In large part Christians don’t worship a Triune God.  They worship a Quadrune God of Father, Son, Holy Spirit and Works/Obedience.  We even read this God into Scripture.  For instance, in John 14:15 Jesus says:

  "If you love Me, you will keep My commandments."

  Watch careful what we do with that statement.  We tell ourselves, "OK, I’m going to keep a commandment of God to prove to Him that I love Him!"  But that is NOT what Jesus is saying.  He is saying:

  If you love me, if your focus is on loving me, you will keep my commandments, the outpouring of that love for me will so transform you that you won’t have to try to do something as unnatural as obedience, it will simply begin to flow from you, without you even noticing it.

  Note the word ‘begin’ in that statement.  When God was working to transform creation, He never expected creation to have it all together on day one.  God simply worked in one area at a time, leaving the other parts messy.

  The idol of obedience tells us that we must have our entire lives together all at once, right at the beginning.  That idol is what causes people to put on the "church mask" and hide our sin from each other, when what we need to do is have everyone be so open about our sins that those who wish to judge are so overwhelmed with sins to judge they have a nervous breakdown, trying to do God’s work for Him!

  So, to summarize: the Theology of Adoration is to stop worrying about your obedience and put that focus and energy back where it belongs: on cultivating a love for the voice of God.  From that, you will be fully acceptable in the eyes of God and as a secondary effect of that focus you will begin to be more obedient, without thinking about it.  Imagine that.  David sinned, but God saw him as one who was after God’s own heart, and thus he was acceptable to God.  Abraham had faith (not works) and through that he was also acceptable before God.  The pharisees had perfect obedience and never found God.

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