TAPPING INTO THE ANCIENT AND TIMELESS EXPERIENCE

Beloved friends, what a pleasure to meet you again on air. I welcome you to our broadcast today. Kindly give attention to listen carefully to today’s message. The entrance of the Word of GOD in your life brings light, and causes faith to take a leap.

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Today’s message is titled, Tapping into the Ancient and Timeless Experience.

TAPPING INTO THE ANCIENT TIMELESS EXPERIENCE

And you will get to know in the course of this message, what it is, this timeless and ancient experience. We shall be reading from the Book of Psalm 95. We’ll read the whole of the passage.

Psalm 95 says,

Psalm 95

   ¹ Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord;
let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation.
² Let us come before him with thanksgiving
and extol him with music and song.

³ For the Lord is the great God,
the great King above all gods.
⁴ In his hand are the depths of the earth,
and the mountain peaks belong to him.
⁵ The sea is his, for he made it,
and his hands formed the dry land.

⁶ Come, let us bow down in worship,
let us kneel before the Lord our Maker;
⁷ for he is our God
and we are the people of his pasture,
the flock under his care.

Today, if only you would hear his voice,
⁸ “Do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah,
as you did that day at Massah in the wilderness,
⁹ where your ancestors tested me;
they tried me, though they had seen what I did.
¹⁰ For forty years I was angry with that generation;
I said, ‘They are a people whose hearts go astray,
and they have not known my ways.’
¹¹ So I declared on oath in my anger,
‘They shall never enter my rest.’”

That’s the Word of GOD to us today. So we are speaking on, Tapping into the Ancient and Timeless Experience.

Let’s pray.

PRAYER

Heavenly FATHER, the FATHER of our LORD JESUS CHRIST, we have come to a time when we need to, O GOD our FATHER, tap from the ancient and timeless experience of worship which characterize, LORD our FATHER, our First FATHER, who had a functional relationship with you in worship. Grant, O GOD our FATHER, that this may also become our experience. Teach us YOUR Word, even today…in JESUS Mighty Name I pray. AMEN!

Worship has existed since humankind existed on earth. Adam and Eve lived in a paradise called Garden of Eden. They experienced GOD’s creation before the fall. In all its unimaginable splendor they walked with GOD HIMSELF in the cool of evening. Do you think they were not boasting with expressions of worship and gratitude? When we worship today we are tapping into something ancient and timeless, something that connects us to our Creator in the same way our first ancestors were connected to HIM.

 There are four things we need to understand about this ancient tradition. Four things:

1. Worship gets us out of our head.

At a time and culture when selfies are everything, it’s easy to become the center of our own universe. To pursue accolades and desire for compliments is the characteristic of our time. To promote the brand of me, to embrace the people, opportunities and things that benefit us and dismiss the rest is the characteristics of our time and generation.

Genuine worship, on the other hand, requires a 180 degrees turn. There may be an eye in worship, but it is only phonetic. Worship compels us to focus on GOD and HIS works alone. So, worship gets us out of our own head, for once we begin to concentrate on GOD our creator.

2. Worship requires awareness.

If you go out of your way to do something extraordinary for someone else at the very least you probably like the person to notice what you did. Receiving a heartfelt ‘thank you’ from the person will probably be even better; and perhaps the best case scenario will be to do that.

A detailed expression of appreciation for your gesture that demonstrates a deep understanding of its value as well as everything that went into it and a heartfelt tribute to your kindness or generosity and skillset is very important. Worship gives us the opportunity to offer such an expression and tribute to GOD. In order to do that however, we must be aware of what it is HE has done: What it is the LORD has done. We need to pay close attention to HIS work and in HIS works in our own lives, in the lives of others, and of course throughout creation. We need to learn to spot GOD’s handiwork in big and small things.

No wonder the psalmist begins to call saying, let us bow before HIM; let us kneel before HIM. Worship brings us to the place of worship of GOD. It brings us to the place of awareness of what GOD has done, what GOD is and HIS works in our lives. It gives us an opportunity to express it. That’s one of the things we must learn.

3. Music is tied closely to worship.

David the Chief Psalmist was a musician before he became king of Israel. Music features greatly in worship service. Music works to set the mood for worship. So music is a mood setter. It’s a mood setter. Good music is a mood setter.

It is unfortunate that in our time this is not always the case. I wish the people that play guitar, play band – keyboardist in our worship services will know this, that their role is important in worship. They set the mood for worship. Worship leaders should be conscious of this. Too many things distract us today, but good music will enter the default mood and set our mind right for worship.

So we must learn to listen to our favorite worship songs, listen to them in our cars when we are driving around, listen to them in the morning during our communion – listen as part of our quiet time to good music whenever music can be played. You can prepare the scenario for worship. Music is very important in setting the mood to worship GOD to tap into this ancient and timeless experience.

4. Very important: We were made to worship.

We human beings are wired to worship. The question you ask, why did GOD create us? What is our job description as GOD’s creatures? The answer is that, GOD created us to worship HIM. We are created to worship. And this is the reason why people worship anything around them. They worship snake, they worship the river, they worship stars, they worship moon. Where it is covenant for them they make god. They mold their own god and worship, because man is made to worship. He must worship something. Some others are worshipping Satan. They worship evil spirits; they worship water spirits: because they have not known GOD the Creator of the earth whom to worship.

When Satan tempted JESUS, he wanted JESUS to bow to HIM. But JESUS said to him, get away from me; it is only GOD you must worship, and HIM alone.

Worship is in or blood. That’s why GOD created us as HE did. When we embrace genuine worship we experience a sense of fulfillment and purpose that can’t be experienced in any other way.

That’s why the psalmist calls on us, as we read from Psalm 95. And I want to read a particular verse.

³ For the Lord is the great God,
the great King above all gods.
⁴ In his hand are the depths of the earth,
and the mountain peaks belong to him.
⁵ The sea is his, for he made it,
and his hands formed the dry ground.

So let me raise some questions as we begin to close:

How much time do you spend worshipping GOD in a given week? Is it enough? The time you spend in worshiping is it enough? Is it acceptable? How can we make room despite our busy schedules for more worship? Think about it.

And may the LORD help you to connect to this ancient and timeless experience in…The Mighty Name of JESUS CHRIST.

Let us pray.

Heavenly FATHER, help, O GOD my listeners, to know that they are created  to worship YOU. We did not create ourselves – GOD created us. Impress upon them to understand that they are wired to worship GOD and genuinely learn to worship YOU. The bible says, they that worship GOD should worship HIM in spirit and in truth. Bring them into this experience, and connect them to you…in JESUS Mighty Name I pray. AMEN!