What is Right Worship?

Silhouette of two arrow signs

Photo by Raul Petri on Unsplash
Before I was a pastor, I was a photographer. I remember one of my first weddings I did, I was assisting a friend. The wedding was to take place on this beautiful outdoor venue looking out over a mountainside. Lovely location in the middle of a state park. There was one issue, however. The GPS didn't know where it was. We had no clue what it looked like. The wedding was starting in 45 minutes. And we were lost. Thanks to my friends confident driving (and his beautiful Chevy Camaro's roaring engine), we finally came across it (in time!). But we would have much rather had a guide. 

While missing a wedding would have had consequences for us, there are far higher stakes when it comes to worship. Displeasing a bride on her wedding day is a sad thing, but it is a sadder thing, and actually much scarier thing to displease God. 

As you know we are in the midst of a series on worship. We saw that worship simply defined is bowing down in awe and joy before God. Having felt that awe and joy, what should we do with it when we are all gathered together? That was the question we left off with last time. 

Historically, there have been two answers to that question. The first approach would say that you can really do anything you want in the gathered worship of God's people as long as it isn't sinful. The fancy name for this is "the normative principle." To take my getting lost in the woods analogy to this, it would have helped my friend and I to eliminate some roads as not taking us to the wedding venue, but we would want the best road to that. 

That's where the second answer comes in. The first answer was we could do anything that wasn't sinful, but the second answer is we can only do what we have been given explicit instructions to do in God's Word. This second answer has a fancy name called "the regulative principle of worship." There are regulations for worship, and based off of what we just confessed in our catechism this morning, those regulations come from the Bible, and no where else, including our own preferences. 

Is that too restrictive? After all, doesn't God care most about the heart, and as long as we are sincere, it's ok? Maybe clown communion is a bit too far (and yes, that's a real thing where the person serves communion dressed as a clown. Look it up if you dare), but isn't there some middle ground where everyone can be happy? 

What I am hoping to convince you of today is that the regulative principle, meaning God regulates His own worship with His Word is in fact the Biblical way to worship God, and is actually the best for your soul. To be clear, we are speaking about public, gathered worship, not private or family worship, where there is more latitude. 

​God Desires His Worship His Way

I think the best way to see how God feels about this is to see what happens when such instructions are ignored. I've got two stories that give us insight on this question and illustrate why, in the verses I read this morning, we are not to add or take anything away from God's instructions on worship. 

The first story comes from Leviticus 10:1-3. When the priesthood was being established, two of them, Nadab and Abihu played fast and loose with the worship that God called for. We don't know exactly how, as the text just says that they offered up "strange fire." It's not like they were offering up no fire of sacrifice, just the same fire but in some wrong way. And God consumed them with it!  

Our second story comes in 2 Samuel 6:7. Many years have passed since Leviticus. The nation is established, King David is on the throne, and the Israelites were moving the ark of the covenant into the new capital city, Jerusalem. But they were doing it improperly. This Ark represented God's presence and if it had to be moved, it was to be carried with long poles, but they opted for a more convenient approach and dragged it on a cart drawn by an ox. Well the ox stumbled, and Uzzah, one of the temple staff, reached out to stabilize the Ark, touched it (HUGE violation, based on an understandable reaction) and was struck dead, too.

Now, these true stories strike us as quite harsh because they are. That's the point. The severity of the punishment shows the severity of the crime. And precisely because we wouldn't think these things were all that bad all the more shows how necessary this response is. God *is* that offended. We need to know that. 

But, you'll also notice that God's mercy is more. There was a lot of bad worship that would come throughout Israel's history. And except for these examples here, the response is mercy rather than justice. This isn't because God was having a bad day, but God was providing an example of what that sin really deserves. The fact that He isn't killing worshipers right and left isn't to say that God doesn't care. It just says that God is full of mercy. 

But we should not presume on that mercy. We should not assume that because this hasn't happened in a while that God isn't bothered by it anymore. The Bible is clear that God doesn't change or have bad moods: Mal 3:6 “For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed. James 1:17 "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change."

