Exodus 4:31 ".....the children of Israel .......... bowed their heads and worshipped."

Exodus 34:5-8 ".....And Moses made haste, and bowed his head toward the earth and worshipped."

Joshua 5:13,14 "......And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship....."

2 Chronicles 7:3 ".....all the children of Israel .......bowed themselves with their faces to the ground upon the pavement, and worshipped, and praised the Lord, saying, For he is good; for his mercy endureth for ever."

2 Chronicles 20:18 "And Jehoshaphat bowed his head with his face to the ground: and all Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem fell before the Lord, worshipping the Lord."

2 Chronicles 29:29 "And when they had made an end of offering, the king, and all that were present with him bowed themselves and worshipped."

Nehemiah 8:6 "And Ezra blessed the Lord, the great God. And all the people answered, Amen, Amen, with lifting up their hands: and they bowed their heads and worshipped the Lord with their faces to the ground."

What is worship? Worship is the soul bowing itself in adoring contemplation before the object worshipped. To worship God is to bow before God in adoring contemplation of Himself.

The word worship is commonly used in a very loose and unscriptural manner - e.g, we speak of the whole service of the Lord's Day morning and evening as "public worship," but there is a great deal in it that is not worship. Reading the Bible and meditating upon it is not worship. It may lead to worship but it is not worship.

Listening to a sermon is not worship. Praying is not worship. It may be, and should be, accompanied by worship; but it is not worship. There are hymns which, if sung intelligently and in the proper spirit, would be worship, but they are comparatively few in the hymnology of the day.

Worship is a definite act of the soul bowing before god in adoring contemplation of Himself. The root of the Hebrew word translated "worship" in the Old Testament means "to bow down."

It has been well said "in prayer we are occupied with our needs, in thanksgiving we are occupied with our blessings, in worship we are occupied with Himself."

We owe worship to God. It is His due We owe love to man, (honour) to parents, worship to God. It is our first duty toward Him. He is the All holy, All wise, Almighty, The Infinite, All Perfect One, and our rightful attitude toward Him is that of bowing before Him, or prostrating ourselves before Him, in adoring contemplation of His infinite loveliness and glory, of His attributes, of Himself.

If we do not worship God we are robbing Him of what is His due. It is not enough that we obey Him, that we pray to Him, that we return thanks to Him, that we seek to serve Him and do His will. We must worship.

Have you ever worshipped God? How much time do you spend daily in worshipping him - in pure and simple worship, in bowing before Him in silent and adoring contemplation of Himself?

What The Bible Teaches, R.A. Torrey, pg. 471