Encountering God’s Presence Through Worship For Mission, Part 1

The LifePoint staff is passionate about serving for God’s glory. Tyler Greene will celebrate one year as Director of Worship Ministries in March. He is a great addition to our team. The heart for and expression of worship at LifePoint is growing and maturing under his leadership. I want to share with you some of his heart and vision for the LifePoint worship ministry through this post he wrote.

Pastor Lane

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As God’s covenant people, the church believes that Jesus is our forerunner, whom we follow into the presence of God. As a result of our voluntary rebellion against our Creator, we were separated from him. His holiness demands that he hate sin and punish sinners. Thus the more we behold God’s righteous character perfectly shown in Christ—the exact imprint of the Father’s nature—we will come to realize we deserve a just penalty for offending him.

Thankfully, our sin and separation was overcome through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Because he became flesh and blood to be the Mediator we desperately needed, we—by grace alone—have free, unlimited access to God’s presence. “He who knew no sin became sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21). We have received the righteousness of Christ by faith and therefore God no longer sees us as children of his wrath, who are defiled by sin. Rather the blood of Golgotha’s cross covers us, meaning that, when God looks upon us, he no longer sees our sin. Instead he sees us as he sees his beloved Son with whom he is well pleased. Therefore God warmly welcomes us into his presence, just as he welcomes Jesus. In Christ we encounter God.

This gospel has profound implications for the local church’s worship of God. Our response to God’s good news should be extravagant, for his presence among us did not come cheap; it cost him dearly. The gift of encountering God required great sacrifice. In the gospel, God demonstrates how his presence is a supreme treasure and the extravagance of our response in worship should reflect its supremacy. However, so many in the church fail to see this.

I am steadfastly convicted that Jesus didn’t pay the highest price for lackluster worship in the life of the church. And while the expression of worship on Sunday mornings isn’t the only measurement of a church’s grasp of the gospel, it is one of the most significant ones. Many churches tragically write this off, but I believe that too often a lack of passion in corporate worship results in a lack of passion for corporate mission.

A well-known worship song called “Mission’s Flame” by Matt Redman contains the monumental lyric: “Let worship be the fuel for mission’s flame.” As a worship leader, my heart can’t help but resound with an enthusiastic “Amen!” to that song. The reason this resonates so deeply with me is because our passion for worship is a thermometer for how acutely we sense the urgency of the Great Commission, as we shall explore more thoroughly in part two of this blog.