Now, some of you may be a little spooked by this. That not really a bad thing. There should be a level of cautious approach, like we talked about last week. We are encountering Absolute Being Itself, Supremely Holy, as a sinful creature from birth defined by rebellion. Reverent public worship from this motivation isn't a bad motive, but there is a better one. 

Despite our sin, an atonement has been made. And it was not made by you. You don't read this book well enough to finally offer up worship perfectly on your own.  None of us ever gets a 10 out of 10 on how well we listened, prayed, or preached. In our sin, we deserve to be struck down every day. That's why we need Jesus so much. He gets a 10 out of 10 every week and then assigns that perfect grade to us. 

We need both! As someone said, the black cloth of God's wrath against sin makes the diamond of God's grace in the gospel shine all the more. And far from making us lax and uncaring about what we do, this reality should motivate us further to dive into God's Word because we want to offer up what He loves because *we* love Him. He has shown us such grace, so how can we not respond with obedience? With trembling awe and celebration? With worship as He desires.  

So what does this public, gathered worship look like? God gives us the elements of worship that He desires in His Word. I think that we not only see what the elements of worship are in the Bible, but the Bible gives us a great deal of the *content* of those elements. 

We will see as we go through our series that our worship centers on God and uses the His Word to worship Him with those elements. We will read and preach it, pray and sing with its words and concepts, see it visibly in the Lord's Supper and Baptism, and send it financially with our tithes and offerings. 

As we will see, that doesn't mean that the service is exactly the same every single week. Same song, same prayer, same Bible passage. There is a tremendous variety of songs and prayers in the Scriptures that shape our own. In fact, the Psalms explore a lot more emotions than the vast majority of modern music these days. When have you ever heard Hillsong sing about God breaking the teeth of His enemies? In other words we can sing and preach all kinds of things, but we can't do an interpretive dance and call it a sermon. We can sing Psalms, Hymns, and, yes, even modern songs that are based on the Bible's words and concepts, but we can't instead substitute in a Broadway song with a "positive message" and call it Biblical worship.

Regulated worship grows our souls best

This doesn't mean that anytime we have private devotions we need to have our church bulletin next to us. This also doesn't mean that public worship becomes some life draining, boring thing because it isn't formed by us for us. 

After all what better source could we use than the Bible? Does not faith come by hearing, and hearing through the Word of Christ (Romans 10:17)? Is it not so that according to James 1:18 "Of his own will he brought us forth *by the word of truth*, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures"?Does not 1 Pet 1:23 tells us that "...you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, *through the living and abiding word of God*;"? Does not Psalm 119 cover this exhaustively by saying, Ps 119:25 "My soul clings to the dust; give me life according to your word! Ps 119:50 "This is my comfort in my affliction, that your promise gives me life." Ps 119:93 "I will never forget your precepts, for by them you have given me life." Ps 119:156 "Great is your mercy, O Lord; give me life according to your rules." And that isn't even all the verses in that chapter that say something similar! 

We don't have to limit the use of the Bible to reading and preaching. It can and should fill all the elements of our worship. 

We will explore those elements individually as we go, but I want to leave you with this thought as we wrap up. This regulative principle doesn't ignore the person in the pew. In fact, as with all of God's Commands, it is an invitation to the Good Life. It's an invitation to worship that shapes your soul, deepens your knowledge and love of God, and actually grows your emotional range. As Psalm 119 put it "gives you life." This isn't worship that is meant to turn you into a bodyless, brain on a stick that wouldn't even THINK about raising your hands. This Word-soaked worship is meant to grow you to the point that you would raise your hands (if so legitimately moved) in spontaneous joy while reciting the truth of the Creeds. 

Regulative worship isn't opposed to the body. In fact, next time we are going to see how our bodies aren't just tolerated but required to participate in worship: the Lord's Supper and Baptism, the Word made visible.