Chasing After Jesus: True Worship and Devotion

The Lord of heaven's armies says to the priest, "A son honors his father and a servant respects his master. If I am your father and master, where are the honor and respect I deserve? You have shown contempt for my name. But you ask, how have we ever shown contempt for your name? You have shown contempt by offering defiled sacrifices on my altar. Then you ask, how have we defiled the sacrifices? You defile them by saying the altar of the Lord deserves no respect." [00:01:55]

When you give blind animals as sacrifices, isn't that wrong? And isn't it wrong to offer animals that have crippled the disease? Try giving gifts like that to your governor and see how pleased he is, says the Lord of heaven's armies. Go ahead, beg God to be merciful to you. But when you bring that kind of offering, why should he show you any favor at all? Asked the Lord of heaven's arms. [00:02:34]

How I wish one of you would shut the temple doors so that these worthless sacrifices could not be offered. I am not pleased with you, says the Lord of heaven's armies, and I will not accept your offerings. But my name is honored by people of other nations from morning till night. All around the world, they offer sweet incense and pure offerings in honor of my name. For my name is great among the nations, says the Lord of heaven's armies. [00:03:00]

But you dishonor my name with your actions by bringing contemptable food. You were saying it's all right to defile the Lord's table. You say it's too hard to serve the Lord. And you turn up your noise at my commands, says the Lord of heaven's arms. Think of it. Animals that are stolen and crippled and sick are being presented as offerings. Should I accept from you such offerings as these? Asked the Lord. [00:03:32]

Cursed is the chief who promises to give a fine ram from his flock, but then sacrifices an effective one to the Lord. But I am a great king, says the Lord of heaven's office, and my name is feared among the nations. Man, this is so appropriate to Easter because Jesus, if you remember the book of Hebrews, we learned that everything in the Old Testament is like a foreshadow, a picture of what is to come in the New Testament. [00:04:00]

Jesus here is actually the priest. He's he's also the sacrifice. So he's he's the perfect priest and sacrifice. We know that he accomplished what he needed to accomplish on that cross. And we celebrate Easter for that day. But we're reminded by God in this conversation that he's having to the people of Israel, the book of Malachi, that he is saying, "I am your father, master. I'm worthy of pure devoted worship." [00:04:27]

And their response is like, uh, I don't know what you're talking about. We're we're we're giving you sacrifices. We're giving you worship. Um, yeah, yeah, they're a little bit defiled, but we're doing it. You know, we're giving you worship. And God is basically saying to them, it's not good enough. I don't accept this because it's not pure. It's not your all. And it's it's not an honor to my name. It's for your convenience. [00:04:56]

Chase after Jesus through godly actions. Chase after Jesus through godly actions. In this context, it's very easy to catch that the priests went through the motions. They put the robes on. They put their hats on. They put their chains on what whatever they were back in the day. We like to wear chain necklaces at the cross. They did all of that. They put they they adored adorned themselves with a look that they were representing God. [00:06:16]

And then they but they brought these sacrifices that people would give them to represent, you know, whatever sacrifice they had to make for their families and for the kingdom. And the priest did it for the kingdom. All of these animals weren't they knew what they had to do. They they weren't meeting the standards for God. God wanted the best. He wanted the firstborn. He wanted the pure. He wanted the spotless. He wanted the clean, the pure animals to be sacrificed to him. [00:06:51]

And they were bringing, "Hey, this this donkeyy's hurt today or or this lamb's hurt today and I'll I'll sacrifice that one or I like this lamb over that one." And u even though that's the one I was supposed to sacrifice, I'm going to give this one to God instead because I want to keep this for myself. And I I think that just kind of challenges us to watch our actions. Make sure that we're not going through the motions either. [00:07:21]

It's very easy to say, "It's a Sunday. I got to go to church. I don't want to go to church. I'll put a TV program on. I'll watch that instead." It it's it's it's a sacrifice. It's a it's an act of worship. But is it is it the best for God? You know, um, coming to church today, I'll be honest with you, I'm like, well, I know that I've already reached a time in my life where I'm not going to wear a suit and tie unless it's a a wedding or a funeral. [00:07:47]

