Dr. Ron Sumners
October 3, 2004
Mike Royce reported this true story in the Chicago Tribune. A man named Gill Mallory traveled to India to discover the purpose of life. He didn't find it there. So after returning, he noticed a sign at a Chevron station that simply said, "As you travel, ask us." So every time he pulled into a Chevron station, he would look to the sign and say "I'm a traveler. I'd like to ask you a question," "What is the purpose of life?"
These were the real answers he got. I'm not making this up. The first guy said, "Sorry, I'm new here." The second guy said, "I don't remember anything in the manual about that." Another guy said, "I'm not much for church myself, sir." Most people just gave him a blank stare and cleaned his windshield. One day Mallory got a call from Chevron Customer Relations, "We understand you've been asking our dealers questions and getting unsatisfactory answers." The man suggested that he write out his question and send it to Chevron Corporate with a self-addressed stamped envelope. So Bill Mallory wrote, "What is the purpose of life?" and sent it to the Chevron Oil Company. A couple of weeks later, the envelope returned. The only thing in it was an application for a credit card!
If you want to know the purpose of life, you are not going to find it at a gas station. You are not going to find it on a talk show or a self-help book. You are not going to find it at a week-end seminar. If you want to know the purpose of life, you have to talk to the one who made you?
Today we are going to look at the first of God's five purposes for your life. Revelation 4: 12 says, "You (God) created everything, and it is for your pleasure that they exist and were created." The Bible says that you were created for God's enjoyment. God made you for His pleasure. The reason you are alive is that God wanted you alive and He gets pleasure from watching us.
How many of you are parents? How many of you enjoy watching your children? I think the same thing is true with God, most of the time He enjoys watching you. You were made for God's pleasure. When you were born, when you came from your mother's womb, God was there in that room, enjoying the moment, because He wanted you made. God smiled at your birth because He created you to enjoy you. He made you for His purpose.
Last week we talked about how you were created to be loved by God. This week we are going to look at the flip side, the first purpose of your life, which is: God wants you to love Him back. He wants you to bring enjoyment back to Him. The first and greatest commandment is to "Love the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind and strength."
There is a word for this. It is the word "worship" . Worship is knowing and loving God back. The problem is, that worship is misunderstood today.
When I say "worship," what do you think of? You may think of prayer. You may think of singing. You may think of rituals or communion or going to church. But worship is far more than all of those things. Our first purpose in life is to worship God. It is our primary objective. It is our highest priority. It is our one purpose in life. Today, we are going to look at what it really means to worship.
(Offertory Hymn & Offering)
Romans 12:1 tells us, ". . . offer yourselves as a living sacrifice to God, dedicated to His service and blessing Him. This is the true worship that you should offer." This is the verse that you will be studying in your small groups. I want to point out two things. First, worship is my response to God's love. Worship is the way I react to God when He loves me. That's what worship is.
He loves us if we return.
His love. God takes the initiative. God always makes the first move. He creates us. He saves us. He forgives us. He blesses us. He protects us. Because of all these things, we worship.
The second thing is giving back to God. Worship is giving back to God. He gives to us and we give back to Him. What we give back is worship. And that brings pleasure to God. It brings enjoyment to God.
What am I supposed to offer to God? What do you give to God, He has everything? He made the world. He made you and me. He made the Universe. What do I give Him? Man, you think a Christmas present for your dad is tough! I'll tell you the only thing you can give Him. You give Him your love!
God wants me to love Him three ways. First, God wants me to love Him thoughtfully. He wants you to think through, to not just do it without thinking. Second, God wants you to love Him passionately. We are to love Him with all our heart and soul. And third, He wants us to love Him practically. He wants us to worship Him with our abilities. The truth is that even though God created the entire world and the universe and He created you, there are three things God does not have unless you give them to Him. He doesn't have your attention unless you give it to Him.
That's loving God with your mind. He doesn't have your affection, unless you give it to Him, that's loving God with your heart and soul. And God doesn't have your ability, unless you give it to Him, that's loving God with your strength.
