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I am speaking tonight to a congregation that loves praise and worship and I'm right there with you. This teaching then is not because the praise has been too dry in recent services, but rather because I've learned a long time ago that the best time to teach on something was not to wait until it was direly needed. In this church, we strive to obey all of scripture and thus want to also have scripture for everything that we do. And so it is beneficial to give a study on praise to "praisers" tonight, to make sure that you know why you do as you do. So that it is not just learned behavior from watching others but that you realize that, in your praise and worship, you are obeying scriptural commandments and Godly principles. It is important -- I think -- for you to know why we praise and worship as we do.

Any time a church gives itself as David did to praise and worship, there will arise -- as they did in David's day -- critics of that praise. The Bible says that David danced before the Lord as the ark of the covenant came into Jerusalem and his wife Michal criticized him for praising so exuberantly. When Jesus made His final triumphal entry into Jerusalem, His disciples and followers began to joyfully and emotionally praise Him, even going as far as tearing palm branches out of trees and waving them in adoration with shouts of "Hosanna!" The Jewish religious leaders showed up and began to criticize such actions and so we find that where true praise and worship is, there will always be someone to criticize. And so I also want to give answers tonight -- scriptural answers -- to the critics of our praise.

And let me say this: you don't want to be the critic of someone's praise, because criticizing praise comes with a price of a spiritual curse. Michal was barren all the days of our life after she criticized David. The Jewish religious leaders missed their time of visitation and crucified their Savior. Judas Iscariot, after criticizing Mary's worship, went out and betrayed Jesus that very night. If the criticism comes from a lack of understanding, then let tonight be your wake up call. But too often open criticism of emotional praise and worship belies serious spiritual issues deep within and brings a spiritual darkness within the heart of the critic. You don't want to be the critic of someone's praise -- if you think they are insincere, then let God judge them, but don't you get on the judgment seat because God deals very severely with such things!

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We have to look no further than the book of Psalms to find commandments and reason to praise God with emotional actions and outbursts. The book of Psalms is the collected song book of ancient Israel and any false notions of a dead service in the Old Testament can be quickly dispelled by reading it. King David wrote almost half of the Psalms and he certainly infused Israel with a new style of praise and worship. King David was a masterful musician and under his leadership, Israel appointed temple musicians and singers and when they met together they had church!

It's important to realize that King David's actions and pushing of outward praise was not of his own invention, but was the fulfillment of what God had intended all along. In the laws of Moses, many feasts and festivals were outlined for the people to keep. In particular, there were three feasts that were commanded by God for all of Israel to keep: the feast of the Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles.

There's a sermon in this simple fact. The Passover was where the blood was shed and applied to the doorposts of the house. Pentecost was the celebration of the harvest and would be the day that the Holy Spirit would be poured out. The Feast of Tabernacles celebrated the fact that God had come to dwell with them day in and day out. In a spiritual sense, God still demands that man keep these three festivals: A day where the blood of the Lamb is applied to your life through Repentance and Water Baptism, a day where you have a "Pentecost" and receive the Spirit of God, and for you to walk with God day in and day out thereafter! We still keep these three feasts!

I bring this up in this study because the Hebrew word for "feast" used in these commandments is "hag" which in its original form means "to dance and whirl around with giddiness." Three times a year, all of Israel was to assemble in Jerusalem at the house of God and, well, celebrate with happiness and dancing! If we still spiritually obey the festivals today, then it is right that we would celebrate and dance when someone applies the blood of Jesus to their life. It is spiritually right for us to dance and celebrate when someone gets the Holy Spirit. And it is spiritually right for us to dance and celebrate simply because of the fact that we are walking with God day in and day out! The people of God don't need a weekend or federal holiday for an excuse to celebrate; their salvation and work of Calvary is enough reason to twirl around in joy!

So David and later musicians and singers only organized and led the people in performing what God had intended coming to His house to be all along! God is an emotional God who created an emotional creation and He desired to be praised with emotional worship. But let's not just make that statement, let's look at scriptures that reveal that fact. We start in the book of Psalms with scriptures on why we act as we do in outward worship:

So we have a Biblical example of people lifting up their hands in prayer at an evening service!

We have a command to clap our hands to God and to shout to God with "loud songs of joy!" We are commanded hundreds of time to sing to God:

The Bible also mentions the "d" word in praise, although some people don't want to admit to such a fact. The "d" word is "dancing." Listen to this verse:

Let me pause here a moment and give some thoughts on dancing. First of all, I realize that not everybody can physically cut a rug in church and I'm not teaching on this to force you to praise God one way or the other. You need to praise God some way, and you need to do what comes from your heart; however that comes out physically, so be it. People have different personalities and different ways of showing their emotions and we have room for a variety of styles of praise in the church of the living God.