But it's Easter. Should I be wearing a a suit and tie for Easter? Is that the best way I can honor God? You know, and and I had to wrestle through that a little bit as a as a pastor, you know, and and I hope you wrestle with questions like that, too. I I'd rather we wrestle with questions like that than not caring and saying, "Eh, whatever. I'll just God doesn't care." No, God does care, but he cares more about the heart, right? [00:08:17]

He cares more about our actions that come from the heart. And so, let's make sure that our motives that we're constantly making sure that they're pure, that they're God honoring, and and that we're not going to cheat the Lord. So yes, I decided I'm not changing the Lord by not wearing a tie, but I will um give him my best of worship, you know, when I come to to the sanctuary today. Uh which brings us to the second thing. [00:08:47]

And by the way, that first part there with godly actions, let me just let me just spend a little a few more minutes just expounding on this part of it. It's very easy to look at a lecture or a sermon rather a message from the Lord and say, "Okay, how can I apply this in my spiritual life here on a Sunday?" Um how how how can I bring my life in alignment with God? But we should also ask how are my actions as an act of worship that's pure. [00:09:17]

I'm not going through the motions and being a true godly person. How am I behaving or I acting when I'm at work, you know, when I'm in my car all by myself, um, when I'm alone, all those things should be taken into account. I want you to pause enough not to just hear me talk about Sunday, but about our everyday lives. If you're young enough, maybe you you're understanding enough to process how am I treating my parents? [00:09:47]

You know, am I just saying, "Okay, I'll clean my room." And then you don't clean your room. your actions are not aligning with what you should be doing. We have to honor God with our daily actions. That's how we give glory to Jesus. That's how we honor Jesus because sacrifices with, you know, in this context of church is not just a Sunday morning thing. When we worship God, it's an everyday thing, every moment thing, 247 thing. [00:10:17]

Chase after Jesus through admiration. chase after Jesus through adoration. What I mean by that by this is is simply let me let me just put it this way. This is a famous quote, but I'm not sure who quoted it and I didn't have time to check, but I know I know I've heard it from from time to time. Everybody worships something. Everybody worships something. Everybody. You either worship your family, your sports team. [00:10:41]

Everybody worships Sunday. As a Christian, obviously we should be asking, are we worshiping God? Are we worshiping Jesus? And this is something that we should be chasing after. How are we doing the best of this? And let me say this, when I say adoration, we get this from the Malachi. God is saying to his people, "Oh, how I wish that someone would rise up and shut the door of the temple because these worship, you know, sacrifices aren't working." [00:11:11]

Um, he's looking for a heart that's that's really worshiping from within, you know, not just doing things, but doing it doing things out of love and out of honoring him. And so, we got to ask ourselves, how are we really coming across to God? Are we does he look down at us? Does he see that we're amazed by him? When we were singing that song, I think it was the forever song. I wondered there was a line there that challenged me as I'm as I was singing. [00:11:41]

When was the last time I was amazed by Jesus that I let myself really be amazed by who he really is? All of us, if not most of us, decided to give our hearts to Jesus and become born again because Jesus amazed us. The gospel of Jesus amazed us, right? That he died for our sins. That he rose from the dead from our for our sins. And and we're reminded today on Easter that he's alive. But are we amazed? Are we amazed at Jesus? [00:12:11]

Let's chase after him with this attitude of adoration because this is what he wants. He's looking for this. Let me put it this way, too. Adoration or worship is not a feminine and it's not a masculine thing. It's a God is worthy thing. God is worthy of our adoration. God is worthy of our worship. So again, it's not a matter of oh that's a feminine thing or a masculine thing. No, this is God deserves our glory. God deserves our praise. [00:12:41]

