Do you think that family worship during the week might encourage our Sunday worship with the church?
I should think so, but the reverse is true as well.
Sunday worship with the church should fuel our family worship. Our weekly gatherings, then, should empower our daily gatherings as a family.
Lord’s Day worship fuels daily family worship.
With blessed times in Sunday morning church (joyful singing, encouraging prayer, learning from God’s Word, etc.), I am much more motivated to do these things in the home: singing, praying, and meditating on the Bible.
Recently with the church we have learned a new version of Psalm 117 as a four-part canon. I have looked forward in singing it again with my family. Now our family, after a few weeks, has enjoyed singing it “in parts” and loudly too.
This motivation to take what we have done in worship with the church and see it affect family worship can be observed in various Psalms, for example, Psalm 100.
Psalm 100 among many psalms gives a basis for worship. This is true for the whole world with a focus in our church gatherings.
Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth!
Serve the LORD with gladness!
Come into his presence with singing!
Know that the LORD, he is God! It is he who made us, and we are his;
we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving,and his courts with praise!
Give thanks to him; bless his name!
For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures forever,
and his faithfulness to all generations. [ESV]
This joyful noise is literally a shout to the LORD. You can’t but feel the energy expected in this praise to God that he deserves.
On the Lord’s Day’s worship with God’s people, we are truly entering God’s gates with thanksgiving and his courts and with praise in heavenly worship. And how could we come with anything less than booming praise?
This entrance into his courts is only possible through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Our exclusive approach to God is through His Son’s sacrifice.
Indeed, the LORD is good! His steadfast love does endure forever and his faithfulness to all generations!
If this is the kind of worship that we enjoy each Sunday with God’s people, shouldn’t this joy and blessing continue to be remembered and encouraged in our homes?
So why would we worship our Creator and Savior in our homes? Is it not to remind us daily as families to know the LORD that He is God (v. 3)?
Is it not to encourage us to live for Christ since we are His sheep belonging to Him, our Shepherd?
With anything less, aren’t we tending to live for ourselves? Becoming self-centered? In other words, just plain selfish?
Instead of worship to God, we start creating other gods of our own imagination: my money, my family, my health, my hobbies, my… (you name it!) And this only leads to something really, really dumb (Psalm 115:5).
I like the words of A. W. Tozer here: “Without worship, we go about miserable.”
Sometimes it really takes God’s gracious “hard providence” to realize this truth. Psalm 100, however, is an antidote to keep us from being self-absorbed.
Psalm 100 gives us the truth for the fuel of exuberant worship at church and home.
Psalm 100 reorients us on the path of being worshipful having been made in the image of God.
In the words of author and pastor John Piper, he writes:
God created us for this: to live our lives in a way that makes him look more like the greatness and the beauty and the infinite worth that he really is. This is what it means to be created in the image of God.
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