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"Praising God for Your Eternal Inheritance"

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“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Pet. 1:3).
God has blessed you richly and is worthy of your praise.
The source of your eternal inheritance is God, whom Peter described in several ways. First, He is our blessed God (1 Pet. 1:3). The Greek word translated “blessed” in that verse speaks of that which is worthy of blessing, adoration, praise, or worship. Peter’s praise for God is an example for us to follow. Our God is especially worthy of our praise in light of the glorious inheritance He has granted us in His Son (v. 4).
“Father” to the Jewish people of Peter’s day was one designation for God. The most common Jewish blessings emphasized God as Creator of all things and Redeemer of His people from Egypt, but not as Father (e.g., Gen. 14:20; 24:27; Ex. 18:10). Yet now through Christ, we “have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, ‘Abba! [Daddy!] Father!'” (Rom. 8:16).
As wonderful a reality as the fatherhood of God is, Peter’s reference was not primarily to God as our Father, but as Christ’s Father. Their unique relationship affirms Christ’s deity (cf. John 10:30-33). God is the Father of believers in a secondary sense because He has redeemed us through Christ and adopted us into His family (Gal. 4:4-6).
In referring to Christ as “our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Pet. 1:3), Peter amplifies His redemptive work. “Lord” speaks of His sovereign rulership; “Jesus” is His name as God in human flesh; and “Christ” identifies Him as the Messiah, the anointed King.
Peter’s final description of God is seen in the pronoun “our.” He is “our Lord Jesus Christ,” a personal Lord and Savior—not some distant, impersonal deity. He created and redeemed you because He loves you and wants to be intimately involved in every aspect of your life.
What a glorious God we serve! Worship Him today as He deserves to be worshiped.

True Worship

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“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” — Matt6:33
Things fight for our worship, whether school, work, friends, movies even. In those moments it can be easy to put God on the back burner of your life; only getting back to Him when you have some extra time.
But we have to make sure we don’t let that happen. We can’t reduce a huge God to a hobby—something we just do and pay attention to on our spare time. We need to keep Him in the forefront of everything we do. He needs to remain at the center of our vision. Everything else should hinge on and flow out of His being first in our lives.
True worship is a whole-life response to how great you know God to be. It should be with everything we have, everything we are, and everything we do.

No Other God

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“You shall not bow down to them (any other gods) or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God…”_ — Exodus 20:5

Consider sports fans at a game; dressed head to toe in paint, yelling and screaming, booing and cheering. Consider a pop concert; persons crying and screaming with arms stretched out reaching for that celebrity.
You see, as humans we are worshipers and we can’t help it. It’s who we are, what we do and how we were made. We therefore need to give our attention over to God. Spend time in prayer, in his word, in fellowship and walking in obedience. From out of that comes our desire to worship God. If you recognize God’s Sovereignty throughout the week, then you shouldn’t have any issues praising, crying and screaming when you meet with the believers (for church services).
What you spend the most time thinking about, doing, or giving the majority of your attention and so your worship to?

What Am I Worshipping

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Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.'”_ — Luke 4:8
We either worship God or we are worshiping something else. But we can’t worship both. We must trade one for the other. Because in its very nature, worship is how we respond to the thing we value the absolute most! There can be nothing above or equal to it. The thing we spend most of our time thinking about, doing, giving the most attention to, putting all our energy into…that’s what we worship.
What am I worshiping? What things am I putting before God?
Challenge yourself to put that thing down where it belongs and put God up to where He belongs in your life: number one, the only one who deserves and is worthy to be worshiped.

Live Out Your Worship

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“Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”_ –James1:22
True worship will lead us to action! As we worship the Lord we are changed and empowered. It all will mean nothing if we do not walk in that way. How can we be changed by the powerful and awesome presence of God and then return to our old ways? It would be insane! True change is seen in the way we live and in every part of our lives.
In order for our worship to be alive we need to change what we’ve been doing and make our worship and our lives not about us but about our King.
Remember when you worship the Lord, He reveals himself in a mighty way. So, live out your worship and let the Lord be glorified in and through your life.