Worshipping the Lord on Our Way to Worship- Psalms 121
Psalm of Ascent
The Psalms of Ascent were sung by God's people in the Old Testament, as they went to Jerusalem to worship. There were typically three festivals that people were called to make a pilgrimage or journey to worship. These Psalms, Psalm 120 through Psalm 134, are part of the Psalter and make up a mini-section of Psalms. They were sung by God's people on their way to Jerusalem, and they were the playlist of God's people as they went up to Jerusalem to worship.
1 I lift up my eyes to the mountains— where does my help come from? 2 My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.3 He will not let your foot slip— he who watches over you will not slumber; 4 indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. 5 The Lord watches over you— the Lord is your shade at your right hand; 6 the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. 7 The Lord will keep you from all harm— he will watch over your life; 8 the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore. Psalm 121
Before God's people entered the Promised Land, after God called them out of Egypt, after he rescued them from the house of Pharaoh, he brought them to Mount Sinai. God's people met with God at Mount Sinai. God gives the instructions to Moses to build a tabernacle or a tent, a place of meeting where God will go with God's people wherever they go during their journeys. Fast forward a few hundred years, God brings them into the Promised Land, and he's given them King Saul, he's given them King David, and then David's son Solomon is on the throne. And God calls Solomon and gives him the ability and the resources to build a temple, a permanent place of residence in Jerusalem. A physical place where God will meet with his people, where God will call home on earth. That's the destination where God's people traveled as they sang these songs. They were going to meet with God in Jerusalem at the temple.
Modern Worship
We worship together as a community of faith at a local church. This is where we gather together. We don't go to Jerusalem anymore to worship. We now worship God in spirit and in truth wherever it is that we go. In fact, wherever it is that two or three or more are gathered, the Lord is there. God's people in the Old Testament worshipped on their journey to worship. Our lives, even as New Testament people, are the same.
We live our lives out, worshiping on our way to our eternal home of worship. We don't go to one physical place now to worship, but on the other side of death, we go to eternity. To forever be in God's presence, to have no distractions anymore, and to worship. Eternity will be fellowship and communion with God perfectly.
Worship is not only found in godly ceremonies. Our worship is found in our daily lives as we follow God's word and God's ways. That's what worship is. That's what the Old Testament, ancient Israelites, did as they journeyed to Jerusalem. They obeyed God's call to worship. They worshiped on their way to worship. They responded in obedience to what God called them to do.
What does this mean for us to worship on our way to worship? Well, our lives are much like these songs. Our lives are very much worshipping on our way to glory. We live our lives now, in the here and present, on this side of death, preparing for what is coming on the other side, eternity. Either eternity with God or eternity apart from God. We are on our way to eternity. We need to prepare for that by worshiping in the here and now and preparing for worship in the hereafter. Worship is not just a ceremony. It's more than that. It's life lived in obedience to God's word. This means that we can worship when we're doing homework. This means that we can worship when we're changing diapers. Worship is responding in obedience to God's word.
It is rendering to God what He is owed. It's having a heart of thanksgiving for who God is. It's having a heart of praise. Praising God in the midst of all circumstances, even in the worst of circumstances. Worship happens in all circumstances. This is what the Apostle Paul was driving at in 1 Corinthians 10. When he said, whether we eat or drink, we do all for the glory of God. Our lives are lives of worship.
Family Worship
God has called us into a community of worship. What we call the church. It's those who are gathered together in church to worship. But God has also called us into little worshiping communities. Smaller units of worship, which we call families. We get together around a table of food and share meals. We give thanks in prayer to God for our food and for his provision for the day. We gather together as families and spend time in prayer. We spend time in God's word. We even ask questions of God and seek his answers in his word when we gather together as families for worship. If you've never had this practice before, begin to think of your time together as a family and how you can integrate family worship. We have many resources to help you get started with family worship, just scroll to the bottom of this post for links.
I don't want you to think I'm ignorant of the difficulties of worshipping together as a family. It can be difficult to get together. It's much easier to let the busyness of life overrun and dictate our days. There are times when worshipping in the home throughout the week is awkward. Worshipping together as a family is such a good thing that even the evil one will do his best to keep you out of the word and make family worship a hassle.
If the evil one doesn't want us doing it, we ought to be inspired to do it all the more. The Lord is leading us together into his word, into song and prayer, even in our own homes. That this is a grace of God that we grow in our faith, in our character, and in our dependence. That we even grow in our knowledge of who God is and of what he's done for us.
“as a pastor, it's always interesting on Sunday morning to see someone making their way towards you with determination. This can either be a delightful or an awful moment. One Sunday at the end of morning worship service, a woman came running up to me. Like most people in a similar situation. I was preparing myself for whatever was to come. Thankfully, she began smiling and shaking my hand. A few months before this particular Sunday, we had encouraged the congregation to begin worshipping with their families during the week at home. We put together a simple family worship outline and took opportunities to encourage the congregation to try it. This mother had been very reluctant. I'm not saying any of you are. This mother was. Very reluctant. She had some active, energetic young boys. As any of us, parents of young boys, can testify. There are days that swimming the English Channel during a raging thunderstorm with a 50-pound weight tied around our ankles and sharks nipping at our toes seems like not only an enterprise at which we are more likely to succeed. But it's also far more enjoyable than the prospect of getting our sons to sit still for more than three minutes. And yet, for this mother, the idea of reading the scriptures and praying with her sons at home seemed undoable at best. However, after a few months, she was smiling and shaking my hand. Why? Because she said it had been one of the greatest blessings her home had enjoyed.” Jason Helopolous A Neglected Grace.
Is it easy to do? No. It's not. Don't hear what I am saying. It's not easy. It's not easy to gather together your family, to read from God's word, pray, and sing awkwardly. But it is good. It is good and it is godly.
Learning and Sharing God in Our Homes
Where did these kids who sang these songs of ascent learn these songs of ascent? They would have been traveling with the rest of their family up to Jerusalem to worship. Maybe they asked, Why are we going to Jerusalem? Are we there yet? How many more times do we have to go up to Jerusalem this week? And yet they were trained. They were taught. They were encouraged. They were discipled. We go up.
We respond to God's word. He has called us to worship, and we will respond.
I'm going to prick your conscience a little bit. I'm going to warn some of you. Don't take this personally. Where do our children most learn about God? Where do our kids and spouses learn the most about our God? Where is it that our co-workers will learn the most about our God? Where is it that our friends and our social connections will learn the most about our great God? In our homes and with us. It's with us. It's not at church.
Spoiler alert. Churches have wonderful programs. They have wonderful teachers and teachings, but they are only gathered together once a week on Sunday mornings and maybe a mid-week lesson. Alright, so three hours a week is what we get you up for. That's less than the average time of an NFL football game. That's less than nine holes on a golf course. Three hours. Three hours of cartoons on a Saturday morning from nine to noon. A three-hour drive going somewhere. My point is that our children, our spouses, our family do not learn the most about our God from coming to church worship and programs. They learn the most in our homes. That's where our kids learn the most about our God and learn about how significant or insignificant He is to our lives.
It is in our homes that our children see whether or not prayer is something that we run to when tragedy strikes, or if prayer is something for someone else to do on Sunday. It's in our homes that our children learn that the word of God is where we get our directives and our priorities, or that it's just a book on the shelf that occasionally gets cracked open. It is in our homes that our children, our spouses, and even ourselves, live out our relationship with our great God. Family worship in our homes is a good and godly thing.
We're worshiping on our way to worship. We're learning together as God's people in our own homes, even as we prepare, and we come together and we learn together.
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