Prayer

Study of Word

Worship

The balance of Christian activity flows from the Trinity of God, as well. Needlessly, we often see imbalances in Christian’s lives, churches and entire denominations, even when we have been shown the proper function and relationship between the three aspects of the Trinity very clearly (John 14-17).

Worship relates to the Holy Spirit. In this ‘category’ we also find emotion in the human soul. How often have believers been emotionally caught up in worship, only to realize that they weren’t anchored in reality. As glorious as the experience of worship was the day before, there are still bills to pay and nagging life circumstances that just won’t go away, no matter how much time we yield our passions in worship. Emotion is good, when it is in proper priority to the other parts of our human existence. Emotionalism in worship, unbalanced, ultimately leads to a vacuum of conclusive life-solutions.

Worship, however, that has its foundation and roots in the revealed Word and timed by the obedience of a relationship through prayer with the Father, is infused with power into the physical realm that releases the miraculous. Healings, deliverances and a tangible sense of His Presence is overwhelming. Many believers then seek ‘worship’ again, to bring them this manifestation of God’s blessing, not realizing that it was an outflow from the prayer that went forth behind the scenes and the revelation of the Word giving fuel to the flames of the Holy Spirit’s movement. Without prayer and the revealed Word, worship is consumed and cannot exist, for it has nothing to empower it. When believers turn to worship over and over again to try to fill their spiritual hunger, it becomes dry and they wonder why this is. It’s because they have lost their memory of why they are rejoicing. Without the obedience of the Cross, and the revelation of the Resurrection, there can be no exaltation of the Ascension. The joy of worship comes from knowing why we are worshiping. Without this, we’re just worshiping worship.

The revealed Word is known as Rhema. It is different than the historical word, Logos. Jesus is the Word made flesh. He came into a fleshly body subject to decay. The letter kills but the Spirit gives life. Jesus, the Word died. The logos will die, but the resurrected Rhema lives forever. Our relationship with the Word is a two-edged sword, killing our flesh and breathing life into our renewing soul. “Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” (Rom. 12:2) The mind of the soul and the Word are linked together categorically. Too often, however, the un-renewed mind of carnal Christians will turn what was intentionally Rhema from the Scriptures into law (Logos). Again, without the balance of the areas of prayer and worship, the Scriptures become dry and legal. Indeed we cannot even come to Jesus (the Word) unless the Father (prayer/obedience) draws us to Him. Our relationship with the Father, through a hunger for and obedience to His will and purpose, is critical in order for our eyes to be opened with new revelation. God will only give us the Revealed Rhema when our hearts are fully toward Him.

Worship and Prayer are often mistaken for each other. They are quite different, however. Worship is a manifestation on the outside of a conviction on the inside. It’s the amplified signal shouting on the rooftops. In essence, it is evangelical. Prayer, however, is on the inside. Jesus told us to go into our inner rooms and shut the doors when we pray. This is not just a physical command, but also, and perhaps mostly, a metaphoric command, for we are spirit, soul and body. He dwells in our spirit. That is where we are to go, our spirit, in communion with His Spirit in us, our ‘Holy of holies’. This can be when we are walking down the street, or in the midst of an intense battle pressuring us on every side. He still dwells in that secret place in our spirit.

Prayer relates to our soul in the area of the will. Jesus said for us to pray, “May Your Kingdom come and Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.” (Matt. 6:10) When He himself was in the garden before His arrest, He prayed, “Father...not my will, but Yours be done.” (Lk. 22:42) Prayer is about submission to His will.

Our will is sovereign. It chooses what to think, what to feel. God, in His Sovereignty, chose to give us a portion of Himself. If our will is sovereign, and He is the only Sovereign, we must admit that He is not divided between Himself and us. He gives us, in love, a perfect balance to choose. “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live." (Deut. 30:19) If we still choose death, however, He takes responsibility for it. It was not Him Who made us choose it, but because our will is part of His Sovereignty, he still takes responsibility for it. In this is the death of Jesus, and in this is the death of our flesh, our carnality. Jesus died as God’s response to our failure, with His responsibility of payment for it. He is the “Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” (Rev. 13:8) As we live in Him, our fleshly nature, our carnality, is challenged and cut away from us in the likeness of His death. Obedience to His will and disobedience to our own, is the process of our inward renewal. How our will responds to His will happens in prayer. Our covenant with Him is forged by our relationship with Him. “How much do I do in this situation (empowered by His Spirit), and to what extent do I remain trustingly uninvolved?” The answer lies within our relationship with Him through prayer, as He reveals it to us in our ‘Holy of holies’.

He reveals Himself through His Word and His Spirit, as analogized earlier by speech: articulation and breath, respectively. (See, Trinity Concepts 1.02 God) Without His revelation, even our prayer goes awry. “He who turns his ear away from listening to the law (Word of God), even his prayer is an abomination.” (Prov. 28:9) God, in His fullness, must be allowed to flow though us, in priority and in balance, in order for each aspect of our Christian growth to be complete. As the wise saying goes, “All Word and no Spirit, you dry up. All Spirit and no Word, you blow up. The Word and the Spirit together, and you grow up.”

(for more study, see the Trinity Concepts Key)