear. How about you?

We’re smack bang in the middle of a series of messages at the moment called Overboard with Jesus. It’s kind of based around that pretty well known story of Peter getting out of the boat on the Sea of Tiberias in the middle of a storm, Matthew chapter 14 verses 22 to 33:

Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side while he dismissed the crowds and after he had dismissed the crowds he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came he was there alone but by this time the boat, battered by waves, was far from the land for the wind was against them and early in the morning he came walking towards them on the sea.

But when the disciples saw him on the sea they were terrified saying ‘it’s a ghost’ and they cried out in fear but immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, ‘take heart it is I, do not be afraid’. Peter answered him, ‘Lord if it’s you command me to come out to you on the water’. He said ‘come.

So Peter got out of the boat and started walking on the water and came towards Jesus but when he noticed the strong wind he became frightened and beginning to sink he cried out ‘Lord save me.’ Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him saying to him ‘you of little faith, why did you doubt?’ When they got into the boat the wind ceased and those in the boat worshipped him saying ‘truly you are the Son of God.

It’s a pretty remarkable story and I love Peter’s heart. So intent was he on following Jesus that he was prepared to follow Him out of the boat onto the water in the middle of a deadly raging storm and with all my heart I believe that that’s the sort of follower that Jesus is looking for today, not a lukewarm, namby pamby, pew warming, middle of the road, my life doesn’t count for much type of Christian but someone who’s prepared to get out of the boat in the storm even though they may sink to follow Jesus wherever He may lead.

Someone who’s prepared to be all in, full on for Jesus. and today and for the rest of the week I want to chat about a few practical real ways that we can do that, be all in, be full on for Jesus. The first way is in this area of repentance. See Jesus had a way(He still does in fact) of cutting through all the nonsense and self-delusion and getting right to the heart of an issue. In His famous Sermon on the Mount He said this:

Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.

Matthew chapter 5 verse 3.

In other words, blessed are those who recognise their spiritual poverty, blessed are those who stop deluding themselves and think that life is all good, that they’re successful and comfortable and they don’t need anything else. You see that’s what pride does, it stops us from recognising what’s really going on in our lives.

It stops us from admitting to ourselves let alone to others the spiritual poverty that lies deep within, the spiritual poverty that leads us off in the wrong direction until the emptiness of life, the burdens of life, the consequences of a life chasing after the mirage, the illusion of comfort and success and material things, so deeply afflicts us that words can’t describe what it is we feel.

I see it all the time. Can I say I see it in people who don’t have any faith at all and tragically I see it in people who profess a faith in Jesus, who warm the pews of a Church each Sunday, who sings the songs, pray the prayers and go through the motions?

Listen to me, whether religious or not, whether professing a faith in Jesus or not we can be beset and afflicted by a deep spiritual poverty that we just won’t admit to ourselves because we’ve invested so much time and energy chasing the things we’ve been chasing after, getting to this desperate place in life that we’re just too proud to admit that we got it wrong and that has consequences.

So how do you turn that around? Well interestingly that’s exactly what the word repentance means, to turn things around, to admit that you got it wrong but there’s an important element that’s required to take that measure. Have a listen to this, 2 Chronicles chapter 7 verses 13 and 14:

When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain or I command the locusts to devour the land or send pestilence among the people, if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, praise, seek my face and turn from their wicked ways then I will hear them from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

See that element that’s required is humility. It’s being prepared to get real with ourselves and go back to God and admit to Him and ourselves that our ways, our rebellion, our stupidity, well because frankly that’s what it is, simply haven’t worked. And God’s promise to us, and you read it over and over again in the Bible, is that when we turn around away from our wicked ways, when we seek His face, He’ll listen, He’ll forgive, He’ll heal and He’ll bless. Plain and simple. 1 John chapter 1 verse 19:

If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves, that the truth is not in us but if we confess our sins He who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

You see the alternative of that is the status quo and over twenty years ago now I came to the realisation that the status quo simply wasn’t an option. How about you? How’s your life going? Are you perhaps one of those people who kind of believes in Jesus but, well somehow it’s not going so well for you? Then there’s every chance that the reason for that is that you’re holding something back from God, some sin, some rebellion, something in your life that you haven’t given over to Him.

