Whether it is private or corporate worship, one’s heart needs to be prepared.  Worship is the communication, or the response, of our spirit with the Spirit of God.  It is when, for our heart of hearts, we rejoice in who He is.

The preparation of our heart is to open ourselves to Him, so that we are in position to receive a spiritual examination.  The Psalmist spoke for all who truly wish to worship, when he said, “Search me, O God, and know my heart, try me…and see if there is any wicked way in me.”  We position ourselves to receive this examination by praying for God to show us our heart.  We don’t always know our heart, as well as we would like to think.  It is easy to be self-deceived.  As we honestly pray for this, we will soon see what things need to be dealt with in our life.  There may be things for which we need to repent, and there may be other areas where we need to make a commitment to action.

For public worship preparation, we must determine to aggressively seek after the Lord through all the aspects of the worship service, from the prayers, to the singing, to the offering, to the sermon, and whatever else that transpires.   Worship is connecting with God.  We must plan to give Him our best, which includes our best attention, our best surrender, and our best commitment.

We should endeavor to give our best in every area of life.  The Bible tells us that whatever our hand finds to do, we are to do it with all our might.  Jesus is certainly worthy of our very best.

The church building should always be well kept and should be one of the nicest buildings in the neighborhood.  When people pass the street and look at our property, they ought to have the subconscious thought, “What those people are doing is very important to them.”

The program of the church should be nothing less than the best we can make it.  Half-hearted planning and preparation is not good enough in the worship of our God.  Everything we do must be designed to help people come in contact with the Lord.

Those who come to worship should offer nothing less than heart seeking after God.  The Bible says that if we will draw near to God, He will draw near to us.  God is more interested in our having a great worship experience than we are.  We do not have to beg Him to allow us to worship, we simply have to obey Him and get ourselves in position to be able to worship.

To whatever degree one might offer God less than his best, it is to that degree that he has robbed God.

Churches, like people, have their own personality.  The personality make-up is due to a number of factors, including median age of the members, location, past experiences, and agreed upon goals.

There are marketing groups that call churches daily to tell them about a great new program that revolutionize their church.  They will send out a huge packet of materials to be examined for thirty days at no charge, and if you don’t agree that it’s the greatest thing you’ve ever seen, you just package it all up, take it to the post office, pay the postage and send it back.

The thing is, every church is different.  That’s the problem with programs.  What works in one will not necessarily work in the next one.  But, many churches keep purchasing another $600 packet of ideas to try and find that silver bullet.

It is true that the majority of churches are in decline instead of being in a pattern of growth.  For some, the telemarketers program might be just the thing, but not for most.   There is something that will work every time, and that is to have an absolute commitment on the part of church leadership to reach people, and center it all around the word of God , the worship of God, and obedience to God in ministry.  There is an opportune ministry waiting for every church, if they can only discover it.  It will likely not be the ministry that is going to bless the church down the road, but it will bless that church, because every church is different.

Have you ever seen a person, or group of people, walking along with a dog trotting along out in front of them.  If you notice, the dog will look back every now and then to make sure he’s still being followed. If the person, or persons, walking have turned another way, he will immediately turn and run and get in front of them.  He may think he’s leading, but he’s just running in front of which ever way those behind him have decided to go.

That’s not a true leadership model.  That’s certainly not the model we find in any biblical leader that God placed in front of his people.   Hopefully, every pastor has made a covenant with God, that as God shows him the direction in which to lead, that’s the direction he will surely go.  In such a case, if people fail to follow, their real proplem is with God.

The way life works, whether we like it or not, is that upsetting things happen to us.  Our reactions tell far more about our hearts than do our actions.  We can plan for our actions, but our reactions are simply a release of what’s stored up inside us.  When the bucket is turned upside down, whatever is on the inside is going to come out.  Whether it’s full of gold or dirt, it’s coming out.  That’s why it’s real important to make sure you are daily putting good things in your bucket.  Reputation and testimony can be severely damaged very quickly if you have the wrong thing in your bucket.  The Psalmist said, “Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against God.”