This week, we’re exploring how a church community should be committed to connectedness to God in worship.
Humans will never be more connected to God than in the kingdom of heaven, or the kingdom of God. The Bible includes the book of Revelation, which recounts John’s vision of the kingdom of heaven. Here’s what he described about angels, and then humans:
Each of the four living creatures had six wings and was covered with eyes all around, even under his wings. Day and night they never stop saying: “HOLY, HOLY, HOLY IS THE Lord GOD ALMIGHTY, WHO WAS, AND IS, AND IS TO COME.” Whenever the living creatures give glory, honor and thanks to him who sits on the throne and who lives for ever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before him who sits on the throne, and worship him who lives for ever and ever. They lay their crowns before the throne and say: “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being.” (Revelation 4:8-11)
Even in the kingdom, there is worship. The word may not appear in this reading, but the core meaning is there. Worship means “to give worth to something.” And the words “you are worthy” are right at the beginning of the words the elders say in their heavenly worship.
You can tell what someone values by how they spend money, time. You can see what’s worth their limited resources. Worship is spending our limited time on God. It’s an expression of love.
In our Marriage and Parenting courses, we introduce the five love languages. Some communicate and receive love through words, touch, acts of service, time, and others through gifts.
In the same way, we can show love to God through various “languages”. Worship includes prayer, and music, confessing sins, asking forgiveness, reminding ourselves what we believe, reading the Bible together, and more. All aspects of how communities of Christians worship.
These are all ways to communicate God’s worth in our eyes. You can see it in this reading. The elders say, “You are worthy to receive glory and honor and power” but then they tell him why: he is the creator of everything.
He knows all this, of course. But this is a time for humans, mortals, to feed that back to him. To acknowledge he is at the cetner of our lives, not the periphery, and we’re not going to deny it.
Question: How do you know someone values you? What do they say, do, or not?
Reminder: Earlier in this series, we saw the importance of reading the Bible together in sync, so our new daily bible readings start today in our mobile app and web site.
Read the Bible in Sync Today
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When did you first hear about life coaches? I hear about them all the time, but it’s a relatively new phenomenon.
I had a terrible time finding its origins. A Google search reveals mostly ads. Searching through Huffington Post reveals article after article written by life coaches, but nothing about what that means. A search on Maclean’s, a reputable news source reveals mostly quotes from interviews with life coaches, and only two articles about the idea, including one about 25 year olds coaching each other through their “quarter life crisis”. This is when Millenials hit the workforce and find it’s not all they’d hoped for, and a lot of hard work.
Some have decided to share these ideas with others for up to $70 an hour by becoming life coaches. In fact, a friend suddenly announced she was quitting her job and going to be a life coach. She tooks osme courses, but many don’t. More and more people taking on the title – pastors, bloggers, etc. as they find it’s something people want.
The profession is not regulated – so anyone with advice to offer, good or bad, can call themselves a life coach, and if you’re willing to pay them, you can put your career and life in their hands.
We do all need help – I meet with a mentor regularly, maybe you do too. We need doctors, psychologists, home inspectors, investment advisors, and so on. We need good advice.
So how do you tell the difference? How do you know when you’re getting good guidance on your life’s mission? We regularly find that our little missions in life – to buy a house, to get a job, to be happy at work, etc. could benefit from some guidance.
But we should be especially careful about the big mission – the reason God put you on this earth in the first place. That’s not one to take lightly.
That’s what we’ll talk about this week – as Jesus’ followers were given a mission, and they weren’t going to be alone in doing it, they’d have the ultimate guide.
Question: Who would be your ideal coach or guide in life? What could they do, say for you?