(Song: Heart of Worship)
Worship is focusing my attention on God. It is focusing my mind, my thoughts, my attention on God. In a lot of religions, the idea of worship is to put your mind into neutral. But God wants us to worship Him thoughtfully. It takes energy. It is more than going through the motions. Did you ever zone out in church? It takes energy to be a part of worship doesn't it?
Do you know why God wants your focus? God wants your focus because He is focused on you.
Psalm 139:1-3 tells us that God knows everything we do. Do you remember the first time you fell in love? You thought about that person all the time. That infatuation wears off. But with God, the attention is eternal. He is always focused on us and he wants to teach us to focus our heart and attention on Him. That is difficult sometimes. It is easy for us to lose our focus. We have to choose to focus on things.
How do we do that? We must first realize that we are easily distracted. There are two things that distract us from focusing our attention on God. First, we are self-centered by nature. And, the second thing is, we live in a self-centered culture. Because that is true, we have to choose to start thinking about God.
How do you do that? First of all, you can start doing that by just establishing a daily time with God. I don't care when you do it - beginning of day, middle, end of the day, where you decide to stop everything else and just be with God. Talk to Him, read His Word.
In the Old Testament, there was only one place where you could worship God. It was the Temple. You had to make a journey there to worship God and focus on God. That is not true anymore. You can worship God anywhere. You can worship in your car on the way to work, in your backyard, in a corner of your living room, anywhere you can focus on God. You don't need ceremony or fancy words. Don't try to be spiritual, just be yourself. Be with Him honestly.
There's a second thing that you can do to focus on God, and that is develop a constant conversation with God. The Bible tells us in Psalms 105:4, "Worship Him continually." Just think about Him throughout the day. You have to decide to do that. I know people do that in a lot of different ways. I know a man who sets his watch to go off every 30 minutes to remind him to think about God. Whatever you do, you develop this constant conversation throughout the day.
When you focus on yourself, the inevitable result is thoughts of worry, insecurity, anxiety, guilt, fear, discouragement. But when you shift the focus to God, all of a sudden, you begin to sense gratitude and hope and confidence and love.
Worship is also expressing my affection to God. For some of you this is difficult because you grow up in families that were not affectionate. Your family may not have physically expressed affection or said, "I love you." Maybe you're the silent type and it isn't easy for you to express affection to God without feeling weird. You are going to have to learn how to grow, develop, and how to say "I love you God." Do you remember the first time you ever said "I love you" to somebody? It probably scared you to death. In junior high or grammar school you sent a note through a friend "I like you, do you like me?" "Yes or No?" It is risky to say ''I love you." The neat thing about God is that He said, "I love you" first. God has said it in a thousand ways. He created you. God has said over and over again, I love you, so you don't have to worry about who is going to say it first.
The Bible says, "We love Him, because He first loved us." You know, in many religions, God is an angry tyrant, and you have to appease God and you have to avoid God and be afraid of Him. But that is not the real God. God deserves our love. God tells us in Hosea 6, "I don't want your sacrifices -I want your love! I don't want your offerings - I want you to know me."
Your purpose is to know and love God. The most important thing you can know in life is that God loves you. And the most important thing you can do in life is to love Him back. That is your first and primary goal in life.
God cares about you. Did you know that? Some of you think that God is too busy. He doesn't care about me. He doesn't even know my name. Oh, yes He does! He loves you so much and He wants you to love Him back. He is never too busy for you.
Exodus 34 says, "He is the God who is passionate about His relationship with you." God desires to know you. He longs for you to know Him. He made you to know Him and have a loving relationship with Him.
I've been married 33 years. What if I walked up to Prissy one day and said, "Honey, here are some flowers. I am giving you these flowers for three strategic reasons: # 1, I am your husband, #2, It is our anniversary, #3, Husbands are supposed to give their wives flowers on their anniversary. So, here they are." Wouldn't she be thrilled? I don't think so. What if I said, "Pris, I bought you flowers because I love you!" Hopefully, a more positive response. Why? She doesn't want duty, she wants love and desire. God doesn't want our duty! God doesn't want "oh, okay, I better go to worship." God doesn't want ritual and rules and regulation. He wants a relationship. And He is passionate about it.
