“Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, Bless His holy name.”1
IF YOU HAVE a family, I’m sure you’re aware how important celebrations are. If your kids are like mine, they are planning their next birthday party the day after they celebrated their current birthday party or they start making their Christmas lists in January. The truth of the matter is people love to be celebrated. There is something special about feeling special. No matter how old you get, you still like to be celebrated. You still like to know that you are loved and that those people around you hold you in high esteem. Celebrations are about remembering someone special or a special event in life.
Though it’s an example in its simplest form, did you know God loves to celebrate? God is constantly throwing a party and enjoying the beauty of His creation. In Leviticus God instructed the Israelites to celebrate seven feasts throughout the year. Absolutely. There are seven feasts in the Bible that the law required the Israelites to celebrate. Here’s what is so interesting. The early feasts celebrated and commemorated the things that Christ had already done, and the latter feasts or festivals celebrated the events that Christ was still going to do. Let me reiterate. The first four feasts celebrated victories the Israelites had already received and experienced, and the remaining three feasts celebrated victories the Israelites hadn’t experienced yet but knew they were promises made by God. The feasts celebrated what God did and the feasts celebrated what God will do. The celebrations were about the past and the future. The celebrations were about the “former” and the “latter” rain. Though the feasts of the Lord provide a detailed and foreshadowed view of the return of our Messiah, I also believe the feasts of the Lord provide a template of how we are to celebrate.
We honor and celebrate the things that have already happened: a birthday, an anniversary, and certain benchmarks. But as children of God we must also celebrate the things He is going to do. You must be intentional and celebrate the things God has done in your life, and you must celebrate the things God is going to do in your life. You have to celebrate the victories that have passed and the victories that are still yet to come.
When Jennette and I had crossed the hurdle of first learning that Josiah was going to live and walk, we then had to encounter the fact that there was a lengthy surgery with lifelong results—things such as limited mobility and certain activities that Josiah will never be able to participate in. However, we didn’t focus on the things Josiah was not going to be able to do. We celebrated the things we knew he would be able to do. We would say things such as, “Praise God, Josiah, you are going to be a walking, talking, breathing miracle! God is going to use you to build faith in other people to believe for their own healing.” Even when Jennette and I would be praying alone together, we would pray, “Thank You, God, that Josiah will have full motion of his neck, that his limitations will be minimal, and his breathing stabilized.” We celebrated and believed for those things we knew God could do and those things God already had done. If you saw Josiah today, other that the physical scars on his neck, you would have no idea he endured and experienced what he had.
As a worship leader I love the verse in Psalm 22:3 that says that God “inhabitest the praises of Israel” (KJV). I would like to make something clear; praise has nothing to do with music. You can praise with or without music. You can celebrate with or without a choir behind you. You can praise loudly or quietly. You can praise with your eyes closed or open. Celebration, praise, and worship are attitudes of the heart and have nothing to do with music.
Now I am not suggesting that you praise God for the mess you are in. I’m telling you that you should praise God because He is on the throne. When you praise and lift high the name of the Lord above the mess that you are in, His presence is sure to visit you in your mess. In essence, what I’m saying is don’t praise Him because of the mess; praise Him while you’re in the mess. There’s a praise that celebrates what He’s already done, and there’s a praise that celebrates what He’s about to do! Celebrate the former and the latter.
Waiting to celebrate the victory until you see it with your eyes is like making the mistake that joy and laughter are the same thing. Let me explain. The word joy and its different variations are mentioned more than two hundred times in the Bible. As Christians we are supposed to be joyful. Did you know the word laughter is mentioned only forty-two times, and of those times it is mentioned, it is often used as a mockery of evil? Joy and laughter are not the same thing. You can laugh and not have joy. Laughing refers to something that is for the moment, but joy is an attitude of the heart and is eternal.
Fun and joy are two different things. You might not be having fun when your bills are piled high with no idea how you will be able to pay them, or when the house is chaotic and your marriage isn’t where you’d like it to be, but you can still have joy. Fun is predicated on your external environment, and joy is predicated on your internal environment. Joy is not associated with a life that is free from trials, nor is joy equated with comfort or pure bliss. Joy is not an emotion. It is a choice. Celebrating those things you have not yet seen is a choice. It is a choice you must make today. It is a choice you must make tomorrow. It is a choice you must make if you are walking through a circumstance that looks like there is no hope. You must have joy and continue to believe and profess, “It’s not over.” Psalm 16:11 tells us exactly where joy can be found:
You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
The only place to find joy is in His presence. True joy, true contentment, true peace is only found in the presence of the Lord. Your source of joy is not your husband, not your wife, not children, not your job; nor is it your pastor or your church. Your source of joy is God and God alone.
