Much is spoken of today regarding praise and worship. Churches fight and even split over what is termed “styles of worship.” To put it bluntly and with the risk of being harsh, if people were really concerned with the worship of God there would be more battles regarding reverence and the heart and a lot less over “styles of worship.” If our real desire is to praise and worship God, our chief concern is that God would be glorified in the praise and worship and not that it must be done according to my own pleasure. In reality, what goes as worship in many circles reeks of self-worship and not the worship of God. Praise and worship is part of the created purpose that God of man and can never be apart from God’s own chief and ultimate goal (terminal) displaying His own glory through all things.
Praise to God should happen throughout every day and we are to worship in all that we do. We create problems when we try to limit those Christian activities to an hour or two a week inside a building where the church is to meet. We then try to focus the so-called worship on what people want. Even in reading those words in the previous sentence should make us choke. The object and focus of worship is to please God and not human beings. We have it exactly backwards. Praise and worship is meant to display the glory of God in accordance with His created purpose for us. When human beings take worship and make it all about self and our feelings, that is nothing but the worship of self. Let me put this in a different way. Modern humanity has taken what we call worship and have shaped and fitted it to please ourselves. We then expect God to be pleased with what we are pleased with because we use His name in it and ostensibly claim to worship Him. True worship is to praise and worship God according to how He wants to be worshipped and to have our hearts broken so that we are pleased with what He is pleased with. As previously said, modern human beings have it exactly backwards.
When human beings go to buildings where the church is supposed to meet and do things that are called worship but really only please self, that is nothing but the worship of self. God created all things and that includes human beings to display and manifest His glory. Yet human beings want to worship God as they see fit and to do what they like in worship. I call it worship because it is still worship, but rather than the worship of God it is the worship of self. Who cares if there are instruments or not if God is truly being worshipped? If we would be more consumed with God than with our own preferences the differences would mostly just disappear at the throne of God. When human beings worship self in the name of the worship of God then what is really going on is that many gods engage in battle over who is to receive the worship. It might be over likes, preferences, tastes, comfort level, and tradition, but it is over MY likes, preferences, tastes, and comfort. But we keep forgetting that we were created to worship that the glory of God would be manifested through us. It is not primarily about us, but Him and His glory.
I will perhaps be accused of personal preference at this point, but there must be gratitude, reverence and awe in the worship of God or it is not worship (Heb 12:28). It must also be in spirit and truth (John 4:24). Much of today’s so-called worship shows little reverence and awe if it has truth. That which has truth shows little spirit and little awe. Again, worship is the obedient and loving response of the creature to its Creator in love. All of the feelings (called emotions in the modern day) that can be raised do not mean something is worship. It just means that the feelings are raised. The affections (as Edwards called them) are to be raised in worship but they must be raised in response to the truth and according to the working of the Holy Spirit. When the affections are raised by music or by shouting and chanting, they just might be from self and not the Spirit. Singing and chanting words to loud music, even when the participants are joyful and shouting words of praise to God, are not things that necessarily point to true worship of God. The people can simply have high and exalted feelings at religious things and they believe they are worshipping because of the highly exalted feelings. Just because the name of God is on the lips and the affections are high does not mean that the Spirit has raised those affections by the truth. God is only exalted and glorified in praise and worship when the heart out of love for His glory truly praises Him for who He is and not just for what He has done for me. That alone is worship according to His created purpose for humanity.
God Loves... Himself 
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