Biblical Worship

A couple of years ago Dr. David Peterson, author of the well-known book on worship Engaging with God, was on the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary campus in Louisville, KY to lecture on worship (www.sbts.edu).  One of his sermons,”The Worship that Pleases God,” centered on Hebrews 12:18-29 continuing into chapter 13.  Peterson’s succinct definition of worship in the sermon comes from verses 28-29:

Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire.

This new kingdom comes to us as believers through Jesus Christ who offered for us the full and final sacrifice on the cross to pay for our sins.  He is the mediator of a new convenant made possible by His blood.  When we realize the extent of what Christ has done for us, our response is simply gratitude.  We cannot earn this salvation for we could never repay this great debt. We can only accept this gift of grace and show gratitude.  Jesus Christ paid a debt He did not owe to satisfy a debt we could not pay.

So Peterson reminds us that our worship is really all about showing gratitude for what Christ has done for us.  Our lives should be filled with gratitude to Jesus Christ. Our corporate worship times - our songs, our prayers, our testimonies all point to one theme — gratitude.  The Apostle Paul reminds us of this gratitude in his Colossians letter:

Therefore as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith, just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude. Colossians 2:6-7

Let us be a grateful people this Thanksgiving season!  As we recount the Lord’s blessings with family and friends, let us not forget to show gratitude for the work of Christ in our lives.

Also see these quotes from Peterson’s book, Engaging with God:

http://biblicalworship.com/?p=264

http://biblicalworship.com/?p=354

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Our small group at church is studying a book called How People Change (Timothy Land, Paul Tripp, New Growth Press, ISBN 0-9770807-2-2).  The first chapter deals with the topic - The Gospel Gap.  The authors relate that there is often a “gap” for Christians between their conversion and their future life in heaven.  This is demonstrated when Christians fail to make the Gospel a vital part of their everyday lives - family, work, and leisure.  Part of the problem according to Land and Tripp is that we as ministers fail to help our people see how the Gospel should permeate every part our lives by giving them practical application.  They call pastors to make sure there is a connection in their preaching between the Gospel and its application to our daily lives. 

Land and Tripp state:

“It is in the here and now that many of us experience a gospel blindness.  Our sight is dimmed by the tyranny of the urgent, by the siren call of success, by the seductive beauty of physical things, by our inability to admit our own problems, and by the casual relationships within the body of Christ that we mistakenly call fellowship.  This blindness is often encouraged by preaching that fails to take the Gospel to the specific challenges people face.  People need to see that the Gospel belongs in their workplace, their kitchen, their school, their bedroom, their backyard, and their van.  They need to see the way the Gospel makes a connection between what they are doing and what God is doing.  They need to understand that their life stories are being lived out within God’s larger story so that they can learn to live each day with a Gospel mentality.”  (page 4 - How People Change).

The first challenge for pastors is to make sure that our worship services are full of the Gospel.  We then need to make sure our people see the connection of how this Gospel should permeate our lives.  Are we helping our people prepare to face life on Monday when we are opening and sharing God’s Word on Sunday?  I’m not talking about a list of 10 things that will make your life successful.  We do not need more self-help lessons.  We need to hear about the life changing Gospel and how this impacts our lives 24/7.

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What is appropriate for corporate worship?  How is this determined?  The only sufficient guide for us on these matters is God’s Word, the Bible.  Scripture alone should guide what we are doing in our worship services.  I think most Christians would agree on this point, but how many churches actually use the Bible as their final authority on worship practice?

This was one of the driving principles for change in the Reformation - doing only what Scripture prescribes in our worship practice.  This standard of only Scripture guiding worship practice became known as the Regulative Principle.  In the Westminster Confession of Faith (1646) we read:

We may not adopt any device [in our worship] which seems fit to ourselves, but look to the injunctions of him who alone is entitled to prescribe.  Therefore, if we would have him approve our worship, this rule, which he everywhere enforces with the utmost strictness, must be carefully observed…God disapproves of all modes of worship not expressly sanctioned in his word.