Remember, ‘blessed are the poor in spirit’, the ones who admit their sin and their poverty to God for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven. It’s time to get Overboard with Jesus in the storm, just like Peter did. It’s time to stop pussy footing around with our faith and get real and live a life that’s all out for Jesus and that starts with being honest, with admitting, with turning away from that sin that’s been plundering our lives and turning back to Jesus. Acts chapter 3 verses 19 and 20:

Repent therefore and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.

So, how about it?

Forgiveness, it’s a word that we toss around out there as though it’s something simple to achieve. Someone’s hurt you, just forgive them, right, okay, done and dusted, let’s move on. But hang on, let’s just hang on a cotton picking minute, if you’ve ever tried to forgive someone who’s hurt you you’ll know that it’s just not an easy thing to do and that right there is why most people have the destructive darkness of unforgiveness lurking deep in their hearts.

To be honest forgiveness never used to be a thing for me. Why forgive? My motto in life used to be ‘don’t get angry, get even’. If you did something to hurt me or betrayed me or you undermined me or you ignored me I would find a way of getting even. Vengeance is sweet they say although from experience I can tell you it does leave a bitter after taste in your mouth.

It wasn’t until age thirty-six that forgiveness became a thing for me. This is how it happened, Jesus met me in a dark time in my life, my saviour came for me and reached down into the dark pit where I was and lifted me out. Those aren’t just words, that’s what happened and today I look back and I still find myself asking, “why me?” I’m speechless at the idea that Jesus came for me.

There were so many people who were nicer than me, I was a shocker I have to tell you. I was tough, hardnosed, brutal in my pursuit of success and then one day I read this story that Jesus told, Matthew chapter 21 verses 18 to 35:

Then Peter came and said to Him, ‘Lord if another member of the Church sins against me how often should I forgive, as many as seven times?’ And Jesus said to him, ‘not seven times but I tell you seventy-seven times. For this reason, the Kingdom of heaven can be compared to a king who wanted to settle accounts with his slaves.

When he began the reckoning one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him and as he couldn’t pay his Lord ordered for him to be sold together with his wife and children and all his possessions and payment to be made. So the slave fell on his knees before him saying ‘have patience with me and I’ll pay you everything.

And out of pity for him the Lord of that slave released him and forgave him the debt. But that same slave as he went out came across one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii and seizing him by the throat he said ‘pay what you owe’. Then his fellow slave fell down and pleaded with him, ‘have patience with me and I’ll pay you. But he refused. Then he went and threw him into prison until he could pay the debt.

When his fellow slaves saw what had happened they were greatly distressed and they went and reported to their Lord all that had taken place. Then the Lord summoned him and said to him, ‘you wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me, should you not have had mercy on your fellow slave as I had mercy on you? And in anger his Lord handed him over to be tortured until he would pay his entire debt.

So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart.

The end of that story is just a bit brutal isn’t it? I mean really. Is forgiveness that big of a deal? Well apparently it is to God. I was perplexed by this story, this parable that Jesus used to teach Peter and the other disciples about forgiveness so it got me thinking.

God makes us humanity kicking it off with Adam and Eve, He gives us a free will full knowing that we were going to rebel, full knowing that we would fall short of His perfect standards, full knowing that one day the demands of justice, Gods justice (after all we’d expect God to be just, right?) would have to be met.

I mean if I break the law and end up in front of a judge as I did once as a young man by crashing my car, you’d expect the judge to be just. He gave me a sentence, rather a light sentence as it turned out at the time, a fine or if I didn’t pay the fine a couple of nights at her majesty’s pleasure in a prison.

That’s what you’d expect but imagine, just imagine if that judge had been my father, my dad who brought me into this world and loves me beyond measure. Now in that instance the judge would have had a fundamental conflict of interests. On the one hand, he’s the judge and by the very nature of his role his job is to meet our justice. On the other hand, he’s my dad and he loves me and he doesn’t want to have to do that.

