choose to worship
The book
I so enjoyed reading Choose to Worship. The powerful testimonies and revelations the Lord has given Pastor Uziel in this book are so beautiful. As I read the book I could feel the Lord’s heart for His people and His desire that we would experience the power of His love as we worship Him spirit and in truth. I so appreciate Pastor Uziel’s honesty and humility. His willingness to write “real” is a powerful tool for the Lord to open hearts allowing the Holy Spirit opportunity to reveal the simple beautiful truths in this book. Every worship leader, every musician that ministers on a worship team and every Christian needs to read this book. Choose you this day whom you will serve, because He is God and worthy of it all!
Thank you Pastor Uziel for writing this book God will use it to bring many back to the heart of worship!
Marlene J. Yeo Director of Somebody Cares New England and Lead Pastor of Community Christian Fellowship of Haverhill
CHOOSE TO WORSHIP
INTRODUCTION
Life is full of choices: good choices, bad choices, choices that we regret, choices that make us rejoice, choices that make us sad or mad, choices that we are persuaded to make, choices that we made on our own. We have choices to make with every step we take; every day we are pushed to make choices. All this bring us to one conclusion: we are the product of our choices. If we had made one different choice in the past, we would not be the same person we are today. Choices lead us to experiences we would never have had otherwise.
Another result of our choices is that they don’t impact only our lives, but those of the people around us, and people who are led by God to meet us along the way.
When my wife, Daniella, and I decided to leave Brazil and come to the United States in the year of 2000, we knew our lives would never be the same. The experiences we went through, people we met from all over the world, friends we made, the two wonderful daughters God gave us here, the spiritual growth that occurred, the marriage troubles we faced here, and, by the grace of God, overcame, changed us forever. Today, we are who we are because of that one choice we made sixteen years ago, combined with all the choices we’ve been making every day in our lives since.
At the same time, we are assured that because of our decision to come to this country, we have had an impact on all the people we have met here.
I remember the day when I made the choice to not give up on my marriage. I thought that decision would affect just my wife and I, but time proved me wrong, and I will share one story in particular.
Daniella and I spent the whole year of 2001 struggling in our marriage, which almost ended up in a divorce, but in the beginning 2002, right after we got back together and worked things out in our relationship, we decided to pursue God in a way we never had before. We realized that was the only way to restore our lives and our family. So we immersed ourselves deeply into the Holy Spirit. He wa the missing link in our lives.
During this journey, we decided to open a Christian book store. After six months, we realized that financially the business was not a good investment, but we kept it going. In the next few months, one woman, who I’ll call Deborah, began to frequent our store. As Daniella started to get to know Deborah better, we discovered she was a believer, but at that time was far from God. Daniella always talked to her about coming back to Jesus and prayed with her.
Time went by, we closed the store and lost contact with her, but fFive or six years later we spotted Deborah in one of the Brazilian churches in our city. After the service, Deborah told us how the time she spent in our store helped her to return to Christ. Immediately, God ministered to my spirit and said, “Your decision to continue to stay married to your wife made this. Your decisions affect other people’s lives, not only yours.” I realized that the only way to not mess things up for myself, the people around me, and people that I haven’t even met yet, is to obey God. He knows our future, so He is the one who knows where our decisions will take us.
It may be difficult to understand how God knows everything: our past, present, and future; He knows our purpose of life. After all, He is the one who placed this purpose inside of us, and yet He gives us opportunities to fulfill it. He has never forced us and never will. One thing I now understand is that every time we make a decision without consulting God, we miss an opportunity to stay on His path to fulfill our purpose.
So, why Choose to Worship?
Worship is a journey of relationship, a journey of acknowledgement of God, a journey that can bring us back to Him, and to look like Him.
“Let us acknowledge the LORD; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth” Hosea 6:3.
My invitation to you, through this book, is to come with me on this twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week journey of worship. Choose to Worship God, choose to be like Him.