Student Study Guide
Lesson 16
The Sacrifice of Praise
Section 1 - The Standard Has Not Changed
Section One
Lesson 15 established the foundational principle: there is a right way and a wrong way to approach God, and the distinction matters absolutely. The principle does not change from the Old Testament to the New Testament.
1. The principle of approaching God the right way applies to , to , and especially to .
2. God's rebuke in Malachi is direct: "Where is My ? Where is My ?" The priests were bringing lame animals, blind animals - offerings that them nothing and communicated nothing of the weight of who God is.
3. The form has changed - we do not bring animal sacrifices anymore. But the New Testament is equally clear that what we do bring is a sacrifice of . The same God who rejected the lame lamb in Malachi assesses with the same eye the praise that fills many church buildings today.
Your Reflection
Section 2 - The Prescribed Path: A Map, Not a Metaphor
Section Two
The architecture of the Old Testament tabernacle and temple was not decorative - it was instructional. The movement through the physical space mapped the movement of the soul toward God: outer gates, courts, inner court, holy place, and finally the holy of holies.
This is not liturgical poetry. It is a map. The gates cannot be entered without thanksgiving. The courts cannot be entered without praise. A person who arrives at the presence of God having bypassed gratitude and wholehearted praise has not followed the prescribed approach.
4. The gates cannot be entered without . The courts cannot be entered without . This is not liturgical poetry - it is a .
5. A person who arrives at the presence of God having bypassed gratitude and bypassed wholehearted praise has not followed the prescribed approach. They may have felt some . They may have been in the vicinity. But the holy of holies remains to those who did not approach it His way.
6. The moment worship becomes a performance to rather than an offering to , the approach has been abandoned in favor of , and His presence is replaced with an adrenaline-induced, sensory-overloading spectacle.
Your Reflection
Section 3 - What God Has Commanded in Worship
Section Three
God has not left the question of how He likes to be worshiped to individual preference or cultural expression. The Scriptures are remarkably concrete, and the commands are not suggestions.
God's Specific Commands in Worship
7. These are not descriptions of what a particularly enthusiastic group happened to do. They are from God about the manner in which He wants to be approached. They carry the same weight as any other in Scripture.
8. Jesus said: "If you love Me, you will My commandments." The command is: love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and . Applied to worship: sing with all your strength, shout with all your strength, dance with all your strength - not as a performance, but as an act of expressed through .
9. The Hebrew word halal, often translated as "praise," carries a startling meaning: to act foolish, to shout loudly, to make a great noise, to rave about God. God chose this word . He is describing a quality of approach that is wholehearted to the point of .
David Dancing Before the Ark: He danced before the ark with all his might, leaping and spinning, consumed with the glory of God coming home. Michal watched from a window and despised him in her heart. David's response: "I will be even more undignified than this." He had no interest in managing his image before men when he was before God.
10. David had no interest in managing his before men when he was before God. Worshiping God His way is not religious . It is expressed through obedience.
Your Reflection
Section 4 - The Lame Sacrifice in the Modern Church
Section Four
God's word in Malachi escalates: "If you are going to bring Me this kind of offering, I would rather you shut the doors entirely than kindle fire on My altar in vain."
The Diagnosis: "You shout louder for your sports team than you do for Me. You get more excited about a sale than you do for Me. You will stand in a queue for two hours to see the latest film, but you cannot manage to arrive at church on time."
11. The connection between lame worship and the of the church is direct. The divorce rate in the church matching the divorce rate in the world, the pervasive moral failure, the absence of revival - these are not to the quality of the approach being made to God.
12. A people who do not honor God in worship have forfeited the conditions in which His flows. Not because God is vindictive, but because the approach He prescribed carries the spiritual that release His presence and power. the approach and the power remains locked.
The Alternative: Those who have been around genuine revival know what happens when a congregation truly worships God His way. The presence of God comes swiftly and heavily. Miracles break out. Strongholds are demolished. People are transformed without the preacher having to work for it - because the presence of God has done what no program or technique can produce. The presence makes the difference. And the presence comes when the approach is right.
Your Reflection
Section 5 - Gratitude: The Gate
Section Five
The Starting Point: The path to the holy of holies begins at the gates, and the gates are entered with thanksgiving. Before any shout, before any dance, before any lifting of hands: gratitude. Genuine, not performed. The kind of gratitude that does not exist without a prior reckoning with what is genuinely deserved.
13. God gave a revelation that permanently reshaped the approach to thanksgiving: the only thing any of us actually is an eternity in hell. The of sin is death - eternal separation from God. That is what sin .
14. Everything else - every , every mercy, every moment of grace, every answered prayer, every morning - is an gift. When that is genuinely understood, gratitude is not a spiritual discipline that requires effort. It is the only response to existence.
✍ The Benjamin Story - Read It Carefully
One evening, writing on the subject of thanksgiving, the truth arrived in a form that made it impossible to remain merely theoretical. Late at night - around eleven - a thirteen-year-old son, Benjamin, appeared in the doorway. He was supposed to be in bed.
