The Power of Worship

Part 1: When Glory Occupies the House

Bishop Joseph W. Walker, III

June 7, 2026

Scripture: Isaiah 6:1–8 (NKJV)

¹ In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple.

² Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew.

³ And one cried to another and said:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; The whole earth is full of His glory!”

⁴ And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke.

⁵ So I said:

“Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, The Lord of hosts.”

⁶ Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal which he had taken with the tongs from the altar.

⁷ And he touched my mouth with it, and said:

“Behold, this has touched your lips; Your iniquity is taken away, And your sin purged.”

⁸ Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying:

“Whom shall I send, And who will go for Us?”

Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.”

I.  INTRODUCTION

Watch the full sermon: https://www.youtube.com/@mtzionnashville/streams

Worship has many expressions, and many people have only a limited understanding of what authentic worship really looks like. We are products of our denominational upbringing and cultural context. But let’s be very clear: worship is more than music. It is more than a moment. Worship is more than an emotional experience that fades away.

Worship is the environment where heaven interrupts earth, and where God reveals Himself to His people in ways that human hands could never produce. Worship is divine disruption — God coming in and literally creating access points between glory and earth so that His will can manifest in the world. “Your will be done in earth as it is in heaven.”

Too often our culture looks at how we produce stages and spaces, and we lose sight of the power of presence and Spirit. God is not just concerned about the house being full — He is also concerned about the people in the house being filled. God is concerned about us moving out of moments of religiosity and into a pure relationship with Him.

It is important to understand the difference between glamour and glory:

• Glamour entertains; glory transforms.
• Glamour impresses; glory invades.
• Glamour draws attention to people; glory draws attention to God.

The glory of God is the manifested presence of God — the character, the weight, the excellency of God. The Hebrew word translated “glory” literally means the idea of weight, substance, or significance. God wants that weight to fall in this place and in your life. When it does, everything that’s crooked will be made straight, everything that’s sick can be healed, and everything that’s broken can be repaired.

II.  REAL WORSHIP BEGINS WHEN YOUR VISION OF GOD BECOMES BIGGER THAN YOUR CIRCUMSTANCES

A.  When God reveals His holiness, it confronts our casual view of Him.

In the year that King Uzziah died, Isaiah saw something he had never experienced before. Uzziah had reigned for 52 years — everybody in the kingdom had grown up knowing nothing but him. But now the king was dead, the nation was in transition, and people were wondering what would come next. It was in that moment of uncertainty that God stepped on the scene and gave Isaiah an encounter.

Isaiah said, “I saw the Lord, high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple.” The train of a king was symbolic of the breadth and length of his kingdom. The longer the train, the greater the kingdom. What Isaiah saw was a King whose train filled the entire temple — every single crevice and space — suggesting that God was in control of everything.

The Seraphim crying “Holy, holy, holy” emphasized the absolute purity and uniqueness of God. Even the heavenly beings covered their faces and feet in His presence. We must be careful not to allow familiarity with sacred things to cause us to lose our reverence for God. We know the songs, we know the language, we know the rhythms — but we must not let routine rob us of the fear of the Lord.

Consider the contrast: we stand for presidents, but sit for the Almighty. We scream for entertainers, but whisper in worship. We travel hours for a game, but complain about traveling to church. We spend hundreds of dollars on concerts, but struggle to give our time to God. The problem is not that we don’t know how to celebrate — we just don’t know who to celebrate.

B.  When God reveals His glory, it shakes what we thought was secure.

The text tells us that the posts of the temple shook at the voice of the heavenly beings. This shaking is not random — it is a physical response to the weight of God’s glory. The posts represent access points and anchor points: things you have depended on and leaned on.

God shakes those things so that you will know where your real help comes from. You’ve been depending on your career, your degree, your title — and God causes a situation in your life where none of those things can bring you out. Only God can. What you are experiencing may be the intentional shaking of systems and things you have leaned on, so that God can show you where your real help comes from.

Whatever is over your head is still under His feet. The cancer is under His feet. The unemployment is under His feet. Whatever you are dealing with is under His feet — and if you could just stop looking at your problem as a big thing and start looking at your God, you will begin to recognize that He has it all M

III.  WHEN YOU ENCOUNTER GOD’S PRESENCE, IT EXPOSES WHAT MUST CHANGE IN YOU

A.  The presence of God exposes what familiarity has allowed us to ignore.

Isaiah’s vision did not lead him to celebrate himself — it forced him to confront himself. There is a difference between a religious experience and a spiritual encounter. Religious people say, “I know what’s wrong with you.” People who have had a spiritual encounter say, “God has shown me what’s wrong with me.” You cannot get into the presence of God and not see yourself for who you are.

Worship is more than inspiration — it is transformation. Many of us have begun to evaluate worship by our preferences instead of by God’s presence. We ask: Did they sing my song? Was it loud enough? Did they do it the way I like it? But the question of worship has never been whether we enjoyed it. The question is whether God enjoyed it.

