Genuine Worship Series: Trusting Obedience

Genuine Worship Series: Trusting Obedience

Amen, let's take our Bibles. Please turn with me to, we are going to be drawing from two very familiar verses of Scripture this morning and they're found in Proverbs chapter 3. Proverbs chapter 3, we are in a study on genuine worship for the past two Sundays and we're continuing this Lord's Day. In Proverbs chapter 3, and when we arrive there, I would like to look together at verses 5 and 6. Proverbs chapter 3, verses 5 and 6. And it's here that we read these words, trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding in all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths. Let's mark our Bibles to these words we've just read now here in Proverbs chapter 3 this morning.

And I want to take the moment to ask the Lord's blessing on this passage. Heavenly Father we thank you for this opportunity we have to be in your house. Thank you for all those gathered here today. We see a number of visitors, and we're just grateful for their attendance today. We just pray, Lord, that in our thoughts and our very motives of our hearts, Lord, that it would be because you see those Lord that you would be pleased with the worship that we would offer up a genuine sacrifice of praise today from our hearts.

Lord, we thank you that you have, your word is just as true today as the very day that it was written. And we're thankful that these words that we've just read this morning are very much, they very much apply to our lives where we're living here in the year 2026. The truth found in this passage, help us to understand it this morning, not only to understand it in our minds, but help us to apply it to our hearts and lives, Lord, that we may be blessed and may be a channel of blessing to others that we come in contact with. And of course, Lord, first and foremost, that our lives may be a sweet smell and a blessing to your own heart, not because the blessing originates with us, but because we are we want to be we want to be in your will we want to to do what you'd have us to do and to think the way you'd have us to think. We pray these things now in Jesus name amen.

As I mentioned we've been looking at what is genuine worship to the Lord and as we know worship this is a house of worship we gather to worship in but worship is much more extends beyond the house of God into our how we live our lives every day it extends into our very thinking our words our actions they're all part of our worship to the Lord. We've made it very clear I mean the scripture is very clear the understanding of what worship is is literally to bow down and to prostrate oneself before before the Lord because he is certainly worthy of our our worship he is certainly worthy of us giving our best to him.

But this morning I want to see one aspect another aspect of worship and that is trusting the Lord, trusting obedience to the Lord. Biblical trust isn't blind confidence in some sort of feeling that we got somewhere along the way. It's actually confidence that God will do what He says He will do. It's the faithfulness of God like we saw this morning in his confidence even in the face of adversity. We read that there's some ground the seed of the Word of God is sown on and that ground typifies the heart human heart and it and it shows that the word doesn't actually take root in that heart it springs up but in time of tribulation they fall away the scripture says because there's no root there's there's no root there. We have to be rooted in something more than our feelings we have to be rooted in something more than, everything seems to be going my way right now. That would be a fair weather trust. It's easy to trust when the sun is shining, right? But what about when the clouds come? What about when the storms of life come? That is the test of faith. It's the test of worship, true genuine worship before the Lord. To bow the knee to him to bow our hearts before him and trust his word even when there is no proverbial herd or animals in the stall and fruit on the vine and everything is not going swimmingly we might say.

The circumstances are not in our favor it seems. The Bible is full of examples of this kind of worship. The Bible is full of examples of those who did not trust in their own understanding but instead trusted in the Lord with all of their heart even even when there was not much to hang their hat on so to speak in the in the in the appearance of things in the horizontal appearance. We could go all the way back to the beginning in the book of Genesis and and and see. Not that I want you to turn there. I would like you to turn to Hebrews chapter 11, verse 4, though. Hebrews 11, verse 4. And it's here that we see in verse 4 that, by faith, Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts and by it he being dead yet speaketh. Why was Abel's sacrifice more excellent than Cain's? Why was it accepted by God but what was the difference? Well it had nothing to do with Cain him or Abel himself, it had everything to do with trusting and obeying God's plan that he had set forth.