Well that’s precisely the dilemma that God finds Himself in only for Him it’s much, much worse because as we read in Romans chapter 6 verse 23:

The wages of our sin is death.

You and I through our sin, our rebellion against God, are under a sentence of death. Make no mistake about it, an eternal existence of judgement and suffering, John chapter 5 verses 28 and 29:

Do not be astonished at this for the hour is coming when all who are in their graves will hear His voice and will come out. Those who have done good the resurrection life, those who have done evil the resurrection of condemnation.

There it is, a resurrection of eternal condemnation, that’s what’s at stake here. So God sends Jesus, His one and only Son, the one through whom the whole of Creation was created, He sends that Jesus to suffer and die for you and me, do you get it? This is why forgiveness is such a big deal for God. This is why Jesus told this powerful parable about forgiveness. Matthew chapter 27 beginning at verse 45:

From noon on darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. At about 3 o’clock Jesus cried out with a loud voice ‘Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani’ that is ‘my God, my God why have you forsaken me?’ Some of the bystanders heard it, they said ‘this man is calling for Elijah.

“At once one of them ran out and got a sponge, filled it with sour wine and put it on a stick and gave it to Him to drink but the other said ‘wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to save Him.’ Then Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and breathed His last. At that moment the curtain of the Temple was torn in two from top to bottom, the earth shook and the rocks were split.

Do you get it? That’s what Jesus did for me and for you so that we can be completely set free from that eternal condemnation, for God so loved the world, so loved you, so loved me that He gave His only begotten Son so that when we believe in Him we won’t perish under that burden of eternal condemnation but instead we will have eternal life.

So He looks at you and at me and says, “well if that’s what I did to forgive you how is it possible that you wouldn’t forgive those who’ve sinned against you? Well, how is it possible?” That’s the question that God is asking us today, how is that possible? So let me ask you whom haven’t you forgiven in your life? For whom do you still harbour the darkness of unforgiveness in your heart?

This series of message is called Overboard with Jesus, it’s about taking our lives out of the mediocre comfort zone where we’re perhaps have been living and going all out living our lives full on for Jesus. There are so many people who want to do that, they just don’t know how. Well get a revelation today, you cannot, you simply cannot live your life full on for Jesus if you’re carrying unforgiveness around in your heart, you just can’t.

Well if you’re captive to unforgiveness today, if you’re struggling to let go of that darkness, that destructive force of unforgiveness in your heart today here it is; Jesus came to set you free, let it go. Put it into His hands, pray for your enemy, get out there, go overboard with Jesus, trust Him and He will show up. He will grab your hand when you start sinking, because that’s just what Jesus does.

There’s a description of God’s people that pops up several times in the Bible, it’s the adjective ‘stiff-necked’, an interesting way to describe the stubbornness of Gods people. I’m guessing that it points to their unwillingness to bow down their lives in worship to God. I wonder if you know anyone like that.

We live in a world where we’re taught to be proud of who we are, you can be who you want to be, you can do whatever you want to do. If you work hard you can achieve whatever you want to achieve and when you do be proud of what you’ve achieved. The problem is though that pride so often comes before the fall.

I remember when I was a young lad learning to ice skate. Now physical co-ordination, that’s not one of my strengths so my bottom spent a lot of the time making contact with the ice. And you know every time I thought ‘there you go Berni you’ve got it, you’re doing really well’ and I’d look over at mum and dad to show them how clever I was, oomph, down on the ice I’d go.

Pride is actually quite a terrible thing, it’s something that God always, always, always opposes, James chapter 4 verse 6:

God opposes the proud but He gives grace to the humble.

But pride takes all sorts of different forms. As we chatted yesterday on the program, sometimes pride stops us from admitting that we’re wrong. The more you invest in a course of action or in a way of life, the harder it is to admit that it was the wrong way to go about living life.

I mean, you’ve invested a lot in your approach. People have watched you, some have admired you, to turn back from that, to turn away from that, to admit that you were wrong, well you lose face don’t you? Losing face is only a problem if you care what other people think about you.

