My Worship DNA

John 4:23

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.

There are times when I have found myself praying or worshiping via proxy. What I mean by this is I pray or worship using someone else’s words or songs instead of my own. I become a spectator. In certain situations, It’s not a bad thing we all do it. However, the Lord shared a simple perspective with me that changed the way I view myself, from the aspect of how He sees me when I worship.

I was on my deck after dinner just enjoying the Florida evening, and “Glory” by United Pursuit was playing. I felt God’s presence come in like a gentle fog, it was so soft and tender. In the moment I closed my eyes and just began to worship Jesus. I played that song on repeat for a while, as the end of that song is so beautiful.

As I was worshiping I heard The Lord say to me, “Andrew, No one will ever be able to worship me like you do… and I love it.”

My first thought after I heard that was “God how can that be? My worship is not anything amazing or special so many others can worship, pray, and sing better than me.”

His reply was “No one in all of creation has ever been able to nor will ever be able to worship me the way I created you to worship me. The complete expression of your worship is unique only to you and I so enjoy every minute of our moments together.”

I broke down and just cried. Not because of the fact that God hears my worship but that he knows me intimately through my unique expression of how I worship Him. It was so humbling to realize that God knows me in that way.

There is such a uniqueness to your worship that God absolutely loves. No one since the dawn of creation has ever been able to worship God like you do. This is why it is so essential that you do not look at yourself as flawed, broken, or worthless because God sees you as complete and unique. He created you the way you are because no one will ever worship God like you do.

When He calls us and we give Him our response He comes close to us in that moment. No matter what it looks like or sounds like, He loves our Yes. When He calls us to that place and time of intimacy there must be a response. Not a casual response but one that comes from deep inside our spirit. This is a response that will cost us something. Worship by proxy doesn’t cost me anything. There is no sacrifice when I repeat the words or sing the songs coming from someone else’s heart. Worship is a sacrifice of personal resources. Worship involves a sacrifice of my heart’s affections. Worship demands a sacrifice of my comfort. Worship demands a sacrifice of my time. Worship requires a sacrifice of my vulnerability. I offer Him a sacrifice when I worship in spite of my circumstances. In that place of sacrifice, he wraps me in His arms and loves me, ministers to me, directs me, corrects me, heals me, and secures me. I must not rush these moments, I must learn how to linger with Him.

I want to take you back to my deck story. What I did not tell you previously is before that precious time I had on my deck I was in a really dry place. My family was fighting a long ongoing health situation that just drained us of all emotions. I was weary, tired, and mentally drained. But in that moment when I felt His presence I buried my face in my hands and talked to Jesus and told Him that I was so sorry for being absent and distant. He didn’t beat me up or punish me. He knew what I was going through; he knew my emotions and what I was facing. He also knew that when He called I would give Him my response. I have learned that He is ok when I am raw and vulnerable with Him. In fact, he prefers it that way. He also knew the perfect time to tug on my heart. He knew that on that night out on my deck when He tugged on my heart and asked me to come and spend time with Him I would respond and be in a place to accept His love and would quiet my own thoughts to hear His voice. On that back deck, I fell into the arms of my Heavenly Father and He wrapped His arms around me and held me and in that moment I saw myself as He sees me, and it wrecked me. Everything I was going through just vanished in the fog of His presence. Every moment spent with Him establishes History with Him and because of who he made me He loves the uniqueness of those moments He and I spend together.

There is nothing wrong with turning on my favorite praise and worship artist, or my favorite Pastor and listening along. However, there must be moments when I adore Him and lift Him above everything else with my own voice, in my own style, where I Behold Him and tell Him how great and wonderful He is. When I worship via proxy it’s not my worship it’s theirs. It’s their heart crying out to God. Worshiping God via proxy would be similar to me going on a date with my wife and having someone else on the date with us telling my wife how beautiful she is, how much I love her, and how special she is. In those intimate moments, my wife desires it to be just Her and I. She wants to hear my voice telling her how much I adore and love her. She wants to get lost in the moment as I behold Her beauty. God is the same way. His sole desire is to get lost in moments with you. He wants to hear the sweet songs and passionate prayer coming from a heart that is head over heels in love with Him.

The way we pray, the way we sing or make a joyful noise, the way we move our hands, the way we dance, the way we pace the floor, our vocal cadence when we worship, everything we do in those moments beholding Him is unique only to us. It’s how He made us, it's our worship DNA. When I look up the meaning of DNA it states: DNA is the genetic information inside the body's cells that helps make people who they are. It's the instructions for how to make the body, like the code for a video game or blueprints for a house. Our worship DNA is the unique genetic instructions inside our spirit man/woman that make us who we were created to be.

It’s the distinct perfume that draws God to me.

I was in corporate worship at Abide, my home church, several weeks ago and in that moment we were instructed to sing in the spirit with our own voice, without any music or guidance from anyone on stage. As people began to sing and worship with their own words the presence of God came in so thick and the entire room was lost in His presence. One of my pastors came up behind me and he started worshiping. It sounded horrible. He was off-key, he was pitchy. It was not an angelic sound. It was indeed a joyful noise. 😂 I was about to move to another location on the floor but I felt the Lord just hold me in the place I was standing. He opened my ears and I began to listen to what my pastor was saying, I listened to the cadence of his voice, and I watched the way his body moved, the complete ecosystem of his worship in that moment was so beautiful to experience as He poured His heart out to God in his own style. He was so vulnerable in that moment. His worship was so raw, so pure, it was not a performance, he was not trying to impress anyone. He was in the throne room of God offering a true sacrifice of worship to the Lord. I heard the Lord speak to me and say, “This is His worship DNA. I created Him to worship me this way.” I felt the Lord instruct me to go around the church building and just stand near different people and just experience their worship. All of it was so different. Not a single person worshiped like someone else. It was all so unique and so beautiful. I was overwhelmed with the emotion and passion of their worship. After several minutes of listening to individuals in worship, my focus shifted to the entirety of the room and I heard the whole room in worship. All the individual worship melted together into one sound. It sounded like a rushing river but had beautiful melodic undertones to it. As I looked around the room it was an absolutely beautiful scene to watch a church family in unity completely lost in an intimate moment with their Creator. It is in these moments where I am most complete, and why my life is such a chaotic mess without Him but so complete and fulfilled with Him. Because the sole purpose of my existence, the reason He created me the unique individual I am is so that I would worship and Behold Him.

On my deck when I realized how my Creator sees me it suddenly changed my entire perspective of how I see myself. Sure, I have things to work on and I am far from perfect, but that’s the point I DON'T HAVE TO BE PERFECT for Him to come extremely close to me when I offer the sacrifice of my heart to Him! He does not change my humanness He changes my view of how I see life. This is why my worship must be a sacrifice because, through my sacrifice of laying down self, he changes my perspective. Things that used to dominate my mind just become less important compared to Him.

This is why it is so essential that When I come into His presence that I am not just a spectator, because He is actively listening for me. His ear is searching and He is listening intently waiting to hear my unique worship of Him. When He hears me he comes close to me, loves and pours himself into me and I am never more complete than I am in that moment.