From the Inside Out: Private Devotion/Public Worship

In ministry, the ideas and execution of private devotion time and public worship, can and do become greatly confused with each other. I know that for myself, distinguishing between the two, can be a challenge. We often mistake the time we take to prepare for the Sunday morning services as our private time with God. I would say that fortunately, this is not the case.

We are extremely blessed to be called to ministry, and while God has given us the responsiblity to care and shepherd others, he also wants the personal relationship. If we don’t take the time to listen to God’s will for ourselves, how can we properly lead others? This is when burnout occurs. If our cup empty, we can’t help fill others.

What is interesting about these two important concepts, is that the heart of the matter is completely the same. When we accept Christ as our savior, our hearts and minds should change to reflect that. We should seek God in our own time, so that we may better know Him through His word and prayer. The same for our public worship. When we gather together, it should be everyone’s goal to come to a deeper understanding of who God is. Both acts are worship and worship is a call on our lives.

In our current schools of thought, worship is music and private devotion is reading. Is that really so? If we define corporate worship as singing, reading, praying, and teaching, then the same should be the case for your private time. When you listen to a sermon through a podcast at home, that’s worship! When you sing along to songs in the car, you guessed it, it’s worship. The only thing that should be different about private devotion and public worship, is who is in the room with you. Congregation? Public. You and the dogs? Private. The actions on how we worship and know God are the same, no matter the setting.