In the book, The Coming Evangelical Crisis (Moody Publishers, 1996) John MacArthur has written an excellent chapter on Worship and the Regulative Principle, “How Shall We Then Worship.”  A discussion on the regulative principle often leads to disagreements on whether to use musical instruments in worship, MacArthur says he is more concerned about other issues:

“I have no interest in igniting a debate about musical instruments, pastoral robes, sanctuary decorations, or other such matters.  If there are those who want to use the regulative principle as a springboard for such debates, please leave me out.  The issues that spark my concern about contemporary worship are far larger than these matters.  They seem to me to go to the very heart of what it means to worship in spirit and truth.  My concern is this:  The contemporary church’s abandonment of sola Scriptura as the regulative principle has opened the church to some of the grossest imaginable abuses - including honkytonk church services, the carnival sideshow atmosphere and wrestling exhibitions.  Even the broadest, most liberal application of the regulative principle would have a corrective effect on such abuses.”

MacArthur proceeds in this chapter on worship to outline four biblical guidelines for worship:

1. The preaching of the Word should take first place.

2. Edifying the church - building up the flock not just stirring the emotions.

3. Honor the Lord - Heb. 12:28 - showing reverence and awe.

4. Put no confidence in the flesh - Phil 3:3 - Trusting God’s Word not the creativity of man.

MacArthur unpacks each of these principles and brings a strong case for letting Scripture be our only guide to worship.

Is your worship service guided by Biblical principles?

Read the MacArthur chapter: How Shall We Then Worship

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When we think of the worship leader at church most people think of the person directing the congregational worship songs and rehearsing the instrumentalists and singers.  Sometimes we call this person our worship pastor, minister of music, or song leader.  I have even seen a church that called their worship leader “the Minister of Magnification.”  Whatever title a church may give to the music leader, I actually do not think that the music person in the church is the main worship leader.

Ultimately, I see the pastor of the church as the main worship leader.   The pastor is responsible before the Lord for what happens in the church which includes the weekly worship services of the church.  Because of this the pastor should be involved with the planning and leading of the corporate worship times.   Yet, how many pastors simply turn over the first 30 minutes or so to the music leader without supervision?

Over the years the Lord has allowed me to be a worship leader in several churches working with different pastors.  Most of the time I worked closely with the pastor in planning and leading the services.  Over time I gained my pastor’s trust and he would leave me with the responsibility of putting together the services each week.  However, I always appreciated his input and impressions concerning what I planned.

I think there are several implications for the church when the Pastor is seen as the main worship leader:

1.  Pastors need to have a good understanding of biblical worship and see that it is practiced at their church.  Even if a music person is planning the songs and other parts of the service, the pastor must know what each song text says and how the service is put together. 

2.  Pastors need to seek out music leaders who have strong theological grounding.  This grounding helps the music leader implement biblical worship principles each time a service is planned.  It also helps the leader to discern scriptural song texts from vague or even heretical texts.

3.  Pastors and music leaders need to work together each week to plan the service.  I am grateful for at least one of my former pastors who would give me his sermon plan for three to six months in advance.  This helped me to strive for a more cohesive worship service as opposed to a series of unrelated items in the bulletin.  Most of my former pastors all would spend time with me in planning the worship service. 

4.  Pastors need to be involved in the worship service prior to the sermon time.  I am all for involving as many people in the service as possible but people need to know that the pastor is interested and also involved in the early part of the service.  The pastor is not only the main worship leader but the lead worshiper as well.  This past year when one of our Boyce music groups traveled to a church to sing, I was impressed by the pastor who was totally engaged in the worship songs and prayers in the first part of the service.  What an example he was to his congregation!  This also sent a message that all of the service was important not just the sermon time.