But having said that, if you are physically able to dance, let me give you some food for thought. We read Psalms 47:1 earlier where we are commanded to "clap your hands." Just about everybody -- regardless of their temperament or emotional personality -- is willing to clap their hands in church eventually. I see first time guests come into our church and they are a bit taken back by the praise, but usually after a few songs, you will see their hands come together a few times -- they can't help themselves. People have no issues clapping their hands, for the most part. Now, keeping all of that in mind, you should know that Psalms 47:1 is the only verse of the Bible where clapping is commanded or mentioned. One verse of scripture, and yet we have no problem obeying.

But on the other hand, the "d" word -- dancing -- is mentioned in scripture at least fifteen times directly. Furthermore, there are fifteen Hebrew words and six Greek words in the Bible which could be rightfully be translated as "dance." They are translated with such words and actions as "twist, whirl, spin, leap, run, stomp, spring, jump, skip, abound, turn, march, walk, reel, revolve, surround, proceed, stroll, and travel." Throughout the Bible, is found an underlying theme of dancing and exuberant praising of God. So a word to the critics: if you don't want to dance before the Lord and just want to sit there and clap your hands a bit, then that's fine and it is your rightful choice. But don't criticize those who do dance before God because we've got more scripture for our dance than you do for your clap!

Emotional praise! If you can't sing very well or dance all that great, then you can just "make noise:"

Make your noise, but be sure that it is joyful! And did you notice that the Bible in that passage also mentioned musical instruments? The Bible commands us to use musical instruments in our praise. We read in our text where at the dedication of Solomon's temple, they blew trumpets and used cymbals, harps, lyres, and "other musical instruments." Here we have the lyre -- the forerunner of the guitar -- and trumpets and the sound of a horn. The last Psalm, Psalm 150, lists even more instruments:

And in scripture, we are commanded to become skillful on these instruments and play together in a harmonious and skillful way:

Godly praise is skillful. Godly praise sings new songs. Godly praise is loud. Godly praise uses multiple instruments. Godly praise "befits" or "looks good upon" or "becomes" the upright! If you are living for God then praise looks good upon you; if you are not living right, it will look awkward! If we are serving Him with our whole heart, we should have no problem praising God!

Now you should know that there are many other examples besides the psalms of people praising God and using emotional motions and musical instruments to do so. For example, when Moses brought the children of Israel across the Red Sea, Miriam grabbed a tambourine and led the women in song and dance in praise and thanksgiving to God. Both David and Solomon and later kings used organized music players and exuberant singing in their temple worship. In the 3rd chapter of 2 Kings, when King Jehoshaphat asked the prophet Elisha for the counsel of God, Elisha asked for a musician to come and play and when the music began to go forth, then the word of God came to him. Jehoshaphat learned the lesson of the power of music because later on, in 2 Chronicles 20:21-22, when he faced a battle against a strong enemy, he appointed singers to begin to sing unto God in holiness and when the people began to sing and worship, God destroyed the enemy!

There are plenty of other examples, but I have focused on the Psalms for a reason. And that is because some of the critics say "well that is all Old Testament, and we never find them using musical instruments in church services in the New Testament church." Nice try, but let's go to our text in Colossians:

This verse, by the way, is an exact mirror of another verse in the book of Ephesians:

There are three categories of songs to be sung by the Apostolic church given here by the Apostle Paul. The first, psalms, refers to the book of Psalms of the Old Testament. We are commanded to sing these psalms. The melodies have been lost throughout the ages, but the words have remained and so in many of the newer choruses that we sing in our church, we quote the psalms directly. "Better is one day." "Give us clean hands." "Blessed are those who dwell in Your house." All of those style songs are almost direct quotes from the psalms of the Bible.

Every once in a while I run into somebody that wants to sing the book songs of the early 1900s and thinks that these "new songs" are from the devil. I have no problem singing "O I want to see Him" and "O how I love Jesus" and "Amazing Grace" but let's not forget that those words were penned by men, whereas the words of the newer songs that quote the Psalms was penned by the Holy Spirit!

There is a place for songs such as "Amazing Grace" whose lyrics are not found in scripture but draw from scriptural concepts. Such well-known traditional songs are called hymns and the Apostolic church had hymns of their own. The most famous was the latter part of 1 Timothy 3:16 which was a hymn of the early church. Jesus sang a hymn with His disciples at the Last Supper. It was not a psalm but a traditional song of praise and worship. And so Paul said to sing psalms and hymns. There is a place for both.

And Paul also gave a third category of praise songs: "spiritual songs." There is a place for newly written "spiritual songs" that are neither psalms or hymns in our worship services. If it lifts up Jesus then it is allowed in the Apostolic church!

