Most Joyful Day

Great blessings are enfolded in the observance of the Sabbath, and God desires that the Sabbath day shall be to us a day of joy...

This is the very first sentence in the chapter "The Observance of the Sabbath" in 6 Testimonies p 349, and reinforces a strong theme relating joy and worship.

I had to fly interstate this week, for reading I took Luther's "Preface to the Letter of St. Paul to the Romans". It was inspiring reading, but only after I'd started underlining it and making notes in the margins. It had something to say on the matter of "joy" and its origins in the Christian life.

Talking about family worship on Sabbath (p 357) Mrs White says:

Make the season one of interest and joy.

On page 359 after lots of good advice on Sabbath worship with children she finishes the section, Sabbath in the Home, with:

As the sun goes down, let the voice of prayer and the hymn of praise mark the close of the sacred hours and invite God's presence through the cares of the week of labor.

Thus parents can make the Sabbath, as it should be, the most joyful day of the week. They can lead their children to regard it as a delight, the day of days, the holy of the Lord, honorable.

I counsel you, my brethren and sisters: "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy." If you desire your children to observe the Sabbath according to the commandment, you must teach them by both precept and example...

Obviously we are to model a joyful religion all day on Sabbath, at home. But what about in church... Surely church should serious?

On page 364 in a quote I gave you a few weeks ago:

God desires His obedient children to claim His blessing and to come before Him with praise and thanksgiving... He has done for His chosen people that which should inspire every heart with thanksgiving, and it grieves Him that so little praise is offered. He desires to have a stronger expression from His people, showing that they know they have reason for joy and gladness.

God wants worship to be joyful. And I'll bring Luther in here. He really hammers the point home about the difference between "doing" the law and "fulfilling" the law. He emphasises that even perfect outward obedience (doing) the law without our heart being in it, is sin. So if our Sabbath keeping is for any other reason than that we delight in it and love the day and our Lord, we are sinning!

If we try to manufacture this joy, Luther would call that "a lie, hypocrisy and sin". But he does give us hope and I'll get to that later.

Our whole life should be joyful, even in trials. On pages 366,367 Mrs White says:

The bright and cheerful side of our religion will be represented by all who are daily consecrated to God. We should not dishonor God by the mournful relation of trials that appear grievous. All trials that are received as educators will produce joy. The whole religious life will be uplifting, elevating, ennobling, fragrant with good words and works. The enemy is well pleased to have souls depressed, downcast, mourning and groaning; he wants just such impressions made as to the effect of our faith. But God designs that the mind shall take no low level. He desires every soul to triumph in the keeping power of the Redeemer.

Near the end of the section she says on p 368:

... The reason why we are not more joyful is that we have lost our first love. Let us then be zealous and repent,..

Luther tells us where we can get this joy from:

Faith is a living, unshakeable confidence in God's grace; it is so certain, that someone would die a thousand times for it. This kind of trust in and knowledge of God's grace makes a person joyful, confident, and happy with regard to God and all creatures. This is what the Holy Spirit does by faith. Through faith, a person will do good to everyone without coercion, willingly and happily; he will serve everyone, suffer everything for the love and praise of God, who has shown him such grace. It is as impossible to separate works from faith as burning and shining from fire... Ask God to work faith in you; otherwise you will remain eternally without faith, no matter what you try to do or fabricate.

To be Inspiring, our worship services need to be joyful. That joy will only come from hearts made joyful from worshipping God at home and seeing God at work even in our trials. As Luther says "no one can give such a heart except the Spirit of God. Please ask God for just such a heart and see our church services and daily life become "more joyful".

Prepared Hearts

Last week I pointed out that one advantage of worshipping on Sabbath was that we met God at the appointed time. Today we'll see that God blesses and hears us even when we DON'T worship Him at the time He specified.

Yesterday's Doing Life Together Bible reading was 2 Chronicles 29-31. Here good King Hezekiah begins to clean up the temple and the nation of Judah after the disastrous reign of his father Ahaz. After only 16 days the priests had reopened the temple in Jerusalem and cleaned all the rubbish out. Hezekiah invited the people to come and hold a Passover feast even though it was a month late. The service was so inspiring that after the seven allotted days the people decided to keep another seven days.

