Mc Crossan
If praise in church was oxygen then God would die from lack of it.
If praise in church was oxygen then God would die from lack of it.
Brendan Mc Crossan
30-11-2011
One
If praise in church was oxygen then God would die from lack of it. I know that sounds terrible, but, In churches that I have been to, praise to God is very limited, he is given only a certain amount of time to be glorified, and to me a Son of the Most High God, this is so very sad. My Father and your Father is worthy of more than that. He is the one who created you and I, and he made us in his own image, gave us multiple blessings and divine grace, he gave us gifts in abundance and he answers our prayers daily, there is never a moment when he is not with us listening intently to all we say to him, and answering our needs even before we realise that we have those needs
When it comes to praising God I sit in church most times in anguish, stifled by the lack of true worship and praise that God gets, his worship is set to an half hour or forty minutes, and that to me is shocking. And I witness the attitude of some of the worshippers, standing with their hands in their pockets as worship goes on, what an attitude that is, it is an attitude of lacklustre, and lack of belief that God is present.
I want to jump to my feet and shout out ‘glory, glory, glory’ to you my lord for hours, because of what you done for this once sinful man, someone who was so disgusting of himself and had a heart filled with evil, and that you changed me forever and gave me a purpose in life, to love and serve you as long as there is breath in my body. Hours would never be enough time to give thanks for what you have made me into, and that is your very own image.
I personally find that forty minutes is a disgrace to offer our God, who gave us his life’s blood, and then the church wonders why there are little healings and miracles. I don’t see churches where they give ten percent of their tithes and offerings in worship around Ireland anywhere, or they would be filled to the brim because people would know that God is always present there and where he is there are signs and wonders miracles and healings.
Some priests I know, pride themselves in the fact that they can make a Mass last twenty minutes, getting the people in and out as fast as they can, why bother having a service at all, and sad to say some people have that get me in and get me out even faster mentality. Why bother going if you can’t be bothered to be there, it’s just a habit of a lifetime, it’s not seeking God or his kingdom. I am not criticizing those priests they don’t know Jesus personally, or they would never rush through with the Mass, they would loving and adoringly desire to be in the presence of God.
Two
Can I ask you?
Can I ask you a question here? Would you be willing to give God, two hours and forty minutes as a minimum of praise and worship, or is getting the spuds into you more important? Or perhaps going out for a meal with someone including your family? Maybe getting to the pub after church is what is on your mind. Or is getting out of the service quickly, having done your Sunday duty what you wish to do?
Remember something here; you are the one who is always asking God for favours for your family, asking that he bless them. But are you prepared to give your worship time to God in fellowship with others in church. Thank God he does not need oxygen to survive, I gave that analogy to show how little we Christians give God praise and honour in our church services. And yet scripture says God dwells in the praises of his people.
Some people from the church that I go to, were in Malawi, Africa a few months ago; they were amazed to discover that most of the people walked for five hours or more to come to church, they spent at least five hours in church in worship, with different bands and musicians taking it in turns to lead the worship, and then they walked five hours or more home again, that is worship, true worship. “Fifteen hours” of genuine worship. They have no television programs or anything else to distract them, they have nothing, but give everything, they have a love for God that surpasses what most western call worship. They are the true believers, the true worshippers, and I get frustrated because the churches here won’t give God more than two hours for a whole service or for the most, even less.
The western church is a joke compared to what these poor people are prepared to do to get to their service and to participate in their service and then to walk back from their service probably praying and praising God on their coming and their going and during. I seen also from letters I receive from Reinhardt Bonke ministries, photos of 300,000 to 500,000 people who gather in the pouring monsoon rains all day waiting on the service, sometimes for ten to twelve hours and sitting or standing in the rain and mud worshipping Jesus and his presence comes among them and hundreds, sometimes thousands are healed just by being in his presence. Aye but come on you wouldn’t expect us to do that would you? Sorry but I would, I would do it, so why should I not expect you to not do it also.
I love the lord and would give any amount of time necessary to get into his presence because I have been often in his presence and time is immaterial when I am there with him, time is meaningless I enjoy every moment that his awesome presence is with me, either on my own or in the body of Christ at a service filled with praise.
Remember two hours and forty minutes are not the ten percent of a full week but only one day out of a week.
That’s 168 hours in a week and he just asks for 2-40 minutes of you on one day a week, and that is too much to give him
Three
Give God the full works from your heart.