And we noticed that we don't read the actual words where the Lord came to Abel and said, now Abel and Cain, I've got you both here in the same place and I'm going to tell you exactly what kind of offering you should offer. But I think it was even, it was very clear even going back to their parents that God was going to require a blood sacrifice. He was going to require a blood sacrifice and that it was not, it was not going to be acceptable to offer the fruit of the ground. That was not what the Lord was looking for. And we noticed that Abel obviously trusted God here because, as it says, he offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. The the very clear implication here is Cain, you ought to have known what kind of offering you should have brought, but I'm going to give you a second chance. I will give you another opportunity. Sin layeth at the door, but if you will just obey, if you will just do what is right, then this whole matter can be reconciled. This whole matter you can be made right with me and with your brother.

But he proceeded, of course, as we well know, Cain proceeded in his envy and jealousy of his brother to take his brother's life. Knowing brothers, I would find it hard to believe that there were not conversations that were had that indicated to Abel that Cain was not happy with him. I would find it hard to believe that he just went from zero to 100 and just murdered his brother upon the first thought entering his mind, you know, I think I'll just go murder him. No, I think there was a process of a build-up to that. There was there was a jealousy, there was an even a bitterness and a hatred that grew in his heart for his brother until he finally came to the point. Did Abel say to him? Did Abel, I'm not saying he did, I'm just asking the question did Abel say well Cain you can just you could just get a lamb like I did and you can offered as well. There's nothing good about me in this other than that I'm just obeying the Lord. I'm trusting the Lord's Word and obeying Him here in this. Well Abel died in faith. Abel died in faith. He believed. I believed that he believed what is called often called the proto-evangelium. He believed Genesis 3 15 that the Lord's promise was that he was going to through the seed of the woman, he was going to crush the head of the serpent. He was going to ultimately make a way to overcome that serpent through faith in this promised seed that was coming.

We see Noah, for instance. Noah was a man, and what I'm getting at by giving some examples here this morning of trusting in the Lord with all thine heart, Abel trusted even though it even though his brother did not understand or agree with his course of action he obeyed God because he trusted what God said in his word not because of a feeling not because of a will not because of what somebody else was doing but because this is what God says in his word I'm trusting that. Noah's faith caused him to be moved with fear because of what God had said was going to happen. We know that very well. Noah believed God even though it cost him ridicule. It cost him scoffing and persecution.

We do not ever, and here's another example, we do not specifically read, and they, you things to Noah. We don't read all of that, but the implication is very clear in Peter's writing that as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the coming of the Son of Man. It's going to be just like that. There will be scoffers, there will be mockers, there are going to be those that are going to come and they're going to rail against those who trust in God's word it's going to be increasingly not that we we should despise the shame but it's going to be increasingly shameful or the shame is going to be put upon those who trust in what the word says.

Trust in the Lord with all thine heart why do we trust in the Lord in the first place because he like he did with the woman at the well. Come see a man that told me all that ever I did. Look, God knows me. God has, God has identified me. God has called me out in his Word and I believe that all have sinned and I believe that I am a sinner that only could be saved by the grace of God. I believe this book is the answer to all of life's issues because it is God's Word. It is the very Word of God. It's not merely the words of men, even though it was recorded by men, God giving them the words to write.

Abraham. Abraham was not always in Canaan. Abraham is a man who grew up in a family of idol worshippers. You know that. Abraham grew up in Ur of the Chaldees. He grew up in the land of Ur and he was a man that was just doing what I think about, for instance, today I was hearing a testimony recently of a man who grew up in Islam. His background, he said he heard people from time to time come with all their arguments to talk about how ridiculous and silly Mohammed was and all these kind of things. And he said, that's not going to win any Muslims over to Christ. To hear, to win a battle of words, and yes, Muhammad was wrong, but what's right about Christ? What is there about this Christ that you say that you worship that should make me leave Muhammad and be willing to come out here and trust in this Bible because my family's going to disown me if I follow what you say is right. Why should I trust in Jesus? Why should I trust in this Bible? Why should I trust that? And thank God he said over time, the man who was witnessing to him was very patient with him and shared the truths of Christ with him and he came ultimately to put his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

But Abraham, Abraham would not have left Ur of the Chaldees. He would not have left the land of his nativity unless he believed it was actually God speaking to him and calling him and he did hear God calling him and he came out and he, of course, there were lapses in his trust of God and his obedience to God, but he believed God's words. It was counted to him. Romans, Paul took all the chapters in the book of Romans to talk about Abraham, and he believed God and it was counted to him for righteousness. He trusted God's Word. He trusted God's Word.

