For the last several weeks, we have looked at the subject of ecclesiology, which is the study of the church. In October, we are going to be celebrating Heaven month. What is heaven month you ask? Heaven month is a month-long emphasis on evangelism. Some of you know that the emphasis in the Shenandoah District this year is evangelism. Each October for the last several years, The Wesleyan Church has held either a salvation Sunday or Heaven Sunday. Currently it is just a weeklong emphasis, but here at Preston Wesleyan Church, it will be the entire month of October. The theme of our Heaven Month is “Come to the Waters.” The sermons during the entire month will be focused on one of the purposes of the church and that is evangelism. Depending on whom you ask there are at least five purposes of the church. What are they? They are worship, evangelism, fellowship, discipleship, ministry service, and I’ll add prayer. Everything we do revolves around these purposes. Most of what we looked at over the last six weeks revolved around those purposes. A church is effective in advancing the kingdom of God when it is performing all of its purposes in a balanced fashion. Most of us know what happens when a wheel becomes unbalanced. It makes for a difficult trip. Our church must be balanced in its approach to ministry. That being said, October is Heaven Month and I will be preaching Gospel messages. It will be an opportunity to bring friends and family to hear the gospel so that they can make a decision for Christ. I hope that you take advantage of this during the five weeks of October.

What I want to do today and next week is take an in depth look at another one of these purposes and that is worship. This morning we sit in a service called a worship service. In most churches the morning worship service is the pinnacle of the week. Most of you can probably remember a time when Sunday School was the best attended event of the week. I think it’s right that this time is the best attended service, we as believers in Christ are called to worship Him. What does it mean to worship?

The dictionary definition looks like this:

WORSHIP — reverent devotion and allegiance pledged to God; the rituals or ceremonies by which this reverence is expressed. The English word “worship” comes from the Old English word “worthship,” a word that denotes the worthiness of the one receiving the special honor or devotion.

It would probably come as no surprise that this idea of worship has become highly controversial. One of the reasons is because worship so many times today is equated with music. Why? Because music connects with our emotions. Remember a few weeks ago I made this statement, “They just don’t play good music anymore.” This is because most of us consider good music, the music we listened to as teenagers and young adults. But I think we make a great mistake when we consider music the only part of worship. I’ve heard this said when referring to the music portion of the service, “Wasn’t the worship wonderful today, and the preaching was good too.” I know that is an exaggeration, but those kind of statements are being made about worship. Last week I sang a song titled, “The Heart of Worship.” The song was written out of a personal experience of the writer. The musical style and worship band was taking the front seat, so the wise pastor said for the next few weeks, we will sing with only our voices, remember what true worship is really about. Eventually the church added back in the instruments, but it really brings home the point that worship is so much more than a song or singing. It is the heart of everything we do.

Let me share a brief excerpt from a book entitled, “The Wonder of Worship.”

“Teaching university students the subject of worship for a half-dozen years has brought me several realizations. First, I’ve learned how little the average person knows about our worship history—the roots of our current worship practices. Worship to many of my students (almost all of whom come from conservative evangelical churches) is a contemporary experience largely cut off from its roots. Many assume that the church has always worshiped in about the same way up to the 1980s and that recent innovations were the first time worship has ever shifted styles. To my delight, these same students light up when they discover the rich history of worship streams feeding into the present. Following a reading in class, one girl burst out in astonishment, “Why, they’ve always changed worship!” Knowing our roots of worship brings perspective and maturity to planning and leading worship.”

So worship has always changed and will probably continue to change until the Lord returns. What I want to take a look at today is what worship is. One of the most profound worship passages in the scriptures is in Isaiah 6.

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple. Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one cried to another and said:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; The whole earth is full of His glory!”

And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke.

So I said:

“Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, The Lord of hosts.”

Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. 7 And he touched my mouth with it, and said:

“Behold, this has touched your lips; Your iniquity is taken away, And your sin purged.”

Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying:

“Whom shall I send, And who will go for Us?”

Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.”

As we can see here, worship has very little to do with singing. If we take a look at some of the great worship passages in the book of Revelation, we will see that while worship involves singing, many times in the scriptures it doesn’t.

In John 4:21-24, Jesus says to the woman at the well, “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. ²² You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. ²³ But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. ²⁴ God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

What happened to the prophet Isaiah when he sensed the glory of God? First of all let’s take a look at what he experienced.

I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple. Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew.

This must have been a frightening sight in and of itself. But the angels starting crying out “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory.” You notice that the angels weren’t singing, they were crying out, they could have been shouting. But what did they shout? Holy, holy, holy. The Hebrew language does not have developed punctuation like our English language does. One of the ways that something was emphasized was by repetition. No other word in the entire Bible is repeated in this manner. Holy is the only word treated like this. God is holy, holy, holy. That is his character. We worship a holy, holy, holy God. No wonder Isaiah was struck with a sense of awe. This same sequence of words is repeated in the book of Revelation, which while it is known for its prophecy, I see it also as a great book of worship. I encourage you to look at some of the “hymn” fragments in the book of Revelation.