1-Peter-2:9-King-James-Version
But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light;
We are a chosen generation a royal priesthood and a peculiar people, who have been called to minister to God through worship and praise, what kind of priests are we, that for quite a lot couldn’t be bothered to spend two hours forty minutes before God in adoration and worship and praise. Praise is not boring or monotonous it is only monotonous when the music is rotten. God is the creator of music, he loves songs of all description sung to him and he goes with the flow, whether it is Reggie or pop or country style or rock. I heard yesterday on one of the God channels, a man saying that it is disgraceful for Christians to worship God with rap music, even if the words were giving praise, he said secular music is the only music that God approves.
And I say rubbish; this is religiosity at its best.
Many years ago when I was just a baby Christian some friends and I decided to take an hour out every lunch time to worship God and to see if we could get in contact with him, four of us gathered the first day and began singing the secular hymns to God and during this time God spoke to me and said, “We bore him with our music.” I nearly passed out; I never expected to hear that because we were singing hymns we just learned at the prayer meeting.
I stopped playing, sitting in shock, when Martian one of the men there asked me, ‘what’s wrong,’ and I told him and the other two what God just said. And we were perplexed and didn’t know what to say or do; but as I sat there I as usual began tootling on the guitar, playing quietly a rock rhythm on my guitar, that had just entered my mind, and quietly began singing to myself, ‘rock on Jesus,’ making words up as I went along, as the others discussed what God said; I was not even aware that I was doing this, until Martin asked me what was that tune I was playing and I became aware of what I was playing, and told him I was just tootling around, not thinking , then he began playing along with me playing little fancy lead bits and in a few minutes we were all singing ‘rock on Jesus’ making our own verses up as we went along. Then suddenly it dawned on me, God said, ‘we bored him with our music,’ we weren’t secular singers but rock and roll was our kind of music, and I realised we were enjoying what we were singing interspersed with, praise the lord, and glory and so, on worshipping God aloud and excited. And I knew then that God wanted us playing what we enjoyed and offer to him it up as our worship, and he done an amazing miracle for us later that night to show how pleased he was with our music. He later told me any music offered to him is acceptable to him as praise if offered from the heart. The full story is in another one of my Books. Now I don’t mean those foul disgusting sexual or profanity songs that we hear so much of today, but any clean decent song is acceptable to God no matter what the style of the music is as long as we are ministering to God. If God only wanted a certain style of music then we would still be stuck in the Psalms in their songs and lyrics of old. That seems to be where the music of worship stems from, from what I know. Worship from the heart for two hours and forty minutes is easy if people sing what they love best in the style that suits them.
Four
To get back
To get back to praise in church; I don’t see churches where they give ten percent of their tithes and offerings in worship around Ireland anywhere, or they would be filled to the brim with
genuine believers because people would know that God is always present there and where he is there are signs and wonders, miracles and healings. Some priests that I know personally, pride themselves in the fact that they can make a Mass last twenty minutes, getting the people in and out as fast as they can, why bother having a service at all, and sad to say some people have that get me in and get me out even faster mentality. Why bother going if you can’t be bothered to be there, it’s just a habit of a lifetime, it’s not seeking God or his kingdom. I am not criticizing those priests they don’t know Jesus, or they would never rush through with the Mass, they would loving and adoringly desire to be in the presence of God.
Amplified-Bible-Exodus15:1-3
The Lord is my Strength and my Song, and He has become my Salvation; this is my God, and I will praise Him, my father's God, and I will exalt Him.
God deserves to be worshipped and praised because he is God, just for himself alone and not because of what he does for us, he is our salvation and that deserves at least an hour’s praise and worship every Sunday never mind every day. The fact the God sacrificed his Son so you could get into heaven is worthy of at least an hour worship. The fact that God made you righteous and gave you right standing with himself every second of the day is worth praising him for.
How I wish God would show every Christian Hell and the horrors of it when they first become Christians, and help them realise that he rescued them from this place of eternal horror, and then they might find it worthwhile in their hearts to give him an hour and a half praise and worship. Then I wish Christians could go and read their bibles and see for themselves that God has given them, gifts and blessings, then they might believe it was worthwhile to give him another half an hour, making that two hours.
After that how I wish Christians could see for themselves that God actually joined them together with his Son Jesus as one person and that they are seated in the heavenly places, and are in that place of highest privilege. Then and maybe then they might find it in their hearts to give him two hours and forty minutes the tithing that God desires from us.