There are many examples. Jacob, Moses, Shadrach and Meshach and Abednego, Daniel, Esther. We could go down the list. So many that trusted God even in the face. And what I want us to see this morning is that God wants and is pleased by his, pleased when his children trust him even in the face of certain death. Even in the face certain death.

Look at Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. They were not what? They were not careful to answer the king concerning the matter of bowing down before that image that had been set up. Why? Because trusting God does not mean bad things won't happen to you. Trusting God does not mean that adversity will not come. Trusting God does not mean that you will not be disowned by those who formerly were very close to you. It does not mean that you will not have health problems. It does not mean that you cannot lose your job. It doesn't mean that your country could go from a first world country to a third world country. It does not mean that any of those things can't happen. What it does mean is that the Lord, we're trusting the Lord will not leave us or forsake us. And that's what Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego trusted. That's what Noah trusted in. We see that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego said they weren't careful to answer the king because they knew the Lord could deliver them from the fiery furnace. And even if he as David would say, the valley of the shadow of death. He will be with them through the valley of the shadow. And he was, it was the image, the figure, the form of that fourth man in the fire as like unto the Son of God that was with them as they walked or stood in that fire.

And I will say that if we truly are trusting in God, we're not leaning to our own understanding. I am a person and I think the way even my personality I'm wired, maybe some people are more like this, I like to plan things out in advance. I like to know how everything's going to go. I like to have it all in nice little boxes and make sure that this is not going to happen before that happens and everything is in order. I mean some people aren't like that. We have, you know, child that's not like that it's just well let's let's go with the adventure of it you know whatever is gonna happen is gonna happen and we'll just we'll just land where we land that's not me I'd like to have it all ordered out and yet if I'm truly trusting the Lord that doesn't mean that that that aspect of my personality just goes away completely but I've got to surrender even that to the Lord's wisdom and the Lord's plan. I can't trust my own understanding.

I hear people say I don't ever want to end up in the nursing home. Well I don't either. I don't want to end up in the nursing home. I don't think, probably nobody in here just says you know I just can't wait till I get you know a certain age and I end up at you know skilled care nursing. I just can't wait for that but if we trust in the Lord with all of our heart he will he will he's gonna be with us even in the worst circumstance that's the confidence that we have even in the most difficult challenging thing we can come into the Lord's not gonna forsake us and and so that we may boldly say the Lord is my helper right I may boldly say I will not be afraid of what man can do unto me because the Lord is not going to leave me alone. He's not going to just abandon me and leave me in this circumstance all by myself.

And so this is this is that confidence that those men and these women had in the Scriptures that was that was deeper than just everything's going well today so I trust the Lord. No, that was not the kind of trust that they had. This was a this is the ability to even worship the Lord in the storm. This is what the Lord was trying to teach his disciples when the winds and the waves were going. And he said, Oh ye of little faith. Oh ye of little faith. Couldn't you, why can't you just trust me? I'm in the boat with you. Why can't you just trust me? I haven't left you just because the storms are going. I'm here with you.

Well, Esther had that spirit of, if I perish, I perish. The Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego had that spirit of, if we die, we die. And so we see that Elijah, Elijah's another one. He was a fan who who did get for a time depressed because his life was on the line. In some ways he just wished that he would just go ahead and die because it was so difficult. Jezebel seeking his life, seeking his life. John the Baptist, his faith did cost him his life, didn't it? His faith did cost him his life. His head, he was ultimately put in prison and then his head was taken and yet even we must trust the Lord with the timetable of all of that. We must trust the Lord with the timetable. He will not allow, he will not allow anything to happen to our lives before it's time to happen. Before it's in his plan, in his perfect sovereign will for that to come to pass in our lives. And so we may trust him.