Revelation 4:8

⁸ The four living creatures, each having six wings, were full of eyes around and within. And they do not rest day or night, saying:

“Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!”

Revelation 5:9-13

And they sang a new song, saying:

“You are worthy to take the scroll,

And to open its seals;

For You were slain,

And have redeemed us to God by Your blood

Out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation,

¹⁰ And have made us kings and priests to our God;

And we shall reign on the earth.”

¹¹ Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, ¹² saying with a loud voice:

“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain

To receive power and riches and wisdom,

And strength and honor and glory and blessing!”

¹³ And every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, I heard saying:

“Blessing and honor and glory and power

Be to Him who sits on the throne,

And to the Lamb, forever and ever!”

Are you capturing a sense of the awe of God this morning? We need to capture it just as the prophet Isaiah caught the awe of God. What happened after or while the heavenly host sang. And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke. Let me tell you about the closest I’ve gotten to this on earth. While we lived in Indiana, my music professor invited us to attend their church’s Christmas musical. It was a spectacle beyond comprehension. The musical told the gospel story from the point of the angels. The choir was dressed up like angels and told the story of Jesus. In addition to this there were the visuals, a huge sound system, a fairly sophisticated lighting system for ten years ago in the church and fog machines. At the point of the crucifixion of Jesus, there was quite a bit of smoke, loud sub-woofer rumblings, and lots of flashing lights. I literally felt like I was Isaiah, with the building shaking and the building filled with fog. I was amazed. I’m sure Isaiah’s experience was even more terrifying when he met up with a holy, holy, holy God. He could barely speak. Again, I am not arguing for emotionalism that has to be rebuilt every week. I’m not talking about an emotional high that’s worked up by singing and prayer and all the other trappings. I’m simply talking about capturing a vision of the holy, holy, holy God and that will light up our worship world. First of all we will understand who we are. We are humans. We are God’s creation. We are not God. It puts it all in perspective. He made us; we didn’t make him.

The heart and wonder of worship is all about God. As we leave here this morning I want you to think about this. What is your view of God? Is He simply someone who created this whole world and then left us to fend for ourselves? Is He watching us, to quote Bette Midler, from a distance, not caring who we are? He is God. He is Almighty. He is the Mighty King. He is the Lord of Creation. He is worthy of worship. He is worthy of giving Him worth. He is worthy of assigning Him some value. When we capture this, it makes it easy to worship God. When we capture this, words may sometimes fail us; we may say as Isaiah said, “I am unworthy, cleanse me, Oh God.” God is God, he is worthy of our worship. As we are going to take a look next week, there are many ways to worship God. We often concentrate just on the singing, but I want to look at practical ways that we can worship God in spirit and in truth. Will you make it your desire this week to discover who God is and truly worship Him? Read through the Psalms; capture the heart of those who wrote the Psalms (they are the Hebrews songbook) Take a look at the book of Revelation, especially chapters 4-7; capture the essence of the worship of heaven. See if it matches your worship. As we close this morning, let’s sing that great hymn of the church “Holy, holy, holy.”

• Would abandon their entire family (25%)
• Would abandon their church (25%)
• Would become prostitutes for a week or more (23%)
• Would give up their American citizenships (16%)
• Would leave their spouses (16%)
• Would withhold testimony and let a murderer go free (10%)
• Would kill a stranger (7%)
• Would put their children up for adoption (3%)

It seems pretty amazing to us that many American could so easily be swayed by $10 million dollars. I’m sure that for some it wouldn’t even need to be $1 million. The crisis that I see here is a crisis of integrity. For some they can be had with a price. Is it that way in the church? Does the church live a life of integrity?

Let me share some findings from Christian pollster George Barna:

§ Churches and parachurch ministries have made divorce a widely-discussed matter in the past two decades. Yet, a majority of born again adults do not believe that divorce is a sin (excluding cases in which adultery is involved).

§ For the typical adult in America, the number of movies they watch during the year is greater than the number of worship services they attend.

§ Adherents of non-Christian faiths are twice as likely as born again Christians to engage in fasting for religious purposes.

§ Born again adults who have been married are just as likely as non-born-again adults who have been married to eventually become divorced

§ Faith has had a limited affect on people’s behavior, whether related to moral convictions and practices, relational activities, lifestyle choices or economic practices

§ Just half of all Protestant Senior Pastors (51%) meet the criteria for having a biblical worldview. The criteria are believing that God is the all-knowing and all-powerful creator of the universe who still rules it today; that Jesus Christ never sinned; that Satan is real; that salvation is received through faith in Christ, not by good deeds; that every follower of Christ has a responsibility to share their faith with non-believers; that the Bible is accurate in all that it teaches; that absolute moral truth exists; and that absolute moral truth is described in the Bible.

§ A mere 7% of born again adults tithed last year.

§ Born again Christians and adults who attend Christian churches are more likely than atheists, agnostics, and adherents of non-Christian faiths to buy lottery tickets.

§ Half of all adults are so satisfied with their spiritual life that there is nothing at all they wish to change or improve in the future. Another one-quarter listed changes that were quite general or not personally challenging.

