quotations about worship
As worship begins in holy expectancy, it ends in holy obedience.... Holy obedience saves worship from becoming an opiate, an escape from the pressing needs of modern life.
RICHARD J. FOSTER
Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth
Those who believe that Christians, Muslims, and Jews worship the same god tend to argue that imperfect worship is still a form of veneration. The Trinity may be the true, revealed form of the one deity, but Jews and Muslims, as peoples who trace their religious traditions back to Abraham (all that matters is that they say they do), in fact do pay homage to the same divinity. In short, while Christians have the fullness of revelation, their shared patrimony with Jews and Muslims makes for a special relationship, a love of the same god, something not shared with Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, pagans, and others.
CHASE PADUSNIAK
"Christians, Muslims, and Jews, Oh My!", Patheos, March 30, 2017
Oh, the place where I worship
Is the wide open spaces
Filled by the hand of the Lord,
Where the trees of the forest
Are like pipes of an organ
And the breeze plays an amen chord.
AL GOODHART & FLORENCE TARR
"The Place Where I Worship"
Get a prayer-book in your hand,
And stand betwixt two churchmen.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Richard III
I can safely say, on the authority of all that is revealed in the Word of God, that any man or woman on this earth who is bored and turned off by worship is not ready for heaven.
A. W. TOZER
Mornings with Tozer: Daily Devotional Readings
A life of kindness is the primary meaning of divine worship.
EMANUEL SWEDENBORG
New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine
God ... produced the greatest display of amazing love that could ever be. Worship is the only proper response.
STEVE ELLISON
"Steve Ellison: Turned Over", The Chattanoogan, February 27, 2016
Friends, worship is as essential in order to accomplish God's purposes in human life as is faith. John 4:23-24 suggests to us that "the Father seeketh such to worship Him." God longs for the adoration and expressions of love and praise that come from honest and sincere hearts.
HEATHER GARNER
"Glorifying God by our worship", The Clarion, February 3, 2016
It is precisely that requirement of shared worship that has been the principal source of suffering for individual man and the human race since the beginning of history. In their efforts to impose universal worship, men have unsheathed their swords and killed one another. They have invented gods and challenged each other: "Discard your gods and worship mine or I will destroy both your gods and you!"
FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY
The Brothers Karamazov
An attack on one house of worship is an attack on all houses of worship.
PIERRE ATLAS
"Plainfield mosque vandalized", Kokomo Tribune, February 29, 2016
So shall they build me altars in their zeal,
Where knaves shall minister, and fools shall kneel:
Where faith may mutter o'er her mystic spell,
Written in blood--and Bigotry may swell
The sail he spreads for Heav'n with blasts from hell!
THOMAS MOORE
Lalla Rookh
To hate man and worship God seems to be the sum of all the creeds.
ROBERT G. INGERSOLL
Some Mistakes of Moses
It is not he who knows most, nor he who hears most, nor yet he who talks most, but he who exercises grace most, who has most communion with God.
THOMAS BROOKS
attributed, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers
The oldest and wisest of human communities show most respect to the gods, and are most careful of their worship.
XENOPHON
attributed, Day's Collacon
One of the lies of the contemporary worship movement is that worship is a homogeneous, exclusive endeavor that targets a specific generation. "Traditional" worship is for older people, "contemporary" is for everyone else. This mindset kills the church, even if the congregation is unaware. A church that prides itself on only featuring old favorites (or current hits) has chosen a toxic path. Call it a sing-along. Call it fellowship. Just don't call it worship. We all must sing.
JONATHAN AIGNER
"8 Reasons Churches Should Sing New Songs", Patheos, February 17, 2016
Divine worship is one of the chiefest jewels of God's crown, which he will by no means part with.
GEORGE SWINNOCK
The Works of George Swinnock
Nobody wants to worship you if you have the same problems, the same bad breath and messy hair and hangnails, as a regular person. You have to be everything regular people aren't. Where they fail, you have to go all the way. Be what people are too afraid to be. Become whom they admire. People shopping for a messiah want quality. Nobody is going to follow a loser.
CHUCK PALAHNIUK
Survivor
When we find that God's ways always coincide with our own ways, it's time to question who we're really worshipping, God or ourselves.
CRISS JAMI
Killosophy
[The] heart is the place in which an acquaintance with God must be sought. It is there we must worship him, if we would worship him in spirit and in truth.
HANNAH MORE
Practical Piety: Or, The Influence of the Religion of the Heart on the Conduct of the Life
The happiest man is he who learns from nature the lesson of worship.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
Nature