David - Trusting Our Resources?

I Chronicles 21

Introduction

How much money do you have? Is it enough for today? How many days could you live comfortably with the money you have right now? Would you make it a week? A month? A year? The rest of your life? If you could live comfortably for more than several months or even a year, how does that make you feel? Do you rest securely because of your possessions?

Do you feel adequate in the place where you serve in the church? How does that make you feel? Are you comfortable in your comfort zone?

This week we will approve the budget for our church. If it is like usual, it probably will be a budget well within our means? What does that say about our hope in God, our dreams about His work and commitments to Him if we pass such a budget?

Please keep these questions in mind as I tell you a story. The story is found in I Chronicles 21 and also in II Samuel 24. We will be following the story in I Chronicles 21. It is a difficult story. When I looked for other sermons on this passage, I did not find any. It contains some difficult questions. In fact the most extensive comments I found on this passage were on a website called “The Sceptics Annotated Bible.” I will try to explain some of the difficulties as I tell the story. Although difficult, it is a story worth telling because I believe it has an important lesson for us to learn about dependence on God.

The Story

We know that there is a problem when the story begins by saying, “Satan rose up against Israel and incited David to take a census.” When David assigned Joab, his general, to carry out the plan to take a census, Joab knew this was wrong and asked David, “Why should he bring guilt on Israel?”

This is the first difficulty in the story. Why did Satan have an influence on David and why did God permit Satan to tempt David? The difficulty of this question is increased when we read in II Samuel 24:1, “Again the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and he incited David against them saying, ‘Go and count Israel and Judah.’” Now we have the problem of whether it was God or Satan who tempted David and the deeper question of how God could tempt him. We know that James 1:13 says, “When tempted, no one should say, ‘God is tempting me.’ For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone…” So how does this fit together? The best explanation for this that I can find is that Israel had done something wrong, perhaps it was the rebellion of Absalom against David, and God needed to punish them. He permitted Satan to tempt David and David sinned by yielding to the temptation to count the people. So simply put, Israel was guilty and deserving of punishment, God permitted Satan to tempt David and David became guilty when he yielded to the temptation.

In spite of the fact that David himself knew that this was a wrong thing to do, as we see in I Chronicles 21:8 and in spite of Joab’s warning to David that it was wrong, he did it anyway and assigned Joab to count the people, or more specifically, the men fit for war.

Joab was a faithful servant of David and carried out the command, although, as we see in 21:6, he did not do a complete job because he was so concerned about this command.

He came back to David with a number and reported in I Chronicles 21:5 that there were 1.1 million fighting men in Israel and 470,000 in Judah. If you read II Samuel 24, you will see that there are different numbers. I do not have an explanation for that, but am not overly concerned about that.

As soon as the job was completed David realized his sin and immediately repented and asked that the guilt for this wrongdoing would be taken away.

However, the deed had been done and so there had to be consequences. The prophet Gad went to David to give him three choices regarding the kind of punishment there would be for this sin. David could choose between 3 years of famine, 3 months of an enemy attacking the land and 3 days of a plague from God.

David was deeply saddened by the consequences that would come, as he says in 21:13, but he understood that of all the choices, the best was putting himself in God’s hands because he know that God was merciful.

As a result, God sent a plague on Israel in which 70,000 people died. It seems appropriate that since the sin was numbering the people that reducing the number would be the punishment.

David was right in relying on the mercy of God and His great mercy came into effect and he stopped the plague before it had gone to its full extent. However, there is an interesting thing that happened next. God told the destroying angel to stop in 21:15. The angel stood there, visible to David and to Araunah at whose threshing floor he had stopped. This threshing floor was located a little to the north of David’s city of Jerusalem as it existed at that time. The angel was poised to begin destroying people in this city with the plague. When the angel stopped, it was like a little pause in the action. This pause gave David a chance to seek God and to ask Him, in prayer, to stop the punishment. David tried to bargain with God and pointed out that it was his sin and that the people should not be punished for his sin. Of course, from II Samuel 24, we know that the people were also deserving of punishment for other reasons and so this punishment had come upon them justly from God’s perspective.

