Worship and Fellowship

Dr Rosy Leong: Worship and Fellowship

We are called to be worshippers, it’s a lifestyle.

In the Old Testament, only Levites could enter the presence of God, but after Pentecost, we are all high priests.

⁶and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father—to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen. Revelation 1:6

⁹But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 1 Peter 2:9

Let us give him thanksgiving, worship and praise for that is all we are able to give Him. Thanksgiving relates to the goodness of God!

Sacrifice thank offerings to God, fulfill your vows to the Most High, Psalm 50:14

Thanksgiving helps us focus on the Lord.

Worship is the highest priority and helps us focus on the Lord.

   ⁷ Ascribe to the LORD, O families of nations,
       ascribe to the LORD glory and strength.
    ⁸ Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name;
       bring an offering and come into his courts.
    ⁹ Worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness;
       tremble before him, all the earth. Psalm 96:7-9

In the inner court, we come into the holy of holies, and we must love the Lord our God with all our heart and all our soul and all our mind. The first and greatest commandment.

The tabernacle is a pattern, a road map, a model, the path of life for worship. Beauty and strength is found in His sanctuary.

²³Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. ²⁴God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth." John 4:23-24

The Holy Spirit brings us to worship God.

¹⁶And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever— John 14:16

The Holy Spirit is a person! True worship occurs when we connect with the Spirit of God, spirit to Spirit!

¹⁷Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. ¹⁸And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect^[a] the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. 2 Chronicles 3:17-18

Where the Spirit of God is, there is liberty. Do not be like Lazarus who came out of the tomb still bound by the burial linen. Only after he took off the burial clothes could he be free.

We must also worship in truth, based on the Word of God! If we have too much Word alone, we dry up. If we have too much Spirit alone, we blow up. If we have Word and Spirit together we grow up!

In the Holy place, the golden lampstand signifies the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

  ²The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD Isaiah 11:2

The table and showbread signifies the living Word. The Altar of Incense signifies prayers and worship, and in the Holy of Holies, this is where God meets the High priest.

We are the temple of the Holy Spirit, we must live a life of thanksgiving, praise and true Worship! We are anointed to worship, anointed to speak. Our tongues can release blessing or curses, God or the devil, good or evil, life or death, healing or hurt

   ³Set a guard over my mouth, O LORD; keep watch over the door of my lips Psalm 141:3

There is powerful dynamics in the speaking of tongues.

¹⁸I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you. 1 Corinthians 14:18

⁴He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but he who prophesies edifies the church. 1 Corinthians 14:4

¹⁸"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed,¹⁹ to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." Luke 4:18-19

The Spirit of God was upon Jesus!

¹⁴May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all 2 Corinthians 13:14

We must seek communion with the Holy Spirit!

True fellowship is koinonia:-

⁴²They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. ⁴⁶Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, Acts 2:42,46

³We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. ⁷But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. 1 John 1:3,7

²⁵Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. Hebrews 10:25