Worship is a labour of love

Worship is a labour of love

[interestingly the phrase ‘labour of love’ comes into the English language from Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians 1v3]

Dave summarised a labour of love as something that requires effort, that is done without expectation of reward, and is done with positive intent. He read Psalm 96, full of active verbs of people doing things to honour God.

• What does worship look like for me right now? What am I choosing to do to honour God that takes effort, expects no reward and is done because I love Him?
• How much we know that we are focusing too much on our own experience of worship, rather than on giving it without expectation?
• Where is my love for God right now, in the midst of all the other loves we are offered?
• What is one area that I can work on in the part worship takes in my life? What we work on together as a life group?

During his testimony, Tony made the comment that while he might think his singing ‘sounds like a wounded animal’, he trusts that God hears genuine worship as something angelic.

• How do we deal with the reality that we can all be doing things that require effort but that not all of our efforts produce the same quality of results? What is the most important ingredient of our worship?
• Read Genesis 4:1-7. In this passage, it can easily look like God values the quality of the offering most, but what is revealed about the attitudes behind the effort from the narrator’s description and God’s words?
• What would be the difference between the ‘best, fat portions’ of worship we can offer, and things that are just ‘some of the produce’ of our time and effort?