It's a good story, worth reading but I want to draw out a few points relevant to Inspiring Worship Service from 2Chronicles 30. Remember that the three parts of Inspiring Worship are "Praise", "Worship" and "the work of the people"

Praise and Teaching played a big part

"...the Levites and the priests praised the LORD day by day, singing to the LORD, accompanied by loud instruments... all the Levites... taught the good knowledge of the LORD" v21,22.

The Work of the People - Prepared hearts

People were invited not just from Judah, but also Israel which had just fallen to to the Assyrians and thousands had been deported. Hezekiah urged these defeated people "yield yourselves to the LORD; and enter His sanctuary"(v8). But the message was laughed at and mocked (v10). Sadly only "some... humbled themselves and came"(v11). The rest missed the blessing of genuine worship.

Many were not ritually clean and should not have taken part in the service, "But Hezekiah prayed for them, saying, "May the good LORD provide atonement for everyone who prepares his heart to seek God"... And the LORD listened to Hezekiah and healed the people.(v18-20)

If you want an inspiring worship experience, first humbly submit yourself to God. This is the preparation of heart we all need in order to "seek God".

When you think about it, this makes sense. Only if we realise how great and awesome God is, and how little and "humble" we are, can we really worship God. Proud people are really only worshipping themselves, or they laugh and stay home and miss even that.

The result of this inspiring worship was "great gladness"(v21) and "great joy" (v26) and "the priests, the Levites, arose and blessed the people, and their voice was heard; and their prayer came up to His holy dwelling place, to heaven." (v27).

Heaven hears genuine worship from humble hearts. And it's good fun.

That's inspiring.

Refreshing

Is there a special blessing available to Sabbath keepers that is not available to those who worship on Sunday? And what does this have to do with Inspiring Worship Services?

One part of the blessing is that Jesus is especially close and wants to give us something:

All heaven is keeping the Sabbath, but not in a listless, do-nothing way. On this day every energy of the soul should be awake, for are we not to meet with God and with Christ our Saviour? We may behold Him by faith. He is longing to refresh and bless every soul. {6Testimonies 362.1}

I thought that Sabbath was especially for this earth but it is kept in heaven too. I knew from Isaiah 66:22,23 that in the new earth we would go up to the New Jerusalem (heaven) for Sabbath worship but I didn't realise that this is already happening now. Maybe it is to honour the humanity of Jesus and the few other humans already there. It shows how interested God and His angels are in what happens here. It shows that heaven and earth are very close.

It doesn't seem to be an apathetic, pew-warming, service either. "Every energy of the soul" is actively engaged, paying attention, breathing in the blessings, breathing out praise.

"Awake"! Sabbath is no time for drowsiness, just look at Who we are meeting. And "by faith" we can see Him.

So the first advantage is that if we wake up and jump into Sabbath worship we are joining all heaven. That means we have an appointment with our Father and our Saviour and are refreshed in a way that can't happen any other time or with any other "congregation".

Is that inspiring?

Reason for Joy

Were you inspired by the "Praise Service" last week? I was and I think it was because we not only sang praises to God, but there were personal testimonies praising God as well.

Praise, spoken as well as sung, is an important part of an inspiring worship service. Last time I ended up by quoting Psalms 100:4.

Enter into His gates with thanksgiving,
And into His courts with praise.
Be thankful to Him, and bless His name

We are to come together to give God praise and thanks. Mrs White backs this up:

We should not come together to remain silent; those only are remembered of the Lord who assemble to speak of His honor and glory and tell of His power; upon such the blessing of God will rest, and they will be refreshed. Early Writings p115

Do you want to be refreshed each Sabbath morning? Do you want God's blessings? Then come to church ready to tell how God has blessed you the past week.

This is what God wants:

God desires His obedient children to claim His blessings and to come before Him with praise and thanksgiving. God is the Fountain of life and power... He has done for His chosen people that which should inspire every heart with thanksgiving, and it grieves Him that so little praise is offered. He desires to have a stronger expression from His people, showing that they know they have reason for joy and gladness. 6 Testimonies 364

God is aggrieved that we don't thank Him more.

Did you notice what "should inspire every heart with thanksgiving"?

So this week, if you want a more inspiring experience during the worship service, claim God's blessings then notice the things He does for you in answer to that prayer. Finally come to church ready to tell others about Him and to praise Him.

That quote from 6 Testimonies comes from an article entitled "The Observance of the Sabbath". Just reading through it made me realise something that I will go into more next time. Until then I want you think about this question:

Is there a special blessing available to Sabbath keepers that is not available to those who worship on Sunday?