The solution was that David was to make a sacrifice. Since he was at the threshing floor, which was on the top of a mountain and was a hard level place, it was an appropriate place to build an altar. David asked Araunah if he could purchase the oxen and sledge he had been using to thresh. He also asked to purchase the grain and the location of the threshing floor in order to make this sacrifice. Araunah, who also saw the angel poised with his drawn sword was quite willing to give these things to David. But David knew that it would not be an appropriate sacrifice if it cost him nothing and so he insisted on paying the full price, as we see in verse 24. So David paid the price and sacrificed the offerings at that location.

It is interesting that although we read in verse 15 that God had already decided to stop the plague, it was still necessary for David to ask God for mercy and to pray and to make a sacrifice before we read in verse 27 that God spoke and the angel “put his sword back into its sheath.” This tells us something of the mystery of God’s sovereignty and the need for our prayers. It doesn’t explain why things are that way, but it does help us understand that this is how it works. God is sovereign and He is Lord, but for some reason he still requires us to pray and to be involved in some way in what he does.

After this event, David continued to offer sacrifices at this location. It seems that this was a special location, at which people had previously met God. This was the location where Abraham had gone up the mountain to offer Isaac. In Genesis 22:2 we read, “Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.” In this story, we find that it was a place where David met God. Later it would become the place where the temple would be built and where all Israel could meet God. In I Chronicles 22:1 we read that “David said, ‘The house of the Lord God is to be here, and also the altar of burnt offering for Israel.’” Later in II Chronicles 3:1 we read, “Then Solomon began to build the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the Lord had appeared to his father David. It was on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite, the place provided by David.”

God’s Resources or Ours?

As we have thought about this story, the one question which we have not answered is, “Why was it such a sin for David to count the people?” It is in thinking about this that we come to the point of application today.

What Was David’s Sin?

In Genesis 22:17 God made a promise to Abraham when He said, “I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore.”

When Joab objected to David’s plan he said to David, “May the Lord multiply his troops a hundred times over. My lord the king, are they not all my lord’s subjects? Why does my lord want to do this? Why should he bring guilt on Israel?”

In I Chronicles 27:23,24 we read, “David did not take the number of the men twenty years old or less, because the Lord had promised to make Israel as numerous as the stars in the sky. ^24 Joab son of Zeruiah began to count the men but did not finish. Wrath came on Israel on account of this numbering, and the number was not entered in the book of the annals of King David.”

In these verses we have a hint about what the sin was. God’s promise was to multiply the people so that they would be “as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore.” It seems that just like the number of stars or grains of sand on the seashore are to be a mystery and not counted, so the number of the people of Israel were not to be counted. From the words of Joab, I believe that there was a very important reason for this and this is the point at which we have a lesson worth applying to our lives. When Joab says, “May the Lord multiply his troops a hundred times over” I believe that he is challenging David that he was not to rely on the number of his troops, but on God. The sin of David is that he wanted to know what his military strength was. Knowing what his strength, his resources were, could lead to dependence on them. As long as he had no idea how many soldiers he had, he would have to depend on God in any battle.

The Bible is quite clear about the need for such dependence. Jeremiah 9:23 says, “Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom or the strong man boast of his strength or the rich man boast of his riches, ^24 but let him who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight,” declares the Lord.”

The Keil and Delitsch commentary says, “David wanted to know the number of his subjects - not so that he would boast of their number; not so that he could tax them, but that he would fully know his defensive power.” “He sought for the strength and glory of his kingdom in the number of the people and their readiness for war.”

It was a sin because it moved in a direction away from God. It could cause David and his nation to depend on their own resources instead of depending on God. God punished such a point of view.

Application

Now this is something that we know about and struggle with in our own life. Where do we wrestle with this? How do we sin by depending on our resources? In which areas do we need to learn to depend on God?

In the introduction, I suggested a few possibilities.

It is a powerful temptation for us, when we have much, to begin to depend on what we have instead of on God. When we have a pretty solid bank account, we are susceptible to the temptation to rely on what we have and to have peace in our heart because of what we have instead of because we are living under the loving care of God. A related temptation when we have financial resources is to solve problems by throwing money at them instead of seeking God’s help.