I used to care a lot what other people thought about me. Well, I wanted them to think well of me, I wanted to impress people, I wanted them to speak well of me behind my back. When you think about it that’s why some people buy the most expensive cars that they can afford to make a statement.   That’s why some people buy grand houses in grand suburbs with so much space and so many rooms that they don’t need and swimming pools that they don’t swim in to make a statement that says, “look at me, I am someone, I’ve made it.”

Not everyone, but a lot of people are like that. Never mind that they’re desperately unhappy in their flashy cars and grand mansions and even if you’re not rich you can find yourself clambering after a successful career or a bigger pay check or a promotion, whatever it is to build up the image that other people have of you.

And when you do that, let me tell you from experience (because all the things I’ve just described I’ve been there, done that, got the t shirt) you realise when you do that, you start believing your own propaganda. You get a puffed up image of who you are and what you’re worth as you look down your nose at the mere mortals who surround you.

Moses … Moses is up on the mountain with God receiving the Ten Commandments, have a listen to this, Exodus chapter 32 verses 1 to 9:

When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain the people gathered around Aaron and said to him, ‘come, make gods for us who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us out from the land of Egypt, we don’t know what’s become of him.

Aaron said to them, ‘take off the gold rings that are in the ears of your wives, your sons and your daughters and bring them to me’. So all the people took off the gold from their ears and brought them to Aaron. He took from them the gold, formed it in a mould and cast an image of a calf and they said, ‘these are your gods O Israel who brought us up out of the land of Egypt.

When Aaron saw this he built an altar before it and Aaron made a proclamation and said, ‘tomorrow shall be a festival to the Lord’. They rose early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought sacrifices of well-being and the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to revel.

But the Lord said to Moses, ‘go down at once. Your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt have acted perversely; they have been quick to turn aside from the way that I commanded them. They have cast for themselves an image of a calf and have worshipped it and sacrificed to it and said, ‘these are your gods O Israel who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.

The Lord said to Moses, ‘I have seen this people, how stiff necked they are. Now let me alone so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them and of you I will make a great nation.

Hmmm, isn’t that what we do? We say that we believe in God, but left to our own devices we become stiff necked, prideful, we make idols of the things of this world and the more we chase after them the less inclined we are to bow down our lives to God, and when that happens God’s anger burns against us.

Let’s get a revelation about that today. Yes, God loves you but when you’re more inclined to chase after the things of this world than bow down your life to worship Him, in His eyes you become stiff necked and His anger burns against you.

We’re in the middle of a series of messages at the moment called Overboard with Jesus, about living our lives full on for Christ but so often our pride, well we delude ourselves into thinking we can put God on a leash and have Him follow us around at our beckon and call, but if you want to live your life full on for Christ, that’s not the way to live.

Who or what is your golden calf? Who or what in your life, in your possessions, in your priorities are you putting before God? You see the alternative is to have a heart like the psalmist who wrote Psalm 95 verses 6 and 7:

O come let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord our maker for He is our God and we are the people of His pasture, the sheep of His hand.

There’s a man with his life bowed down to God. You can’t call him stiff necked.

Paul the Apostle puts it this way in his letter to the Church in Rome in the New Testament, Romans chapter 12 verse 1:

I appeal to you therefore brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God which is your spiritual worship.

The sorts of disciples that Jesus is looking for today are men and women who are prepared to present themselves as living sacrifices. That right there would have to be the complete opposite of being stiff necked wouldn’t it? Living sacrifices, which is your spiritual worship.

Interesting the word used there for worship is the Greek word ‘latreo’ from which we get the word ‘lateral’. Some translations render this word as service not worship, actually it means both, it means to live out our lives in such a way that everything we do is an act of worship to God.

Every thought, every motivation, every action done for Christ because that’s what it means to be a living sacrifice, to give up our way, our lifestyle, our desire, our comfort, our want for material possessions and success and reputation or what other people think, to lay down all of those things, to make a golden calf of none of them and instead to bow our lives down in service and in sacrifice and in worship for God.