But getting back to our critics that say musical instruments are not used in the New Testament church. Paul commanded twice for the New Testament church to sing psalms. James also said that if anybody is happy in church they are to sing psalms (James 5:13). Those critics who don't believe in clapping their hands, dancing in church, making joyful noises, and playing musical instruments would have a hard time singing the psalms that command such things without doing them! How crazy would it be for God to command us to sing the 150th Psalm and yet not do the things that are commanded in the psalm that we are singing! The reason we don't have any specific instances of people using musical instruments in the New Testament is because it is not needed: it follows that to sing psalms, you will do what the psalms command!

What I'm trying to get across to you is that it is Apostolic to praise God with outward motions and it is Apostolic to praise God with musical instruments and psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs! There is a reason why we praise and worship God as we do, and that is because scripture tells us to do so! A church cannot truly obey all of God's word and leave all of these scriptures out!

Let me make two more points about songs in church and we'll move on to other areas. First of all, God ordained that the words of the psalms of Israel be kept for us forever. In the case of 1 Timothy 3:16, He ordained that the words of one of the hymns of the early New Testament church be passed along as well. But lost in time is the melody and the chords and the tune and the style of music. However, we do know that there was quite a diversity to the style of songs in the Psalms because many of them have titles in the Hebrew giving specific instructions such as "softly and mellow" or "as directed" or "to be sung by high females." And then of course there is the command of "Selah" which probably indicated a time where the vocals stopped singing and the music played and everyone had a "praise break." It is very obvious from studying these titles in the Psalms that Israel's worship service had a distinct variety of styles and musical expression.

Having said that, we should know that all of the styles of music today are modern and therefore one is not better than another as far as "holiness." Some people prefer soft orchestral accompaniment with strings and soft woodwinds. Some people prefer the sound of stringed instruments such as a piano and a little jazzy, black gospel feel. Some prefer the simplicity of country gospel music. Some prefer the "modern lyre," the guitar, to be the primary instrument of worship. Everyone has different styles of taste and preference. Sure, some styles are more conducive to certain demonstrations of the Spirit of God, but in time, there will be a place where most styles of music is appropriate in church. Some people claim that God only blesses one style. I think God would rather bless many styles within a congregation. It is obvious from His Word that multiple styles of music were used in worship services in Israel. As long as the song is lifting up Jesus, I have no problem with it being used to worship God!

My other point on songs in church is that many Christians have a misconception about what the song service is, whether it be a special or praise songs. Too many people view the platform as a stage, the congregation as the audience, the musicians the actors and God somewhere giving cues as to what to do next. Actually the congregation should be the actors who act out the worship, the musicians should give the cues as to what to do next, and God should be the audience. He is to be the focal point of our praise and worship. All services where He is not the intended audience is just entertainment for the people and a concert. Such is not what God intended for His house! It is all about Him! When we praise with God as the audience, then we expect Him to respond! That is why we give everything to Him in our praise and adoration. That is why we sing and shout. He is the reason why we praise as we do!

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We have discussed how we are to praise God, and why we should praise God, but let me steer toward the difference between praise and worship by giving you three principles of praise:

1. Praise is natural.

In asking us to give an emotional response in adoration of Him, God is not asking us to do something unnatural or hard. You are an emotional creature and even the world applauds those people who excite them or whom they admire. They clap their hands to the entrance of an important celebrity. They shout out and jump up and down when celebrating something that is of extreme importance to them. They dance to a beat and a song that appeals to their flesh. When people are emotional, they express it outwardly -- either through their mouth or gestures. If you don't believe me, then get somebody to video you the next time you are mad at something!

We are commanded to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. That is outwardly and inwardly. That is with our spirit and our thoughts but also our emotions and our actions. It follows that if we love Him and adore Him and appreciate Him then we will act upon that emotion with outward motions. It is a natural human response.

2. Praise is mandatory.

When the Jewish religious leaders were offended at the exuberant praise of His followers and asked Jesus to hush them, He replied, "if these hold their peace, the rocks will cry out!" In other words, God is worthy to be praised, therefore He will be praised. The commands to clap our hands and make a shout unto God found throughout the psalms and the Bible are decrees. There is nothing optional about "let everything that has breath, praise the Lord." If you want to obey the scripture, then outward praise must be a part of your life.

3. Praise requires no virtue.

If praise is natural and mandatory, then it follows that praise has no prerequisites. You do not have to be "holy" or even "right with God" to praise Him. God does not command the saints and those who are apart of the Apostolic church to praise Him, but everything that has breath. That means that sinners are commanded to praise Him and must be able to do so for such a command to be given.

