Reaching Beyond the Walls… By Worshipping Christ Colossians 1:15-20 The first message in our 6-part series called Reaching Beyond the Walls. Sunday, October 19, 2014 Speaker: Nick Azzuolo

Colossians 1: The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16 For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. 17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. 19 For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

Phil. 2: And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth.

“I did not see that it is in the process of being worshipped that God communicates his presence to men.” -C.S. Lewis

King David’s ruling passion was to worship God One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to inquire in his temple. Psalm 27:4, ESV

Worship is the missing jewel of modern evangelicalism. A.W. Tozer

The most difficult lesson of the Christian life is learning how to continue “beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord….” Oswald Chambers

The question a) What does worshipping Christ mean to you? b) In your experience, what strategies or practices have you found helpful in worshipping Christ (Godhead)? c) What barriers do you encounter or consider important to avoid that may hinder your/our worship to Christ (Godhead)?

Helpful practices/strategies Posture of open hands when praying / contemplating. Examen prayer/Ignatian. Meeting with a spiritual director. Retreating from time to time to be with God. Setting up the alarm on my iPhone every 3 hours to remind me to have a thought about Christ.

Helpful practices/strategies Quiet meditation in solitude and silence, listening to the Lord. Letting God's word speak to my heart leads me to worship. Serving; being in the right place at the right time for others, leads me to worship because "my times are in His hands" and He has decide to use imperfect people like me to do His work in this world.

Helpful practices/strategies “Nature: Walking in the park, sitting by the river in early morning, letting Him speak to me through the beauties of nature.” “I love when my mind starts the day spontaneously quoting the hymn, ‘When morning gilds the skies, my heart awak’ning cries, May Jesus Christ be praised’.” “I consider it a gift when at night I can trace His presence with me over the day and express one more time my appreciation.”

Helpful practices/strategies “You have to be willing to work on it! Just like people don't just fall in love or become good at a sport without putting the effort to invest in those things. Your worship of Christ needs to be a conscious choice.” “Music has a way of bypassing the barriers that I put up in my heart. I think that in order to respond to God with our hearts, the truth about him (the seeing) has to reach the heart, and not just the mind. So I find that music helps with that.”

Helpful practices/strategies “The Lord helped me to have a renewed understanding of what worship is really all about, and this came through a renewal in my prayer life, then I was able to connect prayer and worship. This happened over some time. It often comes after a period of dryness, desert, disillusion...” “ I find that a daily reading and study of the Psalms reveals Christ and the Godhead to me.”

Helpful practices/strategies “ What this looks like practically in my life is intentionally learning about God through His word and through the teaching of His servants, and meditating on these truths with a thankful heart.” “Use the Book of prayer disciplines through a set of books for everyday of the year. They are written by Phyllis Tickle and are called The Divine Hours. You read, pray, meditate, praise, etc...4 times a day. Morning, Lunch, Supper and before Bed. They help immensely.”

Helpful practices/strategies “Admitting (confessing to him) my regular daily sins that keep me from wanting to be close to him or others - admitting my lack of trust, anger and impatience in relationships and my desire to serve myself and other gods instead of him.” “Participating in the Breaking of Bread, the one and only worship service of the NT.”

When we worship with a true heart we position ourselves to experience God’s deeper meaning for our lives. your life is hidden with Christ in God

Genesis 22: (emphasis added) 15 Then the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven, 16 and said, “By Myself I have sworn, declares the Lord, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 indeed I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your seed shall possess the gate of their enemies.

What worship means to me: "I believe that worship comes from my heart first and then from my lips. When I am reading in the Bible about Christ’s sufferings for me during His crucifixion, or His complete selflessness during His life, such as: His great love for the sick, the lepers, touching them, healing them; His compassion for the people, feeding them when He was utterly exhausted and hungry, I am moved and just want to say ‘thank you’ and put out my hands, palms-up, and say 'Lord, I love you, please make me more like You’.”

Barriers to avoid “Unrepentant sin and not getting together with like minded believers.” “Not being in prayer and the word daily.” “Ultimately, avoiding spiritual pride is the greatest danger that I find to worshipping God. Pride not only gets between God and me but it also gets between me and other Christians and the Bible is clear that you can't worship God fully when in conflict with other believers.”

Barriers to avoid “Limiting worship to certain activities (church activities like the 'worship meeting' or my 'quiet time' or certain kinds of music etc.) Or to places like the church buildings.” “Self-centered preoccupation with my needs, my circumstances, my sin, my …” “A closed heart, a hard heart that is not open to the voice of God instead of a soft open heart and open hands. (Nouwen's image of open hands instead of clenched fists never fails to speak to me).”

Barriers to avoid “We find it difficult when people arrive at the BoB late, especially when the emblems are being passed. It is a disturbance that breaks our focus and concentration.” “Idleness, isolation from the Body of Believers.” “The temptation to seek comfort in harmful vices during my times of distress instead of Christ, and the lure of my Old sin nature as spelled out in Colossians 3:5-11: anger, greed, slander, filthy language and more than one reference to sexual immorality.”

Barriers to avoid “What needs to be avoided: not being authentic! Whatever doesn't connect to reality makes worship harder. When truth is presented too simply, so that it doesn't map onto the complexity of my life, I can't worship.” “We are more interested in ourselves than we are in God. We are too busy, too easily distracted, do not set time aside for God.” “Noise, hyper-individualism, money and materialism.”

Barriers to avoid “What hinders me is the Tyranny of the urgent...things that are GOOD i.e. tasks in life, which, when added together can take the full 24hrs or more each day (work, sleep, cleaning, organizing, extra-curricular, shopping, maintaining) that I deem more important than slowing down to be with him.”

I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. John 10:10, ESV