We know. We know, not we feel. I have this warm feeling. We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

Annie Johnson Flint, you may, you know this I'm sure, we have it in our, I think Brother Pete and Sister Brother Ronnie and Sister Andrea have sung this a number of times over the years. God hath not promised skies always blue, flower strewn pathways all our lives through. God hath not promised sun without rain, joy without sorrow, peace without pain. God if not promised we shall not know toil and temptation trouble and woe. He hath not told us we shall not bear many a burden many a care. God if not promised smooth roads and wide swift easy travel needing no guide. Never a mountain rocky and steep never a river turbid and deep but God have promised strength for the day rest for the labor light for the way grace for the trials help from above and I guess this was the original version we have a little different we're unfailing sympathy we have kindness undying love unfailing sympathy undying love.

What do we say worship is to bow down before the Lord to bow down before the Lord we are here today again in corporate worship the Lord the Lord sees right down to every one of our hearts before him he knows he knows our very thoughts he knows our motives. He seeks genuine worship, not… yes there is a form, there's an order to worship, but he's not looking merely for the form of worship. He's looking for the worship in spirit and in truth according to his revealed will. He wants us to worship according to the way that he set forth in a way so it will be pleasing to him.

Well, walking by faith, walking by faith when we leave these doors today is an act of prostrating ourselves before the Lord. Instead of following or leaning to my own understanding tomorrow warning. When a certain set of temptations may come to me in the day, I'm going to bow to the will, the revealed will, of my master. I'm going to bow to him in trusting that he knows better than whatever I may feel about something that's said to me or some circumstance that arises or some physical pain in my body or some financial trial that is, we're tempted with all these various different things that come at different times in our lives. I'm tempted to worry or tempted to complain or tempted to even just simply seek out to try to work it out and my own strength, to try to work out the circumstances in a way, and God will allow us to come to the end of that rope. God will allow us to come to the end of trying to work it out, and there's no more words that can be said, not enough money that can be paid, there's not enough human wisdom that can be pulled together to solve this situation. It's just only the Lord. Only the Lord's going to be able to resolve it. Only the Lord's going to be able to help us through this. It is not our wisdom. It's not our understanding that we'll be able to come through the matter. Trusting and obeying the Lord even and especially when in the midst of the test of life is pleasing and honoring to Him.

Let's look over in Hebrews 11 though, verse 6, we were already mentioning that passage, that verse there with Abel. Let's look in verse 6 there, Hebrews 11, verse number 6. Hebrews 11, verse 6 says, But without faith it is impossible to please him. For he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder them that diligently seek him. Two things here. Number one, we must believe that God is. We must believe that God is who he says he is. Well, God is just. God is merciful. God is holy. God is patient and loving. He's long-suffering, but He's also… He cannot abide with sin. He must judge sin. And that's just who God has revealed Himself to be. I must believe that He is the existing one, the ever-living one, and that He is who He says He is.

But there's also this truth here that He is, we must believe, not only that He is, all that He says He is. Not only that He is the God that He's revealed Himself to be, but that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. He rewards the trusting heart that clings to him, nor any ill forebodes as we sing. He rewards that trust.

Trust is not some sort of a passive thing, although it's not something we perform at another on strength but it's it is it is we are actively like like waiting on the Lord waiting is an action right we're waiting on the Lord we're not just well there's nothing we can do you know I guess we'll just pray no we are praying and trusting and waiting on the Lord because we believe that he is and we believe that he will do what he says he will do even though he may Terry in doing it, at least by our understanding. You know, Mary and Martha waiting for the Lord to come and help their brother and then he died. But Lord, if you had come earlier, well, I had a reason for not coming earlier. I had a reason for, you must even trust me now. Abraham had to trust to learn ultimately to trust the Lord and he said even though my son even though my son may die on this altar I believe that God is able to raise him up again I don't know how see trusts trusting the Lord we we don't know how because if we knew how then we will be leaning on our own understanding we will be leaning on how we're going to make it work but trusting the Lord in the face of what seems impossible, we may just say, Lord, I don't know how you're going to raise the sun up, but I know you can do it. I believe it. I believe it. I believe you.

