Sometimes Worship Hurts

PPM-3.jpgThrough Him then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.

Hebrews 13:15

Sometimes praise is a sacrifice. Hebrews 13:15 is tucked away in the last chapter of the book of Hebrews in the context of the suffering of Jesus Christ. It falls right after words that remind us that here on earth we do not have a lasting city… and we are not to be seeking to… but we seek the city that is to come. A reminder that we are to follow Jesus outside the camp, outside the safety and protection of the wall, and there we are to suffer, to bear His reproach, and as we do so we are to offer up a sacrifice of praise. Our lips are to praise His name in our pain.

Sometimes worship hurts.

But really, did we truly expect it not to?

Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.

Romans 12:1

God gave us our bodies. He formed them out of the dust in the beginning and from then on He formed in the womb of our mothers. He alone breathes the breath of life in them. Our greatest offering that we have is to submit this body to Him and allow Him to use it however He deems worthy.

Sometimes the way He chooses does not make sense to us. Sometimes offering up our bodies as a living sacrifice to Him means submitting to that cancer diagnoses and saying, “Okay, LORD, if it be Your will… I will drink this cup.

My sister-in-law, Phillis Nelson, said, “Yes Lord, I will drink.”

She laid her body on the altar of the will of God and He has taken her cancer diagnoses and used her to inspire many. Only God and her husband knows the extent of her suffering because to all others around her she has kept smiling. She IS fighting the good fight. This is the testimony that the Lord her God gave her and she has been His witness from Alabama to Afghanistan.

When the world tells us that a cancer diagnoses is our permission to put our bodies to death to escape suffering, Phillis instead has listened to the Creator of her body, and her story, and embraced the suffering so that her body could be used to proclaim the excellencies of the One who called her out of darkness into His glorious Light (1 Peter 2:9).

When so many today proclaim the name of Christ as a means of selfish gain, Phillis has been a contrast to the selfishness of the worldly professors, as in her suffering she has proclaimed His name. In Him alone she stands and He is faithful to hold.

These past few years our family has been learning the depth of the meaning of a sacrifice of praise. It’s not a fun lesson. It’s not at all. It hurts. It hurts a lot.

Will you still worship Him when worship hurts?

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