Dear People Who Keep Company With God,
You find out some things about yourself and God that you will never know unless you visit the bottom. God does not require or expect us to live at the bottom, but occasionally in our lives we will experience sorrow and circumstances that bring us to the bottom (2 Cor. 1:8). Recently when I was at such a place, the Lord asked me a question, “What will you do?” I told the Lord, “All I can do is worship.”
“But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. 24 “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” John 4:23-24
There are some scriptures that you have to experience before you can really understand them. I believe we have excellent theological understanding on what it means to worship God in spirit and truth, however, until we actually worship in this way we do not really understand what Jesus was talking about.
There are three levels of consciousness: physical, mental/emotional and spiritual. Most of us are very conscious of our physical self and our mental/emotional self, but only a few of us are spirit conscious. The Father is looking for people who will worship Him with their spirits, not just with their bodies and minds/emotions. Actually, without your spirit’s involvement all we can really do with our bodies and minds is praise. That is good, but the Father is looking for worshippers and true worship comes out of our spirit. When I was at the bottom I could only worship with my spirit as my body and mind had nothing to give.
One day I was thinking about that experience of worship and I heard the phrase“altars are meant to alter us”. An altar is a place that is designed or separated for worship unto God. When I was at the bottom I had built an altar of worship unto the Lord. Although we are to always worship God there are special times of worship that will have major impact on our lives. I thought about Abraham.
Abram passed through the land as far as the site of Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. Now the Canaanite was then in the land. 7 The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your descendants I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord who had appeared to him. Genesis 12:6-7
Abraham is among the first true worshippers in the Bible (Gen. 22:5) and there is some insight on worship revealed in Abraham’s life journey. He built four altars during his life at special times and occasions. Each altar is significant and reveals an aspect of worship that God desires to bring us into.
Abraham arrived in Shechem. Here he built his first altar. It says, “the Lord appeared to Abram”. This is key – it is impossible to worship God in spirit and truth without God revealing Himself to us. Jesus Christ promised us that He would manifest Himself to us (John 14:21). The one thing the devil hates most is for us to personally know God. He does not want us to experience the personal, manifest presence of the Lord. There is a reality of His manifest presence that will forever alter those who experience it. The enemy knows this and has convinced many that we have to be or do something special to know and experience the Lord on such a level. Big lie. It is only because of His love for us that He so desires to manifest Himself to us.
Shechem in the Hebrew language means shoulder. I believe this is significant. In Isaiah 9:6, it is written, “And the government will rest on His shoulder.” Shechem speaks of the Kingdom of Heaven and our bowing to the government of God. There are times in our lives where our circumstances and situation will absolutely be contrary to all we know God to be. In those times we will bow either to our circumstances and miss one of the greatest opportunities to experience the Lord in a new and life changing way or bow to the Lordship of Christ and forever be altered.
Many Blessings, BW