Job said in chapter 13, look over there with me, Job 13 and verse number 15, Job 13 verse number 15, he says, you know it well, though he slay me, though he slay me, yet will I trust in him. That's that That's that heart of worship, even in a circumstance where the friends were not creating an environment conducive for worship. They were not saying words that were friends of grace to help Job onto the Lord. They were not speaking words of edification. But though he slay me, yet will I trust in him. But I will maintain mine own ways before him. He also shall be my salvation. That was his confidence. The Lord is my salvation. He shall be my salvation, for an hypocrite shall not come before him.

Well, hypocrites don't diligently seek the Lord. Hypocrites appear, they like to appear to fast, and they like to appear to give alms so that people will see them, right? But it's not really the spirit of worship. It's not truly the worship in spirit and in truth that the Lord is looking for. It's just an appearance. It's a facade. And this is what Job is saying that, Lord, you know. You know that I'm trusting in you even though you slay me. He was making it clear that he was not hypocritical before the Lord. He didn't want to be a hypocrite. He didn't believe he was a hypocrite. And Job, when it says that He feared God and eschewed evil. Among that, in that listing, we could put hypocrisy in there, and he hated hypocrisy. He eschewed it, he hated, he avoided it like the plague.

I don't believe I am it, I don't want to be a hypocrite. I will trust the Lord even though he slay me. He even told his wife, why are you speaking like that? You're speaking like one of the foolish women. Should not the Lord… Basically, shouldn't we trust him? I know he didn't use that word there, but shouldn't we trust him in good times as well as in bad times? Just because the Lord took away the… I don't know why, I wish he hadn't in one sense, but I feared that this day might come, but it has come and the Lord has done it. And so we must commit ourselves to him even in this, even this low point.

The Lord remembers our frame, doesn't He? He knows that we're but dust. He's touched. Jesus Christ is touched with the feeling of our infirmities. And as we think of that, what is the greatest thing that we can do even as we learned as a child? We are weak, but He is strong. Well, we can trust in Him. We ought to trust in Him. We ought to diligently trust in Him. Lean not to thine own understanding, but in all thy ways acknowledge Him, even to confess Him before men, and He will direct thy paths. He will direct thy paths. The Lord will make the way plain because He doesn't want us figuring out the way. Sheep will just aimlessly wonder, you know, they'll run to and fro, but if we trust in the Lord, He will guide us. And though we walk in a way unknown, we walk with the known Shepherd. And that's all that matters. The Shepherd's always going to be there. His voice will guide us if we would just follow that voice. Trust in his words. Don't listen to the hireling. Don't listen to your feelings. Don't listen to whatever else is out there. Trust in him. That is well pleasing unto him. That is genuine worship.

How hypocritical it would be for us to come here on Sunday or Wednesday in the Lord's house and say that we trust the Lord and then Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, our lives say the exact opposite. Our lives say that we're not really trusting the Lord. We can all think in our lives and perhaps have thoughts of shame of times where we didn't trust Him as we ought to. Maybe we can even think back over this week and think of an instance of where we and completely trust the Lord in something. But may we worship the Lord by trusting him holy. We said it this morning, they who trust him holy, find him holy true. God help us. Let's pray.

Thank you, Father, for this reminder from your Word this morning. Help us not to do what comes so, so natural, I guess we can say, to us as human beings is is to glean to our own understanding, maybe not in everything, but in some particular things we may be more inclined to to follow our own thinking in that matter when we really need to be thinking what you have told us to think. You have told us how our thoughts need to be and we need to acknowledge you in that in every day, in every situation of our lives, whether it be in the job, whether it be in school, whether it be in in our family life, finances, health, help us to trust you, Lord. Help us not to fear, help us not to project ourselves beyond what you have told us to do in your Word, but help us to to rely and depend and lean on and and trust, to worship you by trusting with all of our heart what you have told us in your word. Bless us as we conclude this service with a final hymn. Help us to think, help us to meditate on how we can apply this matter of trusting in our lives right now where we are in our current situations of life. Help us to be diligent and active in this trust toward you. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.