Tomorrow’s service is going to be incredibly difficult for me and my worship team, and even during our rehearsal on Thursday I had a difficult time singing “You give and take away…my heart will choose to say, Lord, blessed be Your name.”

I do believe that we should worship and praise regardless of the pain in our hearts and our lives. I personally make that choice over and over again, and have experienced first hand the hope and healing that can come out of it. My question is…is it ok to have tears along with the praise?

I’m also relating in an extra way–worship for me with my fellow believers on Sunday shall be different than usual. I’ll be worshiping without being able to be verbal due to losing my voice (& allowing someone else to lead our early service in that capacity since I obviously can’t), and possibly dealing with ACTUAL pain/fatigue (ha ha) from a sinus headache/cold. This week I’ve wanted to sing more, and been unable to, and what a great way to think about it — the sacrifice is that I can’t let it out of my heart in the same way, and yet that doesn’t make it any less worship to the King of kings unless I let it keep me from worshiping at all. I’ll be thinking about this post Sunday to keep me “in line” as well as until Sunday, too, and also really liked what you said here:

“As far are our weekend gathering, we would do well to have a different opinion about our experience on the days when things make us uncomfortable and even perhaps in pain. If we are having heart burn about a point in the message, distressed over the volume of the music, dissatisfied with the glum faced people around us it does not negate a worship experience–it makes that experience a sacrifice.”

It is at this time when we worship God the most freely. When he takes things away, it is easier, at least for me, to worship because I am worshipping him in spite of circumstances. It is easy to praise when it is going good. It is a sacrifice of praise when it is hard.