When I was waiting at the airport to get back to my son, fear, doubt, and destruction were shouting loud at me. There are times in life when you need to shout louder than what’s shouting at you. When I was at the airport not knowing how my story would end, I was shouting out with a fearless abandonment for my son’s healing. I believe that certain circumstances in life will not break without the people of God issuing a shout!
There have been some interesting discoveries about the ability of invisible sound waves. I was reading an article that said sound waves, which are not seen by the eye, actually have the ability to break solids, which are seen by the eye.2 Sound waves can cause a glass, for example, to shatter. I’m sure you’ve seen the demonstration on television with an amazing high-pitched opera singer hitting the right note and a glass crumbling. In order for the glass to break, the sound wave and the object must be at the same frequency.
There are situations in your life that require a unique frequency. I recognize that you can’t walk around life screaming, but I am saying that there is a heavenly frequency that you tap into when you change your frequency into a celebration of worship.
In Joshua 6 Joshua led the Israelites around the city of Jericho. In Joshua 6:1 the Bible says, “Now Jericho was securely shut up because of the children of Israel . . . ” Jericho was the promise they were seeking. Jericho was where they were headed, but the Bible says, It was “securely shut up.” Their promise was locked up.
Have you ever felt as if your promise is locked up? You know what God has said you are to inherit, but it is unattainable, somehow out of your reach. There seems to be a wall between you and your promise. God had promised Jericho to the Israelites, but the road from the promise to the manifestation was not what they expected. Remember the Israelites wandered in the desert for forty years and really had to learn to trust God and trust His provision. The Israelites had to wander the desert in order to get the “desert mentality” out of their hearts. A whole generation had to pass away, along with some bad attitudes and wrong patterns of thinking.
The Israelites were instructed to march around Jericho for six days. On the seventh day they were instructed to march around the walls seven times and then blow their trumpets. It wasn’t the Israelites complaining that brought the walls down. It wasn’t their begging or their crying. The walls of Jericho came down when they lifted their shout in unison to God. The Israelite’s promise was released when they lifted their shout. Joshua 6:5 says:
It shall come to pass, when they make a long blast with the ram’s horn, and when you hear the sound of the trumpet, that all the people shall shout with a great shout; then the wall of the city will fall down flat.
Sometimes the only thing between you and your promise is a shout. Sometimes those things locked behind walls are being held back and are waiting for you to lift your voice and celebrate with a shout! Your situation, your promise, your “it’s not over” moment needs a shout of worship to God in acknowledgement for what He’s done and for what He’s about to do.
You may be saying to yourself, “That shouting ‘stuff’ just isn’t for me. It’s just not my personality. I didn’t grow up that way.” Please understand; I am not here to tell you how you need to worship. I recognize and understand every person is different, and each person has a different way of expressing himself. To each his own. Not a problem. But why is it that when you go to the football game, you stand on your feet acting like a maniac for your team, not only shouting, but shouting with your hands in the air? Listen, I believe God should receive your highest and best celebrations. If you’re a quiet “shouter,” then great. But be consistent, and don’t make justifications about your worship. I’ve generally found those people who aren’t comfortable acknowledging God in worship are lacking intimacy in some way in their relationship with Him. Whether it’s shouting, lifting your hands, singing quietly, or quietly observing, always pursue a more intimate relationship with God.
On that same note I’d like to take a brief minute and direct these next few sentences to the men reading this book. I’ve found that, in general, it’s the men who have a difficult time outwardly expressing their worship to God. Somehow society has said it’s not masculine, cool, or acceptable for men to worship God.
Men, your family needs you to be the leader of your home in all areas, but first and foremost in the area of worship. Your children are watching how you interact with God, and they will emulate the relationship they see. You must set a godly example of a praying, worshiping father who is first submitted to His heavenly Father. Leave your children a monetary inheritance, but also leave them a spiritual inheritance and lead them in the things of God.
Generally it is the people who have been set free from deep bondage, addictions, or very dark sins who are able to have the most expressive and outward worship. The way worship is expressed is, of course, individual and unique to every person. Although we may not understand how or why people worship they way they do, we must never criticize or judge the humility, honor, and utter awe that person has in the presence of God. As fathers, and even as children of God, you should want your children and those around you to be affected and infected by your contagious worship. You should want them to see, from your worship, the impact God has had on your life, not just when the music is playing, but also during your daily life.