He said he had been thinking. There is a running joke in the house that when Benjamin thinks, it costs money. He anticipated the response and stopped it: "No, this time it won't cost you anything." Then he pulled his hands from behind his back and held out twenty-five dollars - half of the fifty he had received for his birthday.
"I just wanted to thank you and Mom for everything you do for me." The other half he was giving to the church for missions.
He was sent to bed. Then going into another room and crying - because there are no adequate words for what that moment did. The impulse was immediate and overwhelming: to take him to Walmart and say, "You can get whatever you want. Anything." Because the gratitude was genuine and it was costly and it was freely given.
And God spoke directly into that moment: "Son, this is exactly how I feel when My people are truly grateful to Me. When they are genuinely thankful, I want to open the treasuries of heaven. I want to pour out everything I have."
15. God spoke into the Benjamin moment: "This is exactly how I feel when My people are truly to Me. When they are genuinely thankful, I want to open the of heaven. I want to pour out I have."
16. That is the gate. Enter His gates with thanksgiving - not the , obligatory kind, but the kind that comes from a soul that has genuinely reckoned with and found it overwhelming. That gratitude opens the gate.
Your Reflection
Section 6 - Coming His Way: The Full Path
Section Six
The summary of this lesson: we do not come to God our way. We come to God His way. That applies to every dimension of the approach.
17. He told us to sing, so we . He told us to shout, so we . He told us to clap, so we . He told us to lift holy hands, so we lift them. He told us to dance, so we . He told us to get on our knees, so we get on our knees.
18. Not because any one of these things is a mechanical key that forces open a lock, but because is the expression of , and love expressed in obedience is what honors God, and a God who is honored up.
The Path to the Holy of Holies:
Thanksgiving → enters the gates
Praise → carries through the courts
Wholehearted obedient worship → opens the holy of holies
The secret place of the Most High. The manifest presence of God. Where His secrets are kept for those who came the right way.
19. Obedience is the God is after. Not the offering of a performance. Not the donation of a few comfortable minutes. The full, wholehearted, costly, joyful, obedience of a people who have decided that what God wants matters more than how they look, more than what they feel, more than what is convenient.
20. That is the sacrifice of praise. That is how you enter the gates. That is how you walk through the courts. And that is how, in the end, you find yourself standing in the of holies - in the secret place of the Most High, in the presence of God, where the secrets are kept for those who came the right way.
Final Reflection
Lesson 16 - Practice Test
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Part A: Multiple Choice (5 questions · 2 pts each)
1. What was God's specific rebuke in Malachi 1:6-8, and how does it apply to New Testament worship?
2. Why does the lesson call Psalm 100:4 a "map" rather than "liturgical poetry"?
3. What does the Hebrew word halal (translated "praise") actually mean?
4. What specific revelation came through the Benjamin story about gratitude?
5. According to the lesson, what is the connection between lame worship and the powerlessness of the modern church?
Part B: True or False (6 statements · 1 pt each)
1. The commands to sing, shout, clap, dance, and lift hands in worship are descriptions of what enthusiastic people happened to do, not binding commands from God.
2. Genuine gratitude does not require effort because it is the only logical response to existence when a person genuinely understands that the only thing they deserve is hell.
3. David's response to Michal's contempt for his dancing was to acknowledge she was right and to worship more quietly in the future.
4. God said in Malachi 1:10 that He would rather the temple doors be shut entirely than have lame, vain offerings kindled on His altar.
5. Worshiping God His way - singing, shouting, clapping, dancing - is a mechanical technique to force God to show up, if done correctly enough.
6. According to the lesson, when a congregation truly worships God His way, miracles, transformation, and the breaking of strongholds follow - not because of technique but because His presence has come.
Part C: Fill in the Blank (5 items · 1 pt each)
1. Enter into His with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise (Psalm 100:4).
2. The Hebrew word halal means to act clamorously , to shout loudly, to rave about God.
3. Worshiping God His way is not religious performance. It is expressed through obedience.
4. "To obey is better than " (1 Samuel 15:22).
5. The gates of God's presence are entered with .
Part D: Short Answer (completion credit)
1. Explain why Psalm 100:4 is a "map" rather than poetry. What is the significance of the sequence (thanksgiving at the gate, praise in the courts)?
2. Describe the starting point of genuine gratitude the lesson establishes. What revelation about what we deserve transforms the nature of thanksgiving?
3. What did God reveal through the Benjamin story? How does it change the way you understand what genuine thanksgiving does in the heart of God?
Part E - The Sacrifice of Praise This Week
List two specific ways your personal worship has been lame (costing you nothing, half-hearted, performed). Be honest.
What specific acts of worship God has commanded will you do this week that you have been withholding?
Write a prayer entering His gates with thanksgiving - genuine, not performed. Start with what you actually deserve.