Want to live the life that is full on for Jesus? Want to go overboard with Jesus to unstable, uncharted territory where the only thing that is going to stop you from sinking is the hand of Christ? This is the sort of life that you are called to live. Not a comfortable life, not a life where you chase after the things of this world, but a life where you lay everything down.

You see the alternative, the alternative is that you will, I guarantee you will, you’ll grab onto something of this world and you’ll make an idol of it, you’ll put it before Jesus in your life. The choice is yours, I can’t make it for you, the choice is yours and yours alone.

So let me ask you, do you like the notion of sacrifice? Sacrificing your needs, your likes and dislikes, your comfort, your way of doing things for someone else? For most of us the answer is, well, not so much – but if you or I want to get the most out of life, if you or I are going to live a life that truly counts, let me tell you it’s going to be a life of sacrifice.

Come on, let’s be honest, none of us likes to give up the things that we like. I remember when our children were young – Saturdays were the days of racing around, doing this, doing that, taking them to sport and all the other things they had going on. I mean, I’m somebody who works pretty hard, so come the weekend I’d really love to just put my feet up but there was this running around with the kids, the lawn had to be mowed, the car had to be washed, all I wanted to do was rest but …

That’s what it is right? And you mothers, you know that being a mum is simply a life of sacrifice. Children demand so much attention and effort and time and emotional energy and sheer hard work. You pour yourself into them; it’s a life of sacrifice. In fact, pretty much anything worthwhile in life requires sacrifice. Studying, getting a degree, learning a trade, bringing up children, saving money, building a career, they all involve sacrifice.

So what exactly is sacrifice? Have you ever thought about that? Well my friendly online dictionary comes up with a variety of definitions but the most appropriate one is ‘to give up something that you value for the sake of other considerations.’ You work hard to grow your business at the expense of your social life for instance. Sacrifice always involves giving something up, something that you want now in order to have something better later.

And it seems that you and I are prepared to make all sorts of sacrifices to get the things in this world that we want. The question, though, is whether you and I are prepared to make the sacrifices that are required to get God what He wants in this world? Well, are we?

Yesterday on the program we had a look at that powerful pivotal passage in Romans chapter 12, let’s go back there because it’s quite illuminating but this time we’ll read a bit more of the chapter, Romans chapter 12 verses 1 to 4:

I appeal to you therefore brothers and sisters by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your minds so that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourselves more highly than you ought but to think with sober judgement each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned to you.

Now I remember one of my lecturer’s back in Bible College telling me that whenever you find a ‘therefore’ in Scripture you have to ask yourself what’s the ‘therefore’ there for? Good question, because here Paul (who is writing the letter to the Church in Rome), begins this chapter for us to present our bodies as a living sacrifice has strong appeal when you think about it, with a therefore.

Well what’s the ‘therefore’ there for? See Paul is pointing back to the first eleven chapters of his letter which are all about the amazing sacrifice that Jesus has made for us so that we could be saved from the wrath of God because of our sin. For example, back in Romans chapter 5 verses 6 to 8:

For while we were still weak at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die but God proves His love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.

So in view of the mercies of God ‘therefore present your bodies as a living sacrifice which is your spiritual worship’. Now at this point I need to point out that when people back in the first century AD heard that word ‘sacrifice’ they couldn’t help but think of the other meaning of the word ‘sacrifice’ that I find in my dictionary which is this – an act of slaughtering an animal or a person or surrendering a possession as an offering to a deity.

Specifically, they’re thinking about the relatively recent sacrifice of Jesus on that Roman cross back in Jerusalem, something that happened about fifty or sixty years earlier by all accounts. They’re thinking about the many stories that they’ve heard about Jesus, innocent of any sin or crime, being nailed to a cross to save them from the wrath of God.

A pretty picture it ain’t in their minds as they read the words of the Apostle Paul who was there at the time of the crucifixion, sitting as they are in the relative comfort and wealth of Imperial Rome. What they’re hearing as Paul’s letter is read out is that God is calling them to a life of incredible sacrifice, something that is already becoming obvious to them through the rising persecution and martyrdom of Christians in the Roman Empire. If you’ve ever been to Rome you may have seen the catacombs, the huge underground tunnels where the Christians hid.

