Worship is…. a complex thing. I wanted to start this devotional with something quick, witty, and memorable about worship. But I couldn’t. Not because I can’t boil down worship into a simple truth, but because the first time we see worship in the Scriptures is in the middle of a story, a difficult, radical, but hopeful story.
What I love about stories is that they can teach us truth in ways that we’re more likely to remember, ways that dig down deep into our souls and confront us with more than just a simple statement or a compact truth. What we find is something complex but not complicated, a lot of interconnected parts that in the end point to something central, something we can walk away with. In the stories of the Bible, we come face to face with a God who asks much of us but who also gives much to us. Let’s dive in.
Read Gen. 22:1-14.
Our friend Abraham is being put in an impossible situation. As readers, we can see immediately that God is testing him, but let’s put ourselves in Abraham’s shoes for a moment. Imagine what he must have been feeling: the gut-wrenching fear and anxiety, the stomach-dropping heart-shattering wave of emotions accompanied by this task, the silent debates he must have been having within himself. This test was truly make or break for him, in more ways than one.
Quick background, Abraham’s son Isaac is the son that God promised him, the son that he waited 25 years for, the son who he had at the ripe old age of 100. Every promise that God gave to Abraham would be passed down to Isaac—that’s how important he is! Coming back to the story, it looks like all of this is now in jeopardy. Everything that Abraham had been promised, everything that he had waited for, was now on the line, and he would have to be the one to make the sacrifice, to take the knife and kill his own son. Woof.
In the midst of what we can only imagine is the most harrowing, difficult moment of his life, Abraham recognizes this act of obedience as worship to God. He takes his servants, takes his son, and sets out where God had asked him to go, all without hesitation, all without a plan B. From this, we can build out a sense of how Abraham understood worship.
- Abraham worshiped God through immediate obedience.
- Abraham worshiped God by not withholding what was most precious to him.
- Abraham worshiped God by completely relying on Him for the outcome.
All of Abraham’s hopes, all the promises God had made him, were wrapped up in the life of this young boy, the son of promise. But he (Abraham) had a history with God; time and time again God had come through, even when Abraham would go out on his own and make a mess of things. Now, at this critical moment, Abraham finally got it. He was “fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised,” even if it meant he had take the knife to his boy (Romans 4:21). He wouldn’t waver. He couldn’t; everything that he had came from God, and he knew God would provide, even if he didn’t know how.
We know how this story ends. God ultimately provides a substitute, a ram for sacrifice in place of Isaac. But what was God testing in Abraham? It’s revealed in the angel’s instructions in Genesis 22:12—“Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.”
Abraham worshiped God in this way because he feared Him. He wasn’t afraid of Him, per se, but he recognized God’s rightful authority over his life. This is why we worship God too. We worship Him when we acknowledge He is the rightful King over our lives. There is nothing too great for Him to ask of us, nothing that we should not be willing to lay down at His word. This fear—ultimate reverence for the King of the Universe—is most rightly expressed in obedience: immediate, unhesitating, faith-filled obedience.
Today, God isn’t going around asking His followers to put their children on actual altars; but He does ask everything of us. The apostle Paul puts it this way:
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
Romans 12:1
Living sacrifices. This is God’s rightful worship from us. Why? Because of the “mercies of God”—God, in His mercy, sent down His only Son as our substitute, the sacrificial lamb who took our place. In complete obedience to His Father, Jesus laid down what was most precious to Him—His own life—and trusted that the Father would use that for the salvation of the world. This is what we put our hope in, and this is why we must give ourselves as living sacrifices to Him.
The problem with living sacrifices is that we have a tendency to crawl off the altar. We forget His faithfulness, or we feel the need to take matters into our own hands. But Abraham’s posture serves as an example for us. Our worship should look like his:
- We worship through immediate obedience.
- We worship by not withholding what is most precious to us.
- We worship by relying completely on God for outcomes.
Worship is more than singing a song, more than planning powerful setlists or crafting beautiful transitions or making sure that things go off without a hitch on a Sunday. Worship is a life submitted to King Jesus, trusting Him with all things, even when He asks everything of us.
Reflection Questions
- Is there an area of your life that you haven’t been willing to let go of, even when God has asked you to? What would it take for you to surrender that to the Lord?
- If God were to test you today to see if you feared Him, what would He ask of you? What would your response be?
- Do you trust in God’s track record in your life? In the lives of others? Why or why not?
Prayer
God of Abraham – you’re a God who keeps promises. I see Abraham’s response to You, how he feared Your name and walked in complete obedience before You. I confess that I don’t always do this. I recognize the weakness in my heart. I forget Your goodness and faithfulness. I want control over the outcomes of my life. But You’re calling me deeper into surrender, to lay down my life as Jesus laid down His. Give me the strength to do this by Your Spirit. I trust You, and I ask for help to trust You more. O King of the Universe, King of my life, You deserve all the worship I have to give You. Have Your way in my life. I give myself to You as a living sacrifice today.
In Jesus’ name. Amen.
