Careful with Why You Worship

This morning I was reminded of the why for worship. As I read in Luke, the account of Jesus’ temptation by the devil in the wilderness, I see again Jesus telling me to worship for the right reasons.

“⁶and 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. ⁷If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.’ ⁸And Jesus answered him, ‘It is written,

You shall worship the Lord your God,

and him only shall you serve.’” — Luke 4:6-8 (ESV)

I see here that Jesus is stating for us to remember the why of worship and not just the who we worship. I am to worship the Lord and serve Him, not the other way around, He does not serve me. Yes, Jesus does provide for me, and makes sure that I am cared for and loved and blessed beyond belief, but I serve Him and He gives to me. I am here to serve Him in all that I do and am to instill that lesson of service for all to take part in. I am here for Jesus, and He was here long before I for me.

How then does all of this fit with my beliefs related to the inverted pyramid of leadership if I am to serve the one above me? And that is a great questions that I have asked myself and here is my best response. I am here to serve those in my charge, my boys, my wife, my friends, and all those around me. In doing so, I am serving the purpose that God has for me in life. As I am serving the purpose for my life as given to me by God, then I am in effect serving Him and in service to Him I worship all that He is, provides, and will be for me. I have been given work to do and that work is the driving force for service to Him. Just as in the inverted pyramid, we all work for someone in a hierarchical system, but our customers are those that we impact. Our service for them is in service of our leadership. Jesus is our leadership and I serve him through the service I have for others.

I serve God in the interest of worship to Him. I don’t worship to get something, but more to give something. “Him only shall you serve” is the motto to live by and that is where we find our desire to worship, in the interest of service to our leadership, God.

Who is it that you serve and why? Are you serving to get something in return? What if we simply served as a demonstration of our worship?