I hear people talk about living their lives for Jesus but they want to do it from the comfort of their armchair. In many places today, in many societies, in many Churches there is so much comfort, there is so much wealth that the notion of sacrifice is a foreign one.

But what of the woman who wrote to me recently:

My husband has been extremely cruel to me since Mother’s Day.

What does she do? Does she up and leave him? No, she goes to God and asks Him to protect her, asks Him to change her husband, asks Him to heal their marriage. That’s what she did. In this world, in this day and age the obvious solution would have been separation and divorce but this woman has taken a different route, she’s made a different choice, she takes seriously the Scripture which says in Romans chapter 5 verses 1 to 5:

Therefore since we are justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we now stand and we boast in our hope of sharing in the glory of God and not only that but we also boast in our sufferings knowing that suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character and character produces hope and that hope doesn’t disappoint us because Gods love is being poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

Conventional wisdom, the worlds wisdom says run away from suffering. You’re entitled, you deserve it, you’re worth it but yet the Bible is filled with some hard truths about suffering.

Back to this woman’s lot, 1 Peter chapter 3 verses 1 to 6:

Wives in the same way accept the authority of your husband’s to that even if some of them do not obey the Word they may be won over without a word by their wives conduct when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. Don’t adorn yourselves outwardly by braiding your hair or wearing gold ornaments or fine clothing. Rather let your adornment be the inner self with a lasting beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit which is very precious in Gods sight.

It was in this way long ago the holy women who hoped in God used to adorn themselves by accepting the authority of their husbands. Thus Sarah obeyed Abraham and called him ‘Lord’. You have become her daughters, as long as you do what is good and never let fear alarm you.

We want to throw those bits of the Bible out, they’re politically incorrect, they’re unfair, they’re irrelevant in this day and age and yet Gods truth remains Gods truth. Even though the more comfortable and affluent our world becomes, we’ve had lies dropped on our heads that tells us it’s all about us, Jesus , the same Jesus who suffered and died for you on that cross, Jesus is calling you to a life that involves sacrifice.

Worshipping is singularly the most selfless thing any person can do but all too often our view of what worship is limited by our experience. Some people think that worship is what we do when we sing songs at Church on Sunday but worship is so much more than that.

Okay, so how do you worship God? More recently, I guess, as many if not most Churches have moved to contemporary worship. The songs have become more upbeat, many Churches use lighting and wall banners and logo’s and contemporary furnishings not to mention extremely professional music teams to help their people worship.

It’s easy to be critical of all of that but there’s nothing new in any of that. Go and visit any old cathedral and there are plenty of them scattered across Europe, and you realise we’ve been going to huge lengths to express our awe and wonder of God for a very long time. But to tell you the truth, maybe it’s just me, a lot of those external trappings leave me just a bit cold.

It’s not that I don’t appreciate great ecclesiastical architecture or Handel’s Messiah or some of the great hymns or some of the great worship songs that have been written more recently but I’ve been in places that have all that and more and yet the best way to describe them is dead. It’s as though God isn’t in that place, it’s as though sometimes we try to conjure up God’s presence by designing, by building, by performing.

I remember just before I graduated from Bible College we had Graduands Retreat Day. There was about forty of us who were graduating together with a few of our lecturers and tutors. We headed off to a Church building in a leafy suburb away from distractions just to spend a day fellowshipping and praying and, well, worshiping. The guy who led worship had a scratchy voice, his guitar was slightly out of tune and yet it remains to this day the most awesome time of song worship that I’ve ever experienced.

We’re heading towards the end of a series today, a series that I’ve called Overboard with Jesus. It sort of began around that great passage of Scripture where Peter gets out of the boat and walks towards Jesus on the stormy ocean of Tiberias. Let’s go back and have a quick read just to remind ourselves, Matthew chapter 14 verses 22 to 33:

Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go ahead to the other side while He dismissed the crowds and after He had dismissed the crowds He went up the mountain by Himself to pray. When evening came He was there alone but by this time the boat, battered by waves, was far from land for the wind was against them.