In the area of our ministry, whether it be teaching or leading music or however we serve God, we may be tempted to rely on the gifts which God has given us and the abilities which we have. If someone asks us to do something we have never done before, we may quickly dismiss it if we do not think that we have the gifts to do it. We like to stay comfortable and serve comfortably in our strengths. But what if God has new challenges for us? There is no question that God is the one who gifts for service and that we are probably going to be most effective in our area of giftedness. But at the same time, it is also true that call comes before gifting. God does not always call the gifted, but he always gives the necessary gifts to those whom he calls. Instead of evaluating our willingness to serve in a particular area by our interest or ability in that area, we should be seeking God and asking Him if this is something that He wants us to do. We need to grow in our dependence on God in our service for Him.

In the whole matter of the work of the church, we are also tempted to do only that which we know that we can do. A few months ago, we had a conversation in the mission’s committee about sending out a team from our church to plant a church in another area or even among an un-reached people group. The resources required for such a project would require an increase in trusting God to reveal His will to us, an increased need for prayer for God’s leading, a team of people who would be willing to be trained and to go and an increase in our mission’s budget. When we look at the whole package of such an idea, it seems that it is beyond us. Are we willing to seek God and realize that He has the resources and can provide us with the resources to do such a thing which seems beyond our resources? Will we be able to look beyond depending on what we know we have and stretching to rely on what God has?

Conclusion

What area in your life are you living at the level of reliance on your known resources? Is that where God wants you to live? Is He perhaps asking you to depend on Him instead of only what you know you can accomplish or perform?

When David counted the people in order to learn his military strength, his sin was that of trying to trust in what he had instead of depending on God. That this was a sin and that God punished it should certainly make us take this matter seriously. We have become quite comfortable living within our means. Up to this point, God has not evidently punished such faithlessness. We go along without ever stepping out of our comfort zone or really putting the full weight of faith on God because we don’t need Him. We live within the means we have and it goes alright. How much more exciting it would be to live beyond our resources and in the resources of God! How much more amazing it would be to live in the level of what God could do instead of only at the level of what we know we can do! What would God like to do in us and through us if we would give up dependence on our resources and chose to rely on His?

The only way that David could get out of this situation was by repentance. May we also repent of our self sufficiency and choose to glory in God’s all sufficiency.

Amazingly, God is able to redeem even our failures. That once again, as so often in Scripture, something good comes out of a human failure should not surprise us. That the site of the offering which would stop the plague became the site of the temple where God would meet with His people is right in line with how God works. He takes our weakness and failure and redeems it to become a site of His glory. Will we offer our ability and our inability and even our failures up to Him for redemption? Will we choose to put our confidence and hope in Him?

David – A Life Of Worship

I Chronicles 13-17

Introduction

This morning, I would like to begin a new series of messages which will take us through the winter months. When I choose a series like this, I look at several things – I pray and ask God to guide, I look at what part of the Bible we have looked at recently and then as I read some of the books of the Bible, I listen for God’s leading. As I read I & II Chronicles, there were some ideas that struck me as important and relevant for our congregation at this time. So for the next few months, we will be looking at these two books. We will not, however, be doing an exegetical series in which we examine the whole of both books. Instead, I have chosen to do a biographical series in which we will look at the lives of some of the kings of Israel and discern what God is teaching us from the stories of their lives. The central concept will be an examination of our relationship with God. We recently did the healthy church survey in our congregation. The element which came up as weakest was passionate spirituality. The part of that element which was especially low was that we do not have a sense of God working in our midst. It seemed to me that the stories of the lives of the kings in I & II Chronicles dealt with the same issues and so my prayer is that as we examine these stories, we will grow in our sense that God is truly at work in our midst and that we have would an expectation that He will work.

I recently purchased a book for our church. The title is “Worship Walk” it is written by Gareth Goossen. After I have finished reading it, I will put it in the church library and will encourage you, especially those who are involved in leading worship, to read it. In the book, he discusses the question, What is worship? Some of the answers he gives to this question are, “worship changes who we are as we pursue who God is.” “Music and worship are not synonymous. True worship changes us when God draws us into his presence.” “At the moment of meeting God…We want nothing for ourselves…This is romance which is totally focused on the object of our affection. Self is consumed within our desire to please him.” “Worship encompasses all of us (who we are): our emotions, our intellects, our relationships, our working lives.”

I think we see some of that kind of worship in King David. He is well known for the Psalms and therefore known as a man of worship. In this first message, I would like to look at I Chronicles 13-17 in which we have a number of stories that teach us about worship from the life of a man of worship.

