He that blesseth his friend with a loud voice, rising early in the morning, it shall be counted a curse to him. (Proverbs 27:14)
As I have been reflecting and writing about
praise, I have come to the point that I see the bulk of what we call praise
(and of course worship) as for the most part blasphemous.
I know many are shouting at the top of their
systems that I have overstretched and so I will ask to be allowed to walk us
through the reasons I am saying it.
What constitutes a false friend?
A false friend is simply someone who openly
confesses their friendship yet behind the scenes is working feverishly to bring
you down.
Allow me to give a very fresh example from the
church I have been involved in.
There are these friends of the pastor who have
over the three or so years I have been in that church been pouring praise on
the pastor. They have talked about the wars they have fought for him in the
many battles he has had in ministry for over twenty years.
According to their narrative, they could very
easily take the bullet for him for the ministry and impact he had had on them.
Then early this year they cooked such muck,
muck that was intended to completely obliterate the same pastor’s ministry from
the damage they had cooked against his person. That for the single purpose of
taking over his position.
Simply speaking, Judas would have looked like a
saint if he was compared to what they have done to the same pastor they were
pledging to take the bullet for when they wanted to take over his position.
Could you call such people friends just because
their words spoke very positive about their pastor? Could you treat their words
as praise when they are telling the congregation that they are not part of the
scheme yet at other fora arguing for the guilt of this man of God in such
detail as would make any ears tingle?
Of course not.
That is the point I want to make about praise.
Praise is not about the words we speak to and
about God, words that may sound very pious.
Praise is not the amount of money we pour into
what we think God needs.
Praise is not the actions we perform in God’s
name.
Though praise may have those and even more,
words and actions do not constitute what praise to God is.
At its root, praise is the overflow from a
heart totally consumed by God’s revelation.
Praise originates from the heart. And it is from
the heart that God receives it.
When we use words and songs to define our
worship and leave out surrender, we are not talking about praise to God.
I hate, I despise your feast days, and I will
not smell in your solemn assemblies. Though ye offer me burnt offerings and
your meat offerings, I will not accept them: neither will I regard the peace
offerings of your fat beasts. Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs;
for I will not hear the melody of thy viols. But let judgment run down as
waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream. Have ye offered unto me
sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel? (Amos 5: 21 – 25)
I hope you are getting what I am saying.
It is only a heart that is completely submitted
to God that can able to truly praise Him.
Anything other than that is not praise.
This because praise is not about us or our
interests or feelings.
How then does God look at praise that is not
completely centred on Him?
It is simply bogus praise, or the praise of
another, even if it is feigned as praise to God.
That is why I am calling it blasphemy.
Otherwise explain to me why Christ would call something
that was ordered by Him in Exodus a den of robbers?
The order to Moses was to accentuate the worship
of the Israelites who lived far from the centre of worship by removing the hassles
of driving livestock those distances and looking for acceptable currency to offer
in their worship.
But they had made that trade something
completely different with a completely different focus.
A simple instruction had been transformed into
something that was so abhorrent to God who had issued it that He had to whip
people to stop it.
I believe we should start thinking about praise
or worship void of words or music to be able to recapture what they are.
Otherwise we could be fueling blasphemy in our
worship.
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