And early in the morning He came walking towards them on the sea but when the disciples saw Him walking on the sea they were terrified saying ‘it’s a ghost’ and they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, ‘take heart, it is I, do not be afraid.

So Peter answered Him, ‘Lord if it is you command me to come to you on the water’. He said ‘come’. So Peter got out of the boat started walking on the water and came towards Jesus but then he noticed the strong wind and he became frightened and beginning to sink he cried out ‘Lord save me.

Jesus immediately reached out His hand and caught him saying ‘you of little faith, why did you doubt?’ When they got into the boat the wind ceased and those in the boat worshipped him saying ‘truly you are the Son of God.

So there’s good old Pete, stuck in a boat with his mates on the Sea of Tiberias. They’re a long way from home, the boats been battered by waves, the wind’s against them, remembering that this was Jesus decision for His disciples. And when Jesus finally comes out to rescue them the disciples are petrified until He identifies Himself and within a split second Peter, who remember is a fisherman, he knows these waters, he’s sailed them many a time, he knows the danger of the storm but despite that, within a split second he says to Jesus:

Lord if it’s you command me to come to you out on the water.

Here’s what I believe, what was going on in Peter’s heart in that instant is worship because in that moment Peter is prepared to connect his faith in Jesus with his actions, with his life with what he’s about to do. Peter is prepared to step on to that stormy sea to follow Jesus.

There are two different words used for worship in the New Testament, one is the word ‘proskunio’ from which we get the English word to ‘prostate yourself’. It’s the sort of worship we do on Sunday mornings when we’re singing songs in Church; it’s bowing down and declaring with our hearts, with our mouths that Jesus Christ is Lord.

And that’s awesome stuff, although as I said you can sing songs without worshipping God, I’ve seen people checking their watches, looking around to see who’s coming in late or who’s leaving early, scrolling through social media on their Smartphone’s during worship time. In that case worship is a complete misnomer, it’s just singing.

But if your heart is engaged then yes, what’s going on there is proskunio worship. Bowing down before the throne of God, awesome stuff whether it’s a guy with a scratchy voice on an out of tune guitar or whether it’s a full on rock concert, the trappings are pretty much irrelevant.

The other word, and we looked at this one yesterday on the program, is ‘latreo’ from which we get the word lateral. In other words, outward lateral worship through what we do, how we live, how we behave, how we spend our money, how we spend our time. Many times this word is translated as service rather than worship. There’s one verse in the New Testament where both words are used in that single verse. Its Jesus replying to the second temptation in the wilderness, he says and I quote:

It is written ‘worship the Lord your God and serve only Him.

Luke chapter 4 verse 8.

So here’s the question for you today, as you live out your life – are you living it all for Jesus? Are you worshipping Him with everything that you think and say and do? Because truthfully, stepping out of that boat onto the stormy ocean is worship. It’s living out the proskunio worship that’s in our hearts as latreo worship in our lives.

Much later the Apostle Paul put it like this in Colossians chapter 3 verses 1 to 3 and verse 17:

So if you have been raised with Christ seek the things that are above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things that are above not on the things that are on the earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, is revealed then you also will be revealed with Him in glory and whatever you do, in word or in deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.

So yes, by all means, set your mind on the things that are above. Worship God, see Him for who He is, explore the deep mystery of God with great wonder in your heart, worship Him with all of your heart and then, then whatever you do, do everything that you do, every word, every deed in His name for His sake.

Your life, my friend, is meant to be a celebration, a reflection, a worship of who God is. If the Spirit of Christ truly dwells in you, if you are sold out to Jesus, then how you live your life tells the rest of us, tells God, of your worship and adoration of Him. Or not.

He wants to lead you to places that you’ve never imagined. He wants to work in you and through you in the most amazing ways. He wants to pour His love out into this world through you, through the unique gifts and abilities and motivations and dreams that He’s woven into your DNA.

Why is it that so often we’re too distracted with the mundane, day to day, unimportant issues of life to worship God with our very being? What’s the matter with us that we want to squander the opportunities that present themselves every day to worship God with our hearts and with our hands? Why do we do that?