Inquiring of the Lord

I Chronicles 13:1-4; 14:8-17

The Story

If you turn in your Bibles, to I Chronicles 13, the story begins with the determination of David to bring the ark to Jerusalem. The story of David begins earlier and tells us of how he became king, how he conquered Jerusalem (11:4-9) and made it the capital city of the nation. The ark of the covenant, which he wanted to bring back was the box which God had Moses build, which would represent the presence of God in the midst of His people. This ark had been captured by their enemies, the Philistines, but they had trouble with it because they were not prepared to handle the presence of God and had no right to it. They sent it back on a new cart led by a team of cows separated from their calves. For about 70 years it had been in Beth-Shemesh at the house of Abinadab.

Now David wanted to bring it to the capital city. His reasons were not political, but spiritual. Notice what he says in verse 3, “Let us bring the ark of our God back to us, for we did not inquire of it during the reign of Saul.” He did it because he had a desire to restore the practice of inquiring of the Lord. It was a way of indicating that it was his intent to listen to God. So he consulted with the people and they agreed to this plan.

We will pick up how that all worked out in a moment, but before we do, I would like to look at another story. In I Chronicles 14:8-17, we have a story in which the Philistines, the perennial enemies of Israel, were attacking God’s people. When they came for war we notice how David responded. He prepared for battle, but then, we read in verse 10, “David inquired of God…” He wanted to know from God, how to handle this situation. When he won the battle, David said in vs. 11, “God has broken out against my enemies…” Later the Philistines attacked again and we read in vs. 14 that “David inquired of God again…” Once again God gave them victory.

Lessons About Worship

When we notice this phrase “inquired of the Lord” 3 times in 2 short chapters, it is something that we need to take as significant.

Inquiring of the Lord seems like such an obvious thing. It simply means that we ask God for help. Asking God and expecting God to act seems so simple and such a right thing to do. Yet, during the days of Saul, Israel did not do it. Do we do it? I would suggest to you that more often we are self sufficient or we find some person to help us and our desire to seek the Lord is a last resort which we use when the situation gets really serious. When we are out of practice inquiring of the Lord, we soon drop it all together. The reason this is included in the Bible and the reason that these stories are remarkable is because David determined to inquire of the Lord and made inquiring of the Lord a natural and every day part of his life.

To inquire of the Lord involves some pretty significant assumptions. It assumes that God exists – do you really believe that God exists? It assumes that God is able to help us – do we believe that God is the creator of the universe and that “He owns the cattle on a thousand hills?” If we want to ask God for something, we assume that He is listening when we ask – do we live with the understanding that God always hears our prayers? Inquiring of the Lord also assumes that He loves and cares for us. It assumes that we truly believe that the very hairs of our head are numbered – do we believe that?

Inquiring of the Lord can break down at any one of these points, but when we believe these things and know that they are true of God, we will inquire of Him. When we inquire of the Lord, we will also be worshipping Him, for in acknowledging that God exists, is able, listens and cares, we are recognizing who God is and praising Him and trusting Him.

Bruce H. Leafblad says, “Our greatest need today is to recover the priority of God in our worship and in the whole of life.” When we follow the pattern of David’s life and make it a habit to inquire of the Lord, this will happen.

Respecting God’s Holiness

I Chronicles 13:5-14; 15:1-15

The Story

A moment ago, we talked about David’s desire to bring home the ark. After getting agreement from the people, he assembled representatives from all of Israel and they prepared a great procession which would be accompanied by a great celebration.

They put the ark on a new cart and, accompanied by musical instruments, they celebrated before God with singing as they began to make their way to Jerusalem.

As they made their way along, they came to a piece of uneven road and the oxen stumbled. In order to prevent the ark from falling over, Uzzah reached out his hand to steady it and God immediately struck him dead.

When David saw this, the whole processional stopped. It must have been like a phone call announcing the death of a loved one which is received in the middle of a great party. All of a sudden the party was over. David was angry because God’s wrath had broken out and he became very afraid of God. For three months, the ark stayed right where it was with the family of Obed-Edom and that family was greatly blessed.

In I Chronicles 15 we read that, David had made buildings for himself but he also set up a tent as a place for the ark. He still wanted to bring it to Jerusalem and he still wanted to inquire of the Lord.