There are two ways to look at this fact. First, if sinners and the vilest of human beings can praise God, then surely His redeemed ought to be free to do so! But secondly, this means that if we only go as far as praise, then we are not doing anything more than the common man is able to do.

And so we come to the difference between praise and worship. Praise is emotional expression of thankfulness and awe of what God has done and of who God is. It can be done by anybody anywhere regardless of whether God is pleased or not by their lifestyle. Worship, however, is only accepted if it done in "holiness." When praise is performed by people living holy and separated unto God and done with faith by people surrendered to His will, then that praise becomes worship because God responds to that praise by inhabiting and dwelling in it.

We see this perfectly illustrated in our text in 2 Chronicles 5. It was the dedication of Solomon's temple. These are not just some singers and musicians brought in from the outside to play a gig. These musicians and singers and ministers were of the right lineage and they were in a physical covenant with God. And they had not approached this service lightly but had prepared themselves by cleansing themselves of worldly things and prayer and fasting. When they began to play and sing and shout to God, they were doing so in holiness and separation to God and God responded by showing up! His Spirit descended in a thick smoke upon the temple until they could no longer play and sing and the ministers could no longer minister! It was just praise at first, but when it was performed by those who had consecrated and submitted themselves to God, it became worship and God interrupted to bless and to reveal Himself to them. God commands us to praise, but He is looking for those who will worship Him in spirit and in truth. All creation should praise Him, but those whom He has cleansed should go one step further and they should worship Him with all of their heart, soul, mind, and strength.

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I come to a close by taking you to the very first mention of worship in the Bible. It is found in Genesis 22 where God commands Abraham to take his son, Isaac, and sacrifice him to God. That God would demand such a thing is unthinkable but Abraham was so devoted an loyal that he assembled his servants and son and headed off to the mountain. Now most of you know that it was a test and in the end Isaac's life was spared. But at the time Abraham did not know this. He approached it thinking that God was about to require the life of his promised son. When the approached the mountain, Abraham stopped the servants some distance off and said:

Maybe he had faith that God would intervene, either way how impressive it is that what others would call a sacrifice and a drudgery, Abraham called "worship!"

This teaches us some key principles about what worship is:

Abraham could rightfully call his actions that day worship because he was surrendering everything to God that was most important to him. By going up that mountain and sacrificing his son, he was surrendering his will into the hand and will of God. We cannot truly worship God if we do not totally surrender every aspect of our life to Him.

Abraham could rightfully call his actions that day worship, because he was obeying the commandment of God without grudging and complaint and without excuse, even though what God had commanded seemed hard, unfair, and pointless. God commanded and Abraham acted to obey. We cannot truly worship God if we do not completely obey God's commandments. Only those who obey can truly worship and only those who worship truly obey.

Abraham could rightfully call his actions that day worship, because it was going to cost him something. I am reminded of David's word to Arunah, when Arunah offered to give his oxen and plow to David to be offered unto the Lord. David replied with "no, I will buy them, because I will not offer unto God something that has cost me nothing." Some of you have had to overcome many things just to be where you are in the Lord, and there may have been times that you wondered why you had to endure such things to live for God. But really all of your hardships and trials are setting you up to be able to worship God. Because it is impossible to worship God without a sacrifice. Only those whom living for God has cost them something are in a position to truly worship God!

To worship that day, Abraham brought five things with him up that mountain. He brought wood -- something that was already dead and that could be consumed by the fire. He brought fire -- something that was able to take the dead things and use it as fuel to consume the living things. He brought a sacrifice that was precious to him. And He brought a knife -- a willingness to give up that precious thing to God.

To worship God, we need these same things. We must have dead wood -- a past that was once alive but now dead. We must have the fire of the Holy Spirit burning brightly in our lives and consuming that past. We must have something precious that is alive in our life right now and we must be willing to sacrifice it and give it to God and allow the fire of the Holy Spirit to consume it. We still need these things for worship.

For those of you who were counting and thought I missed one thing, I didn't, I just saved the fifth thing that Abraham took with him up that mountain for last. He took the wood, fire, sacrifice, and knife, but he also took his faith! Faith that God knew what was best for his life. Faith that if he truly worshipped God, God would not let him down. Faith that God was just and kind and right in everything that He does. Faith that God would show up and perform the miraculous if that was needed. And Abraham was not disappointed!

Let us praise God but let us also worship Him! Let us bring our past to God and let us allow the fire of the Holy Spirit to burn within our lives. Let us bring the things of our life that are most precious to us and offer them up and be willing to give them to God. But let us most of all come with our faith believing that if we will do such things, God will intervene mightily in our lives and direct our paths and bless us!

God is good and that is why we praise the way as we do, but God is also faithful and that is why we worship as we do!