THE HOLY BIBLE (Contemporary English Version – Revelation 4:8-11): ⁸ …Day and night they never stopped singing, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord, the all-powerful God, who was and is and is coming!” ⁹ The living creatures kept praising, honoring, and thanking the one who sits on the throne and who lives forever and ever. ¹⁰ At the same time the twenty-four elders knelt down before the one sitting on the throne. And as they worshiped the one who lives forever, they placed their crowns in front of the throne and said, ¹¹ “Our Lord and God, you are worthy to receive glory, honor, and power. You created all things, and by your decision they are and were created.”

THOUGHTS: If we were to give advice to an Olympic swimmer hopeful, it would be that they practice, practice and practice some more, right? So what if you were to give advice to a Christian who might be questioning what they could do to best prepare themselves for their eternal home in heaven? God has shared the above verses with us to give us a glimpse of what it will look like in heaven, our eternal destination. It seems like our preparation might be along the lines of constant praise and worship, to the Lord in whom we have placed our total trust, while here on earth. So how could we possibly prepare for such an awesome time as that? Perhaps like the Olympian swimmer, we should aim at practicing this praise and worship while still here on earth, and like the swimmer would try to improve his/her time, we too should look for ways to draw closer to God and express that closeness through our increased effort to lift up our praise and worship to our King. I believe that if I asked most Christians if they do a fair job at praise and worship already, I would probably receive some ‘canned’ responses, such as “yep, I attend worship services every weekend, and we have the best praise team in town”, or “we don’t need praise and worship at our church because our pastor is such a phenomenal preacher – we can just sit and listen to him endlessly”. I wonder sometimes if our first misconception of praise and worship, is that it can only occur inside a specific building at a specific time. Isn’t it amazing how we believe God is on duty to handle our prayer requests 24/7/365, yet our praise and worship to this same God is limited to specific times and places? Here’s something that Matthew Henry shared on this passage: All true believers wholly ascribe their redemption and conversion, their present privileges and future hopes, to the eternal and most holy God. Thus rise the for-ever harmonious, thankful songs of the redeemed in heaven. Would we on earth do like them, let our praises be constant, not interrupted; united, not divided; thankful, not cold and formal; humble, not self-confident. I believe that while here on earth we should learn to worship our King based on our heartfelt response to Him for His manifold blessings and in deepest sincerity and honesty to our Savior. This should not be something that is only turned on in time for our weekend services, but may our weekend services instead be filled with the overflow of our personal praise and worship to our King. May it not surprise God to see You lift up holy hands to him in church, or to hear you cry out in praise to Him during the church service, because He is so accustomed to seeing and hearing similar acts of praise and worship from you throughout the week. Friends, we are preparing for the greatest day in history, and to meet the awesome God who created mankind and everything in this world, let us be busy readying ourselves by doing all that we are should be doing here and now!

PRAYER: Lord Jesus, it is so exciting to think about a time when we can bow before you with no external interruptions and just worship You as if no one else even exists. For those who are accustomed to lifting You up in praise and worship here on earth, this will be a natural transition. For those who depend on external resources to trigger their worship of You, they may find that they have missed out on an awful lot here on earth, and the idea of personal one-on-one worship may seem challenging. Lord, please open our hearts and our minds to be very aware of Your presence and Your unlimited blessings that You bestow on us daily. May it then come natural to us to burst into praise and worship of You, no matter where we are or who we are with. You deserve our praise today, and every day, as we move closer to the time when we will humble ourselves at Your feet in heaven. Blessed be the name of the Lord forever and forever! These things I ask in the name of Jesus, the name above ALL names, AMEN!

PLEASE NOTE: I will be out of town on a mission trip to be of service to our friends in Mexico during the week of July 19^th. I will not be able to publish these devotionals during that time. Please pray that God might use His servants, our group of 30, so that His children in this foreign land might be encouraged and drawn to Him through our honest and sincere representation of our Savior. May God be glorified in all things through our witness! I expect to resume these devotionals on Monday, July 27^th.

FOOTNOTE: If you have been challenged to make a decision today after reading this devotional, please speak with a local Bible Teaching pastor, or read through Biblical truths on How To Know Jesus, or contact me at NuggetsFromGodsWord@outlook.com so that we can pray with you and give you help and or encouragement as you begin, or continue your walk with Jesus. Any words underlined above will indicate a link to a song that came to mind as I wrote the devotional. Feel free to click on the link and listen as you continue to read or pray. If this devotional was forwarded to you and you would like to see more, please go to www.nuggetsfromgodsword.org and read more, or you may freely subscribe for a daily email conveniently containing each day’s devotional. If you are anywhere near the Highlands County, Florida area and do not have a church home, I would be thrilled to welcome you at Bible Fellowship Church, Sebring, FL! Click the link to check out service times and/or other special activities. God is at work among us! Please consider coming to worship with us!