Worship is like a mirror. You can try to squeeze into something that doesn’t fit, but the mirror will not lie. I don’t care what you post on social media or what you put on Facebook to try to convince others — what will not lie is worship. When you worship, God is going to show you who you really are.

Isaiah admitted: “I am a man of unclean lips, dwelling among a people of unclean lips.” The glory of God made him aware that he had been living in a place and among days he did not want to confront. God doesn’t show you yourself to condemn you — He shows you yourself so you can experience transformation.

Smoke does three things:

• Chokes — Smoke chokes out whatever cannot stand to be in that atmosphere. This is why some people get uncomfortable in certain rooms. When glory gets on you, some things and some people cannot stay in your presence — and that’s not about you. It’s what’s on you. Glory chokes out everything that isn’t right.
• Climbs — Smoke rises. It doesn’t stay at one level. Anything that gets in the atmosphere of smoke has no choice but to go up. Put your marriage in the glory — it’s on the way up. Put your resources in the glory — they’re on the way up. Put your career in the glory — it’s on the way up. “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”
• Clings — You can’t hide smoke. There is no Lysol strong enough to mask it, because smoke lingers. Just like in the natural, when you’ve been in the glory, it clings to you. You can’t deny it. People will look at you and say, “You don’t look like you belong where you used to be.” That’s because glory is on you.

B.  The grace of God always meets us at the point of our confession.

At the very moment of Isaiah’s confession — when people might have condemned him or canceled him — grace showed up. One of the seraphim flew to him with a live coal from the altar, touched his lips, and said: “Your iniquity is taken away, and your sin is purged.” Just like that, grace met him at his place of confession.

You cannot out-sin grace. The job someone has is not because they’ve been so good — that’s grace. The car they drove here in — that’s grace. The food in the pantry, the clothes on the back — those are grace. It’s amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I was lost, but now I’m found; was blind, but now I see.

IV.  A TRUE ENCOUNTER WITH GOD WILL ALWAYS MOVE YOU FROM WORSHIP TO PURPOSE

A.  God’s voice always calls for someone willing to carry His mission.

After the encounter, after the confession, after the cleansing — Isaiah heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Notice the pronoun: “Whom shall I send” — and then “who will go for Us?” This is a revelation of the triune nature of God.

God who is Father is the One who commissions — He gives the instructions. God who is Word gives you the directions on where to go. God who is Spirit gives you the power to fulfill what you have to do. He never sends you somewhere without directions, and He never allows you to do it without His Spirit. Whatever God gives you as a directive, you don’t choose it — it chooses you.

God is not calling you because of your ability — He is calling you because of your availability. You may be scared because you don’t feel adequate. You may feel like your flaws disqualify you, or that you don’t have enough resources. But God would never give you an assignment without also giving you the anointing to carry it out.

There is something God wants you to do. I know you’re scared. I know it sounds crazy in the natural — but that’s how you know it’s God. It’s not something you would do for yourself. You have to have the courage to step out and do what God has called you to do, because when you’re doing God’s job, God always blesses it.

B.  The most powerful response in worship is a surrendered life.

God doesn’t need your money. The Atlantic Ocean will not run out of water because you stopped giving. The sun will not run out of energy because you stopped attending. God wants you here so He can bless you. That’s your covering. The only thing you can actually give God is worship — and worship equates to surrender.

There is one word God has been waiting on from you. One word that will shift everything in your life: Yes. You don’t have to figure out all the details. Just say yes to His will, yes to His way, yes to what He has called you to do. That’s what worship does. It makes your will so yielded that, like Isaiah, you say: “Here am I — send me.”

Several years ago, a major airport experienced a system outage. Hundreds of planes were lined up on the tarmac. Pilots were trained, passengers were seated, destinations were programmed, fuel tanks were full — everything necessary for the flight was present. But one thing was missing: the control tower had not cleared their takeoff. For hours, those planes sat there — tremendous potential, sitting still — because they had not received authorization to leave the gate.

Then the signal came. One by one, those planes pushed back from the gate, moved out to the runway, and launched into the purpose for which they were built. The plane was not designed to live at the gate. The gate was only a place of preparation. The runway was a place of transition. The sky was the place of the assignment.

That’s what Isaiah 6 is about. The temple was Isaiah’s gate. The altar was his runway. The nations were his assignment. God filled the house with glory because He was preparing somebody for departure.

Maybe that’s why God filled this house today — not so you could shout and stay, not so you could dance and stay — but because somebody needs clearance to take off. The glory did not just come to bless us. The glory came to commission us. It did not just come to make us comfortable — it came to push us into something we would otherwise not do for ourselves.

This is your season. Go do what you have always prayed about doing. The teacher needs to leave this room and impact the classroom. The business person needs to leave this room and impact the boardroom. The mother needs to leave this room and impact her family. The young adult needs to leave this room and impact a whole generation.

Have a blessed rest of your week! ❤️