How can we express our affection to God? Start by just saying "thanks". Start looking around at everything and start thanking God. "Thank you God for the blue sky, and the clean air that I am still breathing. Thank you God that I live in America and have freedom. Thank you that I woke up this morning. Thank you that I have food." The list could go on and on. But just be thankful.
Romans 6 says, "Give yourselves completely to God since you have been given new life." God gave us life, then He gives us new life in Jesus. Jesus wants us to give ourselves back to Him completely. Why don't we? We don't because of the one word - fear! We are scared to death. We are afraid that if we totally surrender to God, He will turn us into some kind of religious nut case. We are afraid we'll become a fanatic like we see on those TV channels. And we'll start saying, "Jeeeesus," And every other word is "praise the God."
God doesn't want to turn you into a goof ball. He made you to be you. God likes you as you are. He gave you the personality you have, why would he change you into someone else?
In fact, you are not fully you until you 've got God in your life. You are just existing until then. The more you know God and the more you love God, the more normal you become.
Some of you are thinking, "Ron, the problem is that I don't love God enough." That is not your problem. The problem is that you don't realize how much God loves you. If you really understood how much God loves you and cares for you, you would throw yourself into His loving embrace.
Worship is always a response. We love God because He first loved us. When you understand that God loves you so much that He came to earth and died for you, then you respond, "okay, God, I surrender myself to you, my soul is in your hands.”
If you get nothing else I say today, I want you to get this one truth, because it will revolutionize your life. In life, it is not what you do that matters; it is who you do it for. You give it all to God. All of your work can be turned to worship. I don't care if you are a butcher, a baker, or a candlestick maker. You can do it for God.
A lot of people get hung up and say, “What is God’s will for my career? God, should I do this or do that? God might be saying, "Why don't you just do what you are interested in doing, just do it for Me!''
Whatever you get up to go and do tomorrow, do it as to the Lord! It will ·become a part of your worship. Real purpose-driven life doesn't happen · in ·church. It happens in the mundane, ordinary, routine things of real life. "God, I'm going to take out the garbage for you. God, I'm going to make the beds to the glory of God." Does that sound ridiculous to you? If so, you don't yet understand true worship.
The truth is, everyone worships something. You were wired to worship God. He put it in your DNA. If you don’t worship God, you will quickly find a substitute, even if it is yourself.
Joel Morgan planned to visit missionaries in Eastern Europe. So he asked some friend what to pack. They said to pack food snacks for yourself because there are few available here. As he walked through the grocery store, he prayed,, :lord, what might make it through Customs?” He picked up Reeses’ Peanut Butter Cups, some tapioca pudding, some hard candy and gum, and some cans of fruit cocktail.
When Joel arrived in Romania, he stayed with a missionary family who were living in very harsh conditions, often without even heat and electricity. They enjoyed a very good evening of conversation and prayer together. And as Joel started to leave, he remembered the snacks he had brought for himself and he had an idea. He thought, you know it is only October, but why not celebrate an early Christmas? So he decided to play Santa Clause.
He asked the daughters, “if you could have one thing from the U.S., what would it be?” They responded, “candy!” “What kind, “ asked Joel. “Reeses’ Peanut Butter Cups!” They said in unison, “but we can’t get them here.” With a lump in his throat, Joel pulled out the king size package and the girls jumped up and down with laughter.
Wiping away a tear, Joel asked the mother, “Well, what would you like that would brighten your day?” This was a big risk. What if she asked for a side of beef? She responded, “I miss fruit.” Reaching into his pack, Joel pulled out the cans of fruit cocktail. Everyone was laughing and wiping away tears.
There had been two miracles in a row. Should Joel press his luck? He asked, “Gary, what is your favorite dessert?” The dad smiled and said, “I am one of the few people in the world that loves tapioca pudding.” Joel nearly injured himself pulling out the tapioca pudding that God prompted him to buy seven days earlier and 4,000 miles away.
He is a God who is worthy of our worship!
The greatest mistake you can make in life is to miss your primary purpose. So, let me ask you a question. What do you think about the most? Whatever it is, that is what you worship.
Your first purpose is that you were planned for God’s pleasure. You were made to know and love God. So, I challenge you to make as the #1 goal of your life, getting to know and love God. May your whole life be a holy worship of God.
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