And friends, this a lot of times can translate to the actual adoration that comes out of our mouths. Every time we're in a song and there's like a pause, don't you feel that there's something missing? It's like we're waiting for the next song. Okay, let's jump to the next song. But adoration is a response to everything we do. Oh Lord, I I just we just sang forever. Lord, you are amazing forever. You know, doesn't have to be loud. [00:13:11]

It doesn't just how is our adoration coming through. The church the church throughout the years has evolved. When we first started in in the book of Acts, the communion table of the Lord's supper was the centerpiece of the church getting together. It was remembering the words of Jesus, remembering that he died for us. Somehow that became fa faded away and then prayer came through really strong throughout the years and that was eventually faded away. [00:13:41]

All these things are good. But then worship more recently um took place of of of the church. It's like you go to church if if the songs aren't loud and blurry and there's a beat, you know, that then that's not a a healthy church. And that's not true. You know, the word of God should always be the central piece of the of the church. But also the response of God's people. Doesn't the scripture say in Psalms um I think it's 33, God inhabits the praises of his people. [00:14:11]

And so Jesus said, "Hey, if if you're not going to praise me, the rocks are going to cry out." But there's a there's a tendency to have something central in the church. What is it? Will it be prayer? Will it be the Lord's supper? Will it be the sermons? Will it be the worship? Let it be that Jesus is Lord of all over everything. And that's one thing that we wrapped up with in the Sunday school class towards the end, that Jesus would be supreme over all things. [00:14:41]

And so may he be what we chase whether it's through worship singing whether it's through the Lord's supper whether it's through preaching whether it's through singing whatever it is prayer may we have Jesus the center of it all and really giving out all which brings us to the third point are we chase chase after Jesus with your freedom chase after Jesus with your freedom this comes from those last few verses there verses 13 to Um God says to them, "Hey, I know that you're saying this is hard." [00:15:11]

Living for Jesus is hard." Or that they don't say that, but you know, that's how we we can apply it to our lives. God is saying to them, you're saying, this is back in in Malachi's time, it's hard. It's hard to really worship God to uh bring the pure offerings and give it give it your all. But friends, we got to be all in, not half in. We got to be all in. If you're half in, that's when it's hard. That's when it's hard because you're still holding on to things that you really love or things that are holding you from the past instead of letting it go and being allin for Jesus. [00:15:41]

When you're all in for Jesus, it's a lot easier. You're willing to give up a lot of things for Jesus. You may be even willing to give up your life for Jesus. You can't do that if you're half in. But if you're all in, you're like, "Yeah, I'll give all my life to Jesus. Everything." You see what I mean? If you're half in, you're like, "Yeah, I'm not dying for Jesus." You know, you know, I I remember a friend of mine said, "I I really want the rapture to happen." [00:16:11]

He wanted Jesus to come back, but once he met his fiance, was engaged to get married. This is his testimony. His name is uh we call him Junior Junior Frankie. But I remember him saying testified this up front of church. He said, "I have to admit uh I started telling Jesus, don't come back until until I get married." You know, he's like, "I don't want you to come back until I get married. I want to get married first, then you can come back." [00:16:41]

So, what's more important to you? You know, it's are you all in or half in? So, one of the songs we sang, I think it was the first one by Philip Whitnum. amazing love or something. There's a line in there when he says um you bear my cross. And I want you to u I want to challenge you with that if if uh if you remember that part because Jesus said you have to carry your own cross. You know, carry your cross daily and follow me. [00:17:11]

However, Jesus also did say my yoke is easy. My yoke is easy. So this cross we carry, it's not out of obligation. It should not be out of obligation. It should be out of joy. It should be out of freedom that he purchased for us that he he gave to us. So if if you're feeling obligated today because you're in church and I got to I got to drag myself to church or I got to do the right thing because I'm a Christian, then you're looking at religion. [00:17:41]

You're not looking at a relationship with Jesus. When you have a relationship with Jesus, there's a freedom, there's a joy, you know, you look forward to honoring him and respecting him and giving him the praise and the glory that he is due. So friends, live for Jesus. Chase after Jesus with your freedom. [00:18:11]