Psalm-95:2
Amplified-Bible
Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise-to Him with songs of praise!
Christians could be thanking him for all those wonderful things I wrote about and so come with thanksgiving, making a joyful noise. Did you notice it never said with a beautiful musical sound, but noise, for not everyone can sing in tune so God allows a beautiful noise? And come with songs of praise, heartfelt enjoyable music. Then we could do as this next Psalm says.
Psalm-89:16
Good-News-Translation
Because of you they rejoice all day long, and they praise you for your goodness.
Psalm 71-8-Good News Translation (GNT)
8 All day long I praise you, and proclaim your glory.
Could you proclaim this scripture for yourself, Psalm-71-8?
Because of God they rejoiced all day long, and praised him for his goodness. Surly you don’t expect people to praise God all day long; it was bad enough when you said two hours and forty minutes, now you say we could praise him all day long.
Is God not worth praising all day long, after all he gave you twenty four hours in every day, if he stopped giving you the attention he does you would be dead, he never stops thinking about you says the word. His love never quits.
Psalm-136:4-22-The-Message-Bible
Thank the miracle-working God, His love never quits. The God whose skill formed the cosmos, His love never quits. The God who laid out earth on ocean foundations, His love never quits. The God who filled the skies with light, His love never quits. The sun to watch over the day, His love never quits. Moon and stars as guardians of the night, His love never quits.
How can we not praise God all day long after all look at what he does for us, his love for us never quits, never ends is eternal.
I have been going on annual weekends for twenty five years, and where the praises of God were going on for hours and hours, with people singing and dancing before their God, and the manifest presence of God was demonstrated by healings, signs and wonders. Those people found no difficulty in responding to God’s presence in worship, they loved every moment and the priest who was supposed to give his talks sacrificed his talks many times so that worship could continue uninterrupted; he knew the importance of loving the lord corporately as a body joined together in worship.
And I think of the many years I have been going to that place where praise continued on for hours and people of all ages found it no problem to dance, sing, sit, or to be still or lay in the presence of God. And I hear in church today, ‘you don’t expect people to worship God for two hours and forty minutes’ ‘that would be ridiculous’ ‘to expect people to come and take part.’ people would leave church they would never come, it’s too long.
My opinion on that is if they don’t have the enthusiasm to come and worship their God for two hours and forty minutes then they have no real love for their God who gave them eternal life in heaven. Where has their love gone, I am sixty four years old and I am more excited about Jesus and God and the Holy Spirit now than when I first got excited thirty five years ago. I am reminded of the scripture that said some seed fell by the wayside, and what happened to it, and this is what I see in churches today.
Jesus Explains the Parable of the Sower
Matthew-13-18- Listen, then, and learn what the parable of the sower means.19Those who hear the message about the Kingdom but do not understand it are like the seeds that fell along the path. The Evil One comes and snatches away what was sown in them.20 The seeds that fell on rocky ground stand for those who receive the message gladly as soon as they hear it.21 But it does not sink deep into them, and they don't last long. So when trouble or persecution comes because of the message, they give up at once.22 The seeds thatfellamongthornbushesstandforthosewhohearthemessage;buttheworriesabout this life and the love for riches choke the message, and they don't bear fruit.23 And the seeds sown in the good soil stand for those who hear the message and understand it: they bear fruit, some as much as one hundred, others sixty, and others thirty.
Which seed are you? I pray that you’re the good seed, sown in good soil, God planted good seed into your life, and staying close to God makes that seed grow and bear fruit for God.
Five
My heart is breaking right now, I am saddened to say that most Christians could not be bothered to spend two hours and forty minutes with their God, and if you tried to bring it up in church you would be ridiculed and shut up promptly by your church leaders.
Dear God give us leaders, Priests and pastors who are hungry for you, who can’t get enough of you, that a twenty four hour day is not enough time to give you glory. Give us men and women who have a longing in their hearts for spending time with you, whose only desire is to search for you and keep on searching after they have found you, for to have found God is not the end of our search but only the beginning.
I believe that those in charge of us don’t know God to the depth of love that he has for us, that they could; and if they stopped playing religion or church, trying to draw people into their church filling it up so they can feel satisfied within themselves, and only wished to draw those into church that want to spend time with their God, they would have a powerful ministry and not church, for the sake of church. I know that I would anger some by what I say; they would say you have to have church, that is organised and disciplines and structured, within a certain time frame; but where does God fit in. Are they fitting God in to the church, or is God fitting them into his body.