§ Most Americans do not accept the notion that they are engaged in a spiritual battle. This is fueled by the widespread rejection of the notion that Satan is real, that salvation is by faith alone, and by the common acceptance of the idea that there are multiple paths to salvation. This also partially explains why only half of all self-described “Christians” are not “absolutely committed” to the Christian faith.

Barna states, “People’s religious beliefs change very little, if at all, after the age of 12, but the way in which they apply those beliefs to their lifestyle and societal situations, and the degree to which they allow their faith to affect their behavior, is constantly shifting.”

This morning we conclude a five week series titled, “Five Things James Would Say to the Church.” We are going to start in James 2:14. What have we discovered so far?

1. Submit to God; Resist the devil; Draw near to God; Repent and confess, humble yourself before God.
2. Get Back to Your Roots
3. We Exist in a Community of Faith
4. Simplify, Simplify, Simplify

This morning James would tell us to be the church. What do I mean? We are going to take a look at it in three parts

First, let’s take a look at James 2:14-25:

¹⁴What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? ¹⁵Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. ¹⁶If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? ¹⁷In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

¹⁸But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.”
Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.

¹⁹You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.

²⁰You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? ²¹Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? ²²You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. ²³And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend. ²⁴You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.

²⁵In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction? ²⁶As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.

If the Wesleyan Church is going to be the church, we need to have Be a Church of Action. James makes the claim that it is impossible to be a Christian and not put your faith into action. If were to widen that to the church, it’s impossible to be the church and not be a church of action. Some of you wonder why I emphasize missions the way I do. This is part of the church in action. I said last week, we can’t go everywhere, but we can be a part of the kingdom work everywhere in the world through missions. This is faith in action. This is the church in action. This is part of being the church. This is why we need to be involved in our community. Remember this from what I read earlier, the common acceptance of the idea that there are multiple paths to salvation. This is part of the culture we live in. The culture says there are multiple paths to salvation; that my truth is just as correct as your truth. It says a lot for our witness when we can work together with churches of other denominations, even when we disagree on non-essentials. We the community sees us working together with other believers, it increases our witness. This is faith in action. This is the church in action. We need to be a church that does what it says it believes. James says that faith and actions work together. He goes on to say that Abraham’s faith is made complete by offering his son Isaac. Our faith as a church is made complete by our actions.

The second part of being the church is in the area of speech. Let’s continue in James 3:1-12:

¹Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. ²We all stumble in many ways. If anyone is never at fault in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to keep his whole body in check.

³When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. ⁴Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. ⁵Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. ⁶The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.

⁷All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and creatures of the sea are being tamed and have been tamed by man, ⁸but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.

⁹With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness. ¹⁰Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be. ¹¹Can both fresh water and salt^[f] water flow from the same spring? ¹²My brothers, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water.

The second part of being the church is integrity of speech. I really think the word speaks for itself this morning. How many have ever said, “I wish I could take that back.” Isn’t the power of words amazing? I know just this week; I’ve said things to my family that I have had to apologize for. We’ve heard it in scripture, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” James is getting back to this double-mindedness issue. If our heart isn’t right, then it’s going to show in our words. One of the issues the church (the church universal) is fighting is in the area of hypocrisy. Do we say one thing and do another. Do we say one thing when we are with one group of people and another when we are with another group? James tells us that we can’t do it. (But we do it anyway) He says that it just should not be. We should praise God one minute and curse our brothers the next. How can we do this?

We need to (as James has reminded us) to control our tongues. We need to have integrity in our speech. This is part of keeping our whole bodies in check.

So to be the church, we need to be a people of action who have integrity in our speech. Is there anything else? Let’s take one more look at James 3:13-18:

¹³Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show it by his good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom. ¹⁴But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. ¹⁵Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, of the devil. ¹⁶For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.

¹⁷But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. ¹⁸Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness.

If we are to be the church, we should be a people of action who have our speech under control, AND be wise. James says in chapter one, “He who lacks wisdom should ask for it.” He now tells us how to acquire that wisdom. A church that is seeking to build the kingdom of God should be:

• peace-loving
• considerate
• submissive
• full of mercy
• full of good fruit
• impartial
• sincere

James finishes off the section by saying, “Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness.” My prayer is that Preston Wesleyan will be about the business of building the Kingdom of God. We have just begun the part of our journey entitled Preston Wesleyan Church. Each one of us is called to build the kingdom of God, not just the pastor but each one of us. Let’s review the five things we’ve learned over the past five weeks.

1. Submit to God and draw near to Him. Live of life of confession and repentance and He will life you up.

2. Get back to your roots; Take care of the less fortunate and keep yourselves from being corrupted by the world.

3. Be a community of faith; pray, sing, anoint, and confess to one another. In the process, be apart of the greater community of faith.

4. Simplify, simplify, and simplify in order to advance the Kingdom of God.

5. Be the church that God has called you to be by being a church of action, in integrity of speech and a church of wisdom through being peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy, full of good fruit, impartial, and sincere.

If you follow these, Preston Wesleyan Church will be the church that God wants it to be. Will you endeavor to follow His lead?