Worth Ship

The English word worship comes from the Anglo-Saxon weorthscipe, literally worth-ship.  It means attributing worth to God: in a planned and structure way, articulating what it is about His attributes and His mighty acts that makes Him worthy of all our worship, adoration, obedience, and praise.  We do this to remind ourselves of these things, but even more just because they are true. As such they deserve to be expressed and we need to express them, first for their own sake and then to reinforce our belief in them, our trust in them, and our commitment to them.  Note carefully: Worship is not about us.  It is about God.  And the benefits that we derive from it are there for us precisely because it is not about us but about Him.  We receive them precisely to the extent that we keep the focus not on ourselves but on Him. 

—Dr. Donald T. Williams (Longtime Evangelical Free Church pastor, spends summers in Africa training local pastors).