After 3 months, he was ready to try again and this time, he called together all the members of the priestly families – the Levites. He planned more carefully and discovered, as we read in 15:13, that he had made a serious mistake in the way he had transported the ark previously. We wonder where he got the idea to use a new cart. Was it from the way the Philistines had sent it back? The instructions for moving the ark were very clear in Numbers 4:5,6,15. Only members of the priestly families could move the ark and they were to carry it on poles.

This time David knew about this requirement and the ark was brought to the city of Jerusalem with great celebration.

Lessons About Worship

This is a difficult story. Why did Uzzah die? Why was God so demanding about how the ark should be moved? One thing is clear, Uzzah died, David was angry and became afraid because he failed to take note of the holiness of God. The rules about moving the ark were not arbitrary rules but a way for God’s people to know and understand that God is a holy God. Because of Jesus, we have been taught to call Him a friend and “daddy.” That is a great privilege, but we must be careful not to presume on that privilege. When we approach God, we cannot forget that He is a holy “daddy.” He is set apart in every way and our approach to God must always honour Him and we must come on His terms, not on our terms.

David wanted to inquire of God because he knew it was the right thing to do and he sensed a need to do so and yet when he encountered the holiness of God, he feared to bring “Him” closer. It is right and good to inquire of the Lord and to seek Him. However, our worship must be on God’s terms, respecting His holiness. W.C. Kaiser in “Hard Sayings of the Bible” says, “Good intentions, with unsanctified minds, interfere with the kingdom of God. This is especially true of the worship of God and the concept of his holiness.” We can’t worship God with a careless familiarity.

Ordered Celebration With Abandon

I Chronicles 15:16- 16:43

The Story

So as they learned about the holiness of God, they chose to bring the ark into Jerusalem in the right way. As they did so, we also notice that there was great celebration that went along with the procession into the city.

David appointed various Levites, members of the priestly family, to make music. There were singers as well as those who played lyres, harps and cymbals. There were other musicians who blew trumpets before the ark of God(15:24). Please look at chapter 15 beginning at verse 25. Notice in verse 26 that they made sacrifices, which was one way in which they worshipped God. There were choirs singing (15:27) and musical instruments being played(15:28). They shouted (15:28) and David danced and celebrated (15:29).

David even wrote a Psalm for this occasion, which is recorded in 16:8-36. If the words of this Psalm sound familiar, we should not be surprised, since they come from three of the Psalms which are in the Psalter. Verses 8-22 come from Psalm 105; verses 23-33 from Psalm 96 and verses 34-36 from Psalm 106:1, 47, 48. It is a great Psalm of praise acknowledging all that God has done in redeeming His people. In it God’s people are invited to “sing to the Lord,” to “ascribe to the Lord glory,” to “tremble before Him, and to “give thanks to the Lord.” It gives many reasons to thus respond to God because of “the wonders He has done,” because “splendour and majesty are before Him” and because “He is good.” With this Psalm and with much celebrating they set the ark up in the tent built for it and gave glory to God. What a great day of worship that must have been!

As they came into the city, Michal, David’s wife, saw what David was doing in the procession and 15:29 says that “she despised him in her heart.”

When they had come into the city, they sacrificed some more and David appointed Levites to care for the ark and to inquire of God. Notice in 16:4 the specific job that they had. They were to “minister before the ark of the Lord, to make petition, to give thanks, and to praise the Lord.” In 16:37-43 we see how worship and seeking the Lord were established in Jerusalem before God at the ark of the covenant.

Lessons About Worship

During the holidays, I read a book from our church library called “Trailblazer for the Brethren.” It is a story of one man who was a founder of the Mennonite Brethren church. It was interesting to read about the spiritual renewal that was happening at that time in the Mennonite colonies in Russia. It was also very interesting to read about the debates they had. One of the problems of this new Mennonite movement was about how the worship of God should be expressed. There were some who recognized that they had a marvellous new relationship with God and that this relationship needed to be expressed with great joy. Some wanted noise, celebration, unbounded joy because there was something to be joyful about. They feared that the lack of expression would be an indication of a lack of joy in the heart. Others feared that the “unbounded joy” would go overboard, and promoted a more quiet worship.

Growing up in the MB church at a time when the celebration of God was quite staid and quiet, I was surprised that this debate had already been there at the beginning of the movement. It is a debate that I have heard since then from people in the charismatic movement and those criticizing it. It actually sounds a lot like some of the debates I have heard even in our church in regards to using musical instruments like drums and those who want to raise their hands and even those who would like to move a little more in their worship and, on the other hand, those who are uncomfortable and even critical of this freedom in worship.

