INTIMACY: THE HEART & WORSHIP
A TEACHING ON OBEDIENCE, SACRIFICE & REVERENCE.
God first called me into worship ministry when I was 20. I hadn’t done it before then and stepping into that space, in the context I was in at the time, was a response in obedience — not a personal desire. So, when God said to me in to “Join the worship team”, I quite literally laughed. Out loud.
My beginning didn’t look like having a history of singing for years prior, so it was all new to me. While I didn’t know I was gifted, I knew I was called. I also knew God well enough to know He wasn’t interested in my personal opinions about worship teams and the “cool musicians culture” I grew up around. He was interested in my obedience.
So, I had to yield.
If anyone had warned me about the process that would follow that “yes”, I would have laughed out loud again and walked in another direction. God has used this calling to deeply refine, purify, humble, rebuke, discipline, prune and train me into submission to His will, and to learn what it means to live a life of surrender. He’s used it to root out the broken parts in my soul and teach me what it means to live holy. The music aspect forms about 5% of that call.
God cares more about me being a consecrated vessel — set apart — to become more like Him, than He cares about my voice or being a “worship leader”.
PART I: DEALING WITH THE HEART
From the outset, God began to reveal what it truly meant to be a worshipper. The beginning of that journey involved Him dealing with the foundations — completely exposing the state of my heart. Here’s what I realised:
I’m not as good or as “Christian” as I thought. What a shock. In all seriousness, though, I may have grown up in church but I need the mercy of God every single day. My awareness of this reality drew me into deeper dependency and humility. Worship is about maintaining a heart postured toward obedience, surrender, and reverence. It’s about being yielded to God out of the fear of the Lord — not religious practice.
The sound we release always reflects our inner world. It might seem great in the natural, but in the spirit realm, we risk pouring out what’s corrupted if it’s never dealt with. Luke 6:45 says, “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good… For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.” Worship has very little to do with music and more to do with my entire life being lived to please Him. It involves a continuous process of maturing, where we are instruments in God’s hands, yielded to the process of being made holy so we can be releasers of a pure and undefiled sound.
PART II: ALTARS, NOT PLATFORMS
There’s a difference between platforms and altars. When I think of the word platform, I think of the elevation of something or someone. Most of us will immediately think of a stage. In our modern language, we even use terms like “social media platforms” — places where we showcase our ideas and interests, and where we have personal profiles that are often self-focused.
In contrast, when I think of an altar, I think of a place where something has to die… and it would be understandable that I’d be far less enthusiastic about stepping foot near something like that so casually. When we view worship as approaching an altar, not a platform, we approach it differently. In the Bible, altars were places where exchanges or sacrifices were made.
As worship teams, every time we step forward to lead others into God’s presence, we need to make sure that an exchange has already taken place between us and God — that we’ve crucified our flesh, rather than carrying it onto the altar to let it do the ministering!
We need to be willing to make the sacrifice of what we think looks or sounds good, and exchange that for what will truly minister to the room.
Viewing platforms as altars is reflective of the Levitical priests’ approach to the Tabernacle — the “Tent of Meeting.” They not only stewarded their priestly roles when they were near it, but they stewarded their entire lives in a sacred way so that God could dwell among His people. That was a sacrifice!
The altar is not just a section of floor near the stage where congregation members step forward in response to a preacher at the end of a sermon. The altar is also the very place ministers — worshippers — make intercession and sacrifices on behalf of God’s people.
Platform mentality creates a clear distinction between those two spaces with an “us and them” mindset, whereas altar mentality views the entire room as an altar unto the Lord, where each person comes with a unique role, response, or responsibility within it. Platform mentality says, “Look at me and what I’m doing for God.” Altar mentality simply says, “Look at God.” Full stop.
This is not a call to glorify platforms, altars or stages. It’s a call for the restoration of reverence in what we’re actually doing when we get on there. Our greatest temptation is to make our role about ourselves rather than wholeheartedly about Christ. Worshippers don’t build personal platforms and charismatic personas on stages. They build altars unto God — places stewarded so well that God entrusts His fire to fall upon them. We need to be a people who can stand before man without yearning to say, “Look at me,” and mature to only want to say, “Look at God.”
PART III: WORSHIP REQUIRES SACRIFICE
In the New Testament, we no longer offer animal sacrifices; we ourselves are the sacrifice. Worship without devotion and sacrifice isn’t worship. The reward of these things is a greater level of intimacy with God — and this is not something that occurs at our convenience. It always comes at a cost.
True worship looks foolish to the religious. We know this because Mary was rebuked by the Pharisees for pouring oil on Jesus as a response of her revelation of who He was to her. (Luke 7:36–47).
True worship often costs us something. It cost Mary a year’s wages. It cost Mary a year’s wages. She didn’t care how it looked — her gratitude outweighed the cost. Where some of us might give sparingly or with great calculation, she saw the Messiah as worthy of all of it.
Even King David understood this in 2 Samuel 24:24. David had built an altar to the Lord to make an animal sacrifice as intercession so that a plague in Israel would be withdrawn by God from the land. A man named Araunah offered King David the choice of any animal from his herds as a free gift for the sacrifice. It was a kind and generous gesture, but David refused to take any animal for free, saying: “I will not offer to the Lord that which costs me nothing.”
