"In the beginning. God . . . " Worship begins with God, not with us. Our so called worship wars over style of worship and style of music have proven that we try to make it about us. Worship is simply responding to a creating and redeeming God who brought us and bought us. He seeks to have fellowship with us. It is the desire of His heart that we worship Him with all that we are. The word genesis means "beginning". It is an appropriate title for the first book in the Bible. In it we see God create man and woman. They rebel against Him and a sad history of human brokenness begins and yet we see the joyous plan of God's salvation begin in Genesis as well. We see that man was created to worship. We see that God has a plan to redeem man so he can worship.
This is the beginning of a new year. We as believers and worshippers need to recommit ourselves to our private worship time as well as our gathering together for corporate worship by the body of Christ. Our private devotional life feeds the worship life of the church. It is a new beginning. God is a God of beginnings. Our human tendency is to seek selfish gain rather than God's glory. But, may we begin this new year as children of God through faith, who worship God by living obediently, so that His sovereign will and purposes might be fulfilled in us and through us for His Glory in 2012! Amen and Amen! mjm