I believe that this passage from David’s life gives us some important teaching about this debate and I hope it will encourage us in our worship.

In this story about David, we see that worship involves a proper order. David appointed the musicians. He prescribed an orderly way of organizing worship in which certain people had certain responsibilities and they were to carry them out in a certain way. David also did not simply express words freely, but actually wrote out a Psalm which was to be used in worship. There is order and beauty of expression in this Psalm. This tells us that there must be order in worship, as even I Corinthians 14:40 says, “…everything should be done in a fitting and orderly way.”

However, we also see that worship involves a genuine expression of joy that must not be put down. There was noisy music, shouting and even dancing, which David himself did. Michal’s response is instructive. It asks the question, “what is an appropriate expression in worship.” Michal thought David’s expression was in appropriate. However, in Samuel, we are told that God punished Michal because of her response. David’s worship was honestly expressed praise to God and appropriate and Michal’s attitude, her criticism of it was sin.

The lesson for us seems clear. We must be careful not to criticize those who express themselves freely in worship – raising hands, even dancing. We must open our hearts to genuinely respond to God. A stifled response to God is dishonest and restrictive. When our response is so restrained, one can question whether there is something genuine of God in our hearts. I would invite you to have freedom to genuinely express what you are feeling to God. We can’t leave it in our mind only. I rejoice that young people are expressing their worship to God with instruments, drums and so on. They are in a solid Biblical tradition and criticizing them may find us in the line of Michal instead of David. I suspect that I, we, tend to lean pretty heavily on the side of formality and I have to ask myself if God is really in my life and if I am willing to express that openly.

Gareth Goossen has some good things to say about this debate. He writes, “When our focus deteriorates to style, preference and format, it is no longer worship…When we critique and ostracize people for their heartfelt worship in a style that is not our preference, we are not acting as God’s children.”

However, when we get to the place of having that freedom to worship, then it is important to remember that freedom in worship is not all there is. WE must also give consideration to love for others and to order. Just as David prescribed an ordered worship, so we must also have order in our worship. Freedom in worship must not violate love for others, order and it must be a genuine response to God and not done for show.

What God Does

I Chronicles 17

The Story

After David brought the ark to Jerusalem, life continued as normal. But as David prospered and built houses for himself he became aware that the tent in which the ark of God was housed was quite shabby. So he wanted to build a house for God. He discussed this with Nathan, the prophet of God, and Nathan encouraged David to go ahead.

However, that night God spoke to Nathan and indicated that David was not the one who would build the house for God. Instead, God made a very unique promise to David. He told Him, in 17:10, “I declare to you that the Lord will build a house for you.” The promise contains powerful messianic imagery and a promise that God’s kingdom would continue through a descendant of David. Solomon, David’s son, did build a house for God, but the reference here is to a much greater event. It is a reference to the house God would build, which was a house not built with hands. It is a reference to the temple of God, which is the temple of His people built on the foundation of Jesus Christ.

After David heard this message, he prayed and in his prayer accepted God’s plan.

Lessons About Worship

David had a plan that involved a physical building. God had a plan that involved His people and, in fact, all the nations of the earth. God’s plans were much bigger than David’s.

As we worship God, a part of worship is to submit to God’s greater plan. We may want to be people who don’t look at evil and who are honest and loving. God has a plan by which He wants to transform us into His image. He wants to build us into a house in which we display the glory of God because of what God has done in us. We want to build a house of obedience because we are good people. God wants to build a house in which He is glorified because of the amazing thing He has done in our lives. Are we willing to worship Him by submitting to His greater plan?

Conclusion

So the lessons on worship which we have learned today from the life of David are that it is good to inquire of the Lord, we need to acknowledge His holiness as we do, worship involves a balance of order and abandon and we need to be open to God’s greater plan.

I like what the book “Worship Walk” says, “The essence of worship is a focus on God – to love him, to know him, to desire what He desires and participate in what He is doing.”

May our focus be on God, as David’s was. May we desire that God will be glorified and may we learn more of what it means to express our praise freely, but also to live our praise of God in daily life. As we learn these things, we will worship God well.