Worship Is Life: Finding Our Identity In the Story of Worship

By Todd Marshall

Although “worship” has become a word for the church used to describe only a small portion of its true meaning, our spiritual heart is continually in a posture of worship. We are either worshiping God or ourselves. Worship Is Life—Finding Our Identity in the Story of Worship unpacks the biblical pattern of worship (revelation and response), illustrates the ongoing battle for our worship, and helps believers find their true identities in living a life of worship. “In Worship Is Life, Todd Marshall encourages the reader to answer the call to organize all of one’s life around the God who made us, loves us, and gave his only Son as the model par excellence of a life completely submitted to worship.” —Dr. James R. Hart, President, Robert E. Webber Institute for Worship Studies

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu Publishing Services
• Release date: Mar 11, 2016
• ISBN: 9781483444703

Book preview

University

WORSHiP iS

LiFE

FINDING OUR iDENTITY IN THE STORY OF WORSHIP

TODD MARSHALL

Copyright © 2016 Todd Marshall.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted by any means – whether auditory, graphic, mechanical, or electronic – without written permission of both publisher and author, except in the case of brief excerpts used in critical articles and reviews. Unauthorized reproduction of any part of this work is illegal and is punishable by law.

Unless otherwise specified, scripture quotations used in this book are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

The NIV and New International Version trademarks are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark office by International Bible Society. Use of either trademark requires the permission of International Bible Society.

Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from The New King James Version / Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers., Copyright 1982. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-4834-4471-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4834-4470-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016900261

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Lulu Publishing Services rev. date: 04/18/2017

Contents

Dedication

Foreword

Introduction

Chapter 1 Worship Is Life

Chapter 2 The Battle For Our Worship

Chapter 3 Identity And Security

Chapter 4 Living A Life Of Worship

Chapter 5 A Vision For Corporate Worship

Chapter 6 God’s Provision

Acknowledgments

About The Author

Interested In Hosting Worship Is Life Ministry?

Notes

DEDICATION

"He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the LORD."

Proverbs 18:22

To my wife, Brenda, a Proverbs 31 woman.

I love you and thank you for faithfully standing

with me as together we have discovered the

eternal truth that worship is life.

FOREWORD

Worship has always been a big part of my life. I have come to believe, in fact, that worship encompasses all of life. The first chapter of the Bible affirms that we are here on purpose. The last chapter affirms that Jesus is at the center of that purpose. What connects them all – purpose and Jesus – is a life of worship. Worship is more than the atmosphere of heaven. It is the heartbeat of God’s people here on earth, our moment by moment response to a God who has graciously and clearly revealed himself to us.

I am just old enough to remember when three hymns and a chorus were pretty much standard fare for Sunday morning worship. It represented worship that was theological, testimonial, and musical – a response to God that, indeed, laid lasting foundations in my life. But as a young adult, I spiritually longed for more. It was the newly emerging praise and worship movement that would satisfy that hunger and introduce me to a whole new understanding of what worship could be. Worship became for me more than declarations about God, but the adoration of God. It was as if the post-service prayer ministry experiences that I was so accustomed to growing up were moving into the first part of church services, creating a holistic congregational worship encounter.

Today, both declarational and adorational worship expressions are still woven into the spiritual fabric of my life. But after years of living and pastoring, I realized again that there was more. Beyond singing songs on Sundays or listening to worship music on our phones, worship is meant to permeate life itself. The Apostle Paul clues us in to this when, for example, he exhorts slaves (i.e., employees) not to go to work to serve a boss, but to serve and honor Christ himself (Ephesians 6:5). That is worship in its broadest sense. Everything we do, even our jobs, is because of him and can be for him. No wonder the powers of hell are aligned against the very idea of us living and loving that way.

Worship is life. That is what you will encounter in the pages of this book. Here Todd Marshall charts for us a wonderful journey into the heart of God for his glory and our transformation. I have known Todd personally for many years. He is an adept musician and skilled corporate worship leader. But he has also grown to understand worship in a very holistic and theologically robust way. May this book ignite a new fire in your own heart for responding to God’s revelation of himself in a way that transforms identity, purpose, and life itself.

Dr. James Bradford

General Secretary of the Assemblies of God

INTRODUCTION

"There is nothing new under the sun."

Ecclesiastes 1:9

The book of Ecclesiastes states that there is nothing new under the sun. This timeless nugget of truth applies to biblical worship in many ways. So, how could there possibly be a need for another book about worship? I asked myself that question more times than I care to remember. Having read numerous books about worship, including devotional, historical, theological, and practical, I have barely scratched the surface regarding the wealth of books that have been written about worship by brilliant and passionate authors.

But consider this. While the sun is always shining, our view of the sun does not always reflect its true reality. Sometimes our view of the sun is hazy or intermittent as clouds float past. Other times our view of the sun is completely blocked out by dense fog or an overcast sky. Half of the time the sun is shining on the other side of the earth, and we are completely in the dark of night. My desire is that every reader could have the sun shine brighter on the pattern, the purpose, and the pursuit of biblical worship.

Biblical worship, God’s description of worship, envelops all of one’s life and permeates every moment of every day because God describes worship the same way he describes our relationship with him. Every person has a story. Every person is on a journey. Every person is in a life-and-death battle for his or her worship; his or her relationship with God. Many of us have been conditioned to look at this battle through the lens of good vs. evil or right vs. wrong. These are certainly manifestations, but at the core of biblical worship the battle is between worshiping God and worshiping self; between a God-focused relationship and a self-focused relationship.

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a greater reality is that every moment we are alive, our spiritual heart is engaged

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Allow me to illustrate. Every moment we are alive, our physical heart is engaged. It is beating, working, and pumping blood through our veins. But a greater reality is that every moment we are alive, our spiritual heart is engaged. Our spiritual heart is always in a posture of worshiping someone – God Almighty or our self. The moment by moment decision of who we bow our heart to is tied directly to where we find our identity. How we find our identity in God is told in the story of worship. When you consider what is at stake, and the fact that we are so conditioned to live for ourselves that we have difficulty recognizing it, the topic of worship cannot be overdone. Scripture reveals to us that worship is life because worship is relationship with God. It is not hyperbole to say that nothing matters more; for us and the people around us.

This book contains a healthy dose of biblical teaching and is illustrated with stories from my life: personal, family, and ministry. It is concise in that it reflects the core of the message, mission, and vision that the Lord has placed on our lives and in our hearts for the church and for the world. The God of the universe, who mysteriously exists as Spirit, Father, and