I recently heard a man make this statement:“If we do not worship God as He told us, then we are worshiping a false god”. I admit this made me uncomfortable; as truth often does. I am curious, what do others think about this statement?
I'm in the process of reading the Bible through again, and my reading yesterday was of the death of King Saul and his sons.
Your post made me think of how Saul started out very zealous for the Lord, but eventually started making his own decisions -- including conducting a sacrifice without Samuel when he was told to wait -- and because of this, God left him, and his fate was sealed.
Saul tried to protest to Samuel, "But I did the things the Lord told me to do," but Samuel reminded him that it was not done in the way the Lord had instructed, and that, "Obedience is better than sacrifice." (1 Samuel 15:22.)
We all have some pet thing we want to hang on to in some way. Maybe it's a vice, maybe it's a relationship, maybe it's things we shouldn't be reading, watching, or saying, etc. And most of us, myself included, will say, "But God. I'm doing everything else you've told me to do!" We might even try to convince Him that we're doing our best with our pet sins as well.
But to be a Christian means that God will put His finger on some very personal things in our life that He wants us to change or completely give up.
(I view obedience as an integral part of worship; perhaps others have a different perspective.)
I can only speak for myself, but I know for a fact that for my own life, even if I'm doing all the outward things but refusing to do the things He's pointed out, I am in disobedience and therefore, not worshiping Him as He wants me to.
If I have an area of my life where I'm making my own decisions and He's saying no, like Saul, the rest of my "worship" is not true -- and falls short.
One of the most heart-piercing sermons I ever heard was that, "Delayed obedience is disobedience." I have a tendency to tell God, "I'll do that later!" -- and I've felt convicted every time I'm faced with it again ever since.