True Worship
What is True Worship?
Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
We often hear the terms “praise” and “worship” together.
- Praise is to God.
- Worship is an expression or a devotion of the heart.
The Hebrew word picture for worship.
The middle character is a pictograph of a “fence.” The whole allegory of salvation is that God has a fence where he invites everyone to come and learn about his mercy, grace, and love. He wants people to come inside the fence. Inside the fence are all the good things, the spiritual things, of life—rest, reconciliation, redemption, and more.
The word for “worship” has the idea of the fence in it. The first character (right to left) indicates fullness. The last character means “to behold” or “what comes from.”
Worship is what comes from the fullness of the fence.
The fence refers to our relationship with God in His presence.
There are actions behind Hebrew or Aramaic verbs. The action for “praise” was to stretch out your hand.
The action for worship is to bow down.
It can be translated as stoop, crouch, fall down, or be prostrate. It has the idea of reverence or honoring something.
In Eastern customs, you bow to someone to show them homage. There are many actions that we can associate with prayer, getting down on our knees, or prostrating ourselves, forehead to the ground, like Muslims do in prayer. It’s a way of showing humility as well as getting our eyes off of other things.
The Greek word for “worship,” proskuneo, means “to kiss toward something.”
In some cultures, a prominent person was called “your worship.”
The idea of worship is where your head is bowed, and your palms are up. Worship is a two-way thing because it deals with our relationship with God. Our posture indicates preparing to receive something from God.
When our hands are out, palms up, we are opening our hearts, and we are more receptive.
There are no rules for how to worship; it’s all about your heart.
Psalm 5:7 ESV:
But I, through the abundance of your steadfast love, will enter your house. I will bow down toward your holy temple in the fear [reverence] of you.
The NASB says, “…I will bow in reverence for You.”
Worship is the response of a grateful and humble people to the living God.
Worship is a response first, and then it’s also a receiving back.
Psalm 95:6–7 ESV:
6 Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before [bless] the Lord, our Maker! 7 For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. Today, if you hear his voice,
There are three ways to bow here.
- Worship
- Bow down
- Kneel before
YouTube 10,000 Reasons:
Psalm 138: ESV:
I bow down [worship] toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things your name and your word.
So far, we’ve seen that worship has a posture of bowing down, and that it’s something that comes from your heart and from your relationship with God.
Luke 4:5–8 ESV:
5 And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, 6 and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. 7 If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 And Jesus answered him, “It is written,
“ ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.’ ”
He’s quoting from Deuteronomy Chapter 6, but most translations of that verse don’t use the word “worship.”
Deuteronomy 6:13 ESV:
It is the Lord your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear.
“Fear” is “awe.”
Deuteronomy 6:13 NASB:
You shall fear only the Lord your God; and you shall worship Him and swear by His name.
The word “worship” comes from the Old English “worth-ship” and is the act of giving someone worth or value. “Worthship” was eventually shortened to “worship.”
The word “serve” in the ESV translation is sometimes translated “worship,” but in Old English it was “work-ship.” Worship is sort of a combination of worthship and workship that issues in an attitude of the heart, an attitude of service.
The devil wanted Jesus to not only worship him, but to serve him. True worship includes service.
Romans 12:1 ESV:
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 [latreuo].
The Greek word for “worship” carries the same idea as the Old Testament word for “serve.”
Giving our bodies as a living sacrifice is what true worship is.
Romans 12:1 MSG:
So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him.
True worship is a devotion of the heart that is then acted out in everyday life.
1 Chronicles 16:29 KJV:
Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name: bring an offering, and come before him: worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness.
Psalm 29:2 KJV:
Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name; worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness.
Psalm 96:9 KJV:
O worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness: fear before him, all the earth.
John 4:20–24 ESV:
20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
We’ve often taught that verse 23 is about Speaking in Tongues. But Jesus tells the Samaritan woman that the time is now here. The type of worship he was talking about was available then. He’s telling her that it’s not important where you worship, but how you worship. “In spirit” is the heart part; it’s your whole life that you use to worship. “Truth” is the same as “gird up your loins with truth,” which means with faithfulness or integrity.
What God really seeks is for people to worship Him with their whole lives, their whole hearts, in complete devotion, with faithfulness.
Jesus was telling the woman that she could do this now.
John 4:25–26 ESV:
25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.” 26 Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.”
You can worship God with your whole being, your whole life, and with a fervent heart.
Worship is an expression of the heart’s devotion, and it issues in service.
Do you see the difference between praise and worship?
Praise is to God. Worship is where we bow down as an action of the heart.
YouTube When I Look Into Your Holiness:
Scripture References
See Also:
True Worship on the Acts Now Fellowship website
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