Several years ago Jennette and I had the opportunity to attend a concert for a well-known Christian artist. We were in the Glendale arena in Arizona with about twenty thousand other people and were sitting about seven rows in front of the stage. Seated a few rows in front of us was a lady who was obviously enjoying the concert and was very visibly expressing her worship by dancing and freely moving to the music. A few seats behind this lady were two other couples who were well dressed and perhaps from upper-class suburbia. The ladies carried exquisite purses and the husbands had on very expensive watches. Both couples, whether they had money or not, were very clearly trying to communicate the message of wealth or were desperately trying to act as people who had their act together.
As the concert went on, Jennette and I began to observe a situation that truly broke my heart. The well-dressed, “flashy” couples began to mock and outwardly make fun of the “free-worshiper.” It was so rude and so embarrassing that the spirit of righteous indignation, if you know what I mean, rose up in me. I wanted to take the men outside and give them a lesson on the “fist of the spirit”—I mean, “the fruit of the Spirit.” Right about that same time my wife nudged me, and I heard the voice of the Lord within my spirit (or maybe it was my wife, sometimes they are the same voice—if you’re married, you know what I mean) say, “Ricardo, those people have no idea what I’ve delivered this lady from and why she can worship so freely! Her worship has come at a great price. You have no idea what she’s been set free from or the heaviness she used to carry.” Watching this scenario unfold so spoke to my spirit that there is a freedom that comes from being set free. This moment was the inspiration that birthed the song “I’m Not Ashamed.” The lyrics became a prayer in my own life as an attitude of pure worship between Jesus and me. Read a short part of the chorus and worship without regard to what people think:
I’m going to dance for You
Like nobody’s watching; nobody’s watching
Dance for You, my Lord.
I’m going to sing for You
Like nobody’s listening; nobody’s listening
Sing for You, my Lord.
I’m not holding anything, anything back
I will worship You with all that I am
I’m not ashamed
To worship the name of Jesus, Jesus.3
Just as it was with the lady at the concert, you have no idea when you see people worshiping what they have been delivered from, where they came from, or the heaviness they may have just laid at the feet of Jesus.
In Matthew 26:7 there is a story, similar to the one I mentioned above, about a woman who brought her expensive alabaster box full of perfume and poured it on the head of Jesus. The disciples were indignant and upset that this lady would waste such an expensive asset. When Jesus heard how upset these people were at the lady’s expression of worship, Jesus said, “Leave this lady alone. She has just done something wonderfully significant for Me” (vv. 10–11). Like the alabaster box, your time of intimacy with God is valuable. People might not understand why you would “waste” your time on something, but to God your worship is significant.
Personally, I’m passionate in what I do, and I enjoy seeing passion in others. Honestly, it wouldn’t excite me very much if when I returned home from a weeklong ministry trip and walked in the door, Jennette was sitting on the couch reading a book and only briefly looked up to give me a quick nod. Thankfully, she doesn’t do that. When I come home from being gone, even if it’s a day, my boys coming running and shouting, “Daddy’s home!” Jennette greets me at the door with a hug, a kiss, and sincere joy that I’m back home. I love that! I believe God is the same way. I believe He loves when we celebrate and honor who He is and what He has done for us. Psalm 33:3 says, “Invent your own new song to him; give him a trumpet fanfare” (THE MESSAGE). I believe God enjoys when we celebrate Him.
As the youngest of five boys and one girl, there was often chaos in my house growing up. All six of us Sanchez kids were born within seven years, and we were constantly getting into some sort of trouble.
My mother was a saint. We didn’t have much, but my parents somehow managed to keep us kids fed and clothed. All five of us boys shared one room, which was no bigger than fifteen feet by fifteen feet. I’m sure you can imagine, bedtime was a nightmare for my mother, especially when we were younger. It wouldn’t take long after being sent to sleep, before one of my brothers would be up jumping on the bed, throwing a pillow, and begging for a fight. Despite the number of times my mother would shout, “Go to sleep, boys!” or come into our room to settle us down, we knew we would be given another chance.
But there was something different when my father spoke. There was an immediate authority recognized in my father’s voice. It would take only one time hearing, “Hey, quiet down in there!”, and all of us kids would be scrambling to get under the covers because we knew he would shortly be coming in with his belt.
As children of God there is an authority that comes with your shout that leaves your enemy scrambling. The Bible says in Romans 8:11, “But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.” You have the same authority as God when you come in the name of Jesus against your circumstances. It doesn’t matter if you shout, if you speak, or if you whisper—it’s not the delivery; it’s the name of Jesus that gets the attention of heaven. The Bible says in Philippians 2:10, “At the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”