What sacrifices are the church members willing to make to come into the presence of God, are they willing to give him an hour or two or the ten percent of their day in worship.
Is church playing church, or is church God centred doing what will please God, sacrificing their self in every way to please God. Only church can answer that. In the meantime I still strive to have church look at giving genuine praise and worship to God.
Psalm -71-22-NIV Bible- I will praise you with the harp for your faithfulness, my God; I will sing praise to you with the lyre, Holy One of Israel. 23 My lips will shout for joy when I sing praise to you—I whom you have delivered24 My tongue will tell of your righteous acts all day long, for those who wanted to harm mehave been put to shame and confusion.
I will sing praises to you oh my God, as long as there is breath in my body. I will talk to everyone who listens, about all the great things that you have done for us; I will praise you with my guitar and songs and glorify your name forever for your kindness to me is awesome to behold.
Amplified-Bible-Hebrews13:14-16 Through Him, therefore, let us constantly and at all times offer up to God a sacrifice of praise, which is the fruit of lips that thankfully acknowledge and confess and glorify His name.
God’s word says praise is a sacrifice; it is not always easy to praise God especially when you have a devil doing his best to put you down and put heaviness upon you. even in corporate worship there are times when you will struggle to praise and that is the time when it is a sacrificeandgivesGodthegreatestglorybecauseyouputhimaboveyourfeelingsandemotions.
Psalm 118-New International Version- 19 Open for me the gates of the righteous; I will enter and give thanks to the LORD. 20 This is the gate of the LORD through which the righteous may enter. 21 I will give you thanks, for you answered me; you have become my salvation.
Open up the gates of righteousness the gates into the temple of the lord, thanksgiving lets you enter there, then you enter his courts with praise, coming right into his presence. You are righteous as I have shown you in fifteen of my other books on righteousness and so the way is open for you the righteous of the lord to enter his gates and receive a glad welcome from your father God. If only church could realise that righteousness and thanksgiving is the way to enter through the outer walls of God’s temple home and praise opens the door to the courts where he is sitting. How can the church not see this, righteous thanksgiving gets you in the gates and praise allows you to enter his courts.
I cannot stress this enough thanksgiving and praise brings “you” through the gates and into the courts, do you wish to go there into the courts where God is? then try giving thanks with a grateful heart and try shouting out his praises before you enter his courts, because there is a terrible noise coming from the courts of angels and angelic beings shouting out his praise, and trumpets blaring and cymbals crashing, and peoples of all nations singing out his praise and the elders are continually worshipping him and you are welcomed into all this, because he is God your father.
You may say this is not the way my church does things, and you will be right, but is this the way God wants you to do things. The church of Christ Jesus at this moment in time is not
willing to change and to offer two hours and forty minutes to God in praise thanksgiving and worship as a tenth of the tithing.
I long to see the day when I can go to a church where they are praising God for hours on end and don’t tell me people won’t accept this, not when I have seen this happen every year for twenty five years that I was there. People loved it praising God, because those people needed him, they needed hishealing touch and mercy and presencebecausetheirhusbands,wives,and children were being gunned down and bombed and murdered all through the troubles, and the meetings were mixed Catholic and protestant, so they both had a common denominator - Jesus Christ, lord and saviour. They could dance and sing and worship together for hours on end and still keep going even when it was over, they loved God as a corporate body, as part of the one body of Christ Jesus.
Love drives us to worship for hours on end and not get bored. Church can get very boring at times, and drive us away; love never bores us, loving God is not boring but awesome.
Psalm 81-1-Good News Translation (GNT)
A Song for a Festival Shout for joy to God our defender; sing praise to the God of Jacob 2 Start the music and beat the tambourines; play pleasant music on the harps and the lyres.3 Blow the trumpet for the festival,
Every Sunday should be a festival; offering our lives to God as a living sacrifice.
Romans 12-1-Easy-to-Read Version (ERV)
Give Your Lives to God
1 So I beg you, brothers and sisters, because of the great mercy God has shown us, offer your lives as a living sacrifice to him—an offering that is only for God and pleasing to him. Considering what he has done, it is only right that you should worship him in this way. 2Don’t change yourselves to be like the people of this world, but let God change you inside with a new way of thinking. Then you will be able to understand and accept what God wants for you. You will be able to know what is good and pleasing to him and what is perfect.
Is there any oxygen in the room yet?
Amen