David understood that any sacrifice made to the Lord was not a real sacrifice if it did not cost him something. One commentary says, “He didn’t look for the cheapest way possible to please God.” How often do we try to look for cheapest possible way to access authority and anointing when the keys are sacrifice and intimacy?
Take some time to reflect on this:
1. What has your worship cost you?
2. Does it reflect how worthy you believe God to be?
PART IV: UNDERSTANDING THE WEIGHT OF GLORY
Leading people into encounters with Christ through music is an incredibly sacred calling. True worshippers understand they cannot live in compromise, because each time they stand before people to serve by leading them in song, they’re stewarding God’s glory — and God will not allow His glory to be mishandled.
We see an example of this in 2 Samuel 6 when Uzzah is struck down by the Lord because he touched the Ark of the Covenant as it was being transported between cities. 2 Samuel 6:1-8 reads:
‘David again brought together all the able young men of Israel—thirty thousand. He and all his men went to Baalah in Judah to bring up from there the ark of God, which is called by the Name, the name of the Lord Almighty, who is enthroned between the cherubim on the ark. They set the ark of God on a new cart and brought it from the house of Abinadab, which was on the hill. Uzzah and Ahio, sons of Abinadab, were guiding the new cart with the ark of God on it, and Ahio was walking in front of it. David and all Israel were celebrating with all their might before the Lord , with castanets, harps, lyres, timbrels, sistrums and cymbals. When they came to the threshing floor of Nakon, Uzzah reached out and took hold of the ark of God, because the oxen stumbled. The Lord’s anger burned against Uzzah because of his irreverent act; therefore God struck him down, and he died there beside the ark of God. Then David was angry because the Lord’s wrath had broken out against Uzzah, and to this day that place is called Perez Uzzah.’
We’re told in 2 Samuel 6 that even King David was angry with God’s harsh punishment upon Uzzah, but what was God showing the Israelites then that He may be wanting to teach us now?
This incident happened after the Israelites were playing music, singing and dancing — they were “worshipping” as we commonly know it!
If you’re familiar with the story, you know Uzzah disobeyed a direct command from God given to all the Israelites — to not touch the Ark of the Covenant under any circumstances.
It was only the Levites who could transport the Ark, and they were instructed to carry it using poles — not to touch it directly.
Uzzah was a Levite (he was a worshipper). However, it should be mentioned that not all Levites were musicians — some were priests, teachers, or even judges. Whatever their role, they were all servants and leaders, and Uzzah knew the protocols.
Whether Uzzah realised it in the moment or not, his action was one of disobedience, which showed irreverence for the holiness of God — and it cost him his life.
We too might agree with King David that perhaps God’s response felt incredibly harsh, but God had made His command incredibly clear. Is it possible that in that moment, Uzzah became so overfamiliar with the Ark of the Covenant that he forgot a non-negotiable command of the Lord? Overfamiliarity with God’s presence can cause us to mistake an act of disobedience for a “good intention”. Read that again.
PART V: SPIRIT & TRUTH WORSHIP
We’re in a time where God is calling His worshippers into greater maturity. John 4:23–24 says, “True worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth… for the Father is seeking such to worship Him.” While reading this recently, I heard God say: “You need to tell the truth through your worship.”
This is a corporate message to the Church.
Too often we sing songs or say things to our congregations that are of no personal revelation to us. We may not be lying about a song’s message or a certain truth, but we can slip into performance or pretending if it’s not truth to us personally. Why does this matter? Because what we believe will show — whether we’re aware of it or not.
If we’re going to be truth-tellers in our worship expression, we need to first let God search our hearts.
Do you believe God is faithful?
Do you believe He is always good?
Do you believe He’s a healer?
If you’re honest and the answer is “no,” you need to go on a journey of being discipled into a revelation of that truth. Ask Him — and let Him.
True worshippers are honest — first before God and with themselves. We’re not going to be perfect, but we can begin by acknowledging that though we’re not quite where we want to be yet, we’re willing to be on our way — just like the man said to Jesus in Mark 9:23, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!”
What does intimacy with God have to do with all of this?
God must have our heart first, not a congregation.
If the platform is the only place we deeply — and maybe even uncontrollably — encounter God, we risk becoming a distraction to others because we’ve exchanged the platform for our prayer closet. It is from the secret place that our worship should overflow to minister to others. It doesn’t matter if it looks messy, but mature people can recognise the difference between a disciplined and devoted heart versus a dysregulated and distracting one.
People will not be set free by our performance, but by the anointing that grows from our reverence, our submission to consecration and the depth of our encounters with Him.
DO NOT GET WEARY IN DOING GOOD
Stepping into worship ministry has proven to be more costly than I could have known in the beginning — because God will expose our hearts and take us on a journey of crucifying our flesh.
For each of us — myself included — may the prayer of our hearts be:
Lord, draw me closer to Yourself in intimacy. Let my heart carry a true revelation and reflection of deep devotion to You.
Be reminded that life with Christ is a journey. Intimacy with God builds trust between us and God — allowing Him to do what He wants in us, and knowing that it is always for our good and for His glory.