5.  Pastors and music leaders need to evaluate the worship service.  Pastors should take the lead striving to improve the way the service is planned and carried out. 

Let me also state that although I do see the pastor as the main worship leader, this does not excuse the music leader from also being pastoral in the way he carries out his work as worship planner and leader.  The music leader must be pastoral in the way he works with his musicians and his care for the congregation’s needs. 

Pastors, our churches are looking for your leadership in the worship service.  If you have a capable music leader, you are blessed but this does not excuse you from your involvement in worship planning and worship participation.  If your music leader is not where he should be in his understanding of biblical worship principles, let me encourage you to help your music leader grow in his theological training.

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The Boyce College faculty voted to begin a new Music Education Major at Boyce Fall 2009.  Along with the current Music Ministry major this new degree will give Boyce students two music degrees from which to choose.

The Music Education major will be a Bachelor of Science in Music Education.  Currently, the school is seeking all the credentials with the Commonwealth of Kentucky to have this new major fully certified with the state to train teachers for public schools and Christian schools.  The degree will prepare students to teach in Kindergarten through twelfth grade with a vocal and instrumental emphasis.

Working on a Music Education major at Boyce College will give students the opportunity to train on a campus that is focused on a Christian worldview in each classroom and preparing them to impact their world for Christ.  We are excited about the opportunity to train teachers for both public and Christian schools and mission fields around the world. 

For more information on the Music Education Major at Boyce College contact Greg Brewton, Coordinator of Music Studies, gbrewton@sbts.edu

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When a person becomes a Christian, Jesus Christ gives that person a new heart.  In II Corinthians 5: 17 we are reminded that “if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation; old things have passed away, and look, new things have come.”  Jesus Christ changes us from the inside out.  We don’t remain the same.  Often times at conversion, new Christians are inspired to write new songs.

William Featherston was converted to Christ in 1862 and wrote the hymn text for “My Jesus, I Love Thee” shortly after his conversion.  What many do not realize is that Featherston was sixteen at the time he came to know Christ.  This seems to be the only hymn Featherston wrote in his short life for he died when he as twenty-six.  His hymn was sent to England by his aunt and first appeared in The London Hymnbook in 1864.  The hymn as we know it today is set to a hymn tune by A.J. Gordon, a Baptist minister in New England and first appeared with Gordon’s tune in a hymnal in 1876.

When God calls us to die to self and live for Christ, He gives us a new heart, and a new song.

My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art mine, 

For Thee all the follies of sin I resign; 

My gracious Redeemer, my Savior art Thou: 

If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ‘tis now. 

  

I love Thee because Thou hast first loved me, 

And purchased my pardon on Calvary’s tree; 

I love Thee for wearing the thorns on Thy brow; 

If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ‘tis now. 

  

I’ll love Thee in life, I will love Thee in death, 

And praise Thee as long as Thou lendest me breath; 

And say when the death-dew lies cold on my brow, 

“If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ‘tis now.” 

  

In mansions of glory and endless delight, 

I’ll ever adore Thee in heaven so bright; 

I’ll sing with the glittering crown on my brow, 

“If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ‘tis now.” 

  

William Ralph Featherston (1846-1873) 

 

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This past week I looked for a student choir music book to use with our upcoming Heart of Worship Conference, Jan. 30-31, 2009.  First of all, it is difficult to find student choir music these days because there is just not as much published.  I was looking at one particular student choir collection that was published recently by a well-known arranger.  Of the 10 or so songs in the collection I don’t believe there was one reference to the Cross.  There was some mention of Jesus and his salvation but no clear-cut explanation of the Gospel in any song.

The music consisted of texts that were praise songs and some other helpful biblical themes but there was an absence of the one theme that is central to all that we are as Christians:  The Gospel.  The song texts were not unbiblical, but they were vague.  No wonder our students do not have a good biblical understanding of God, man and our desperate condition outside of Christ.  Churches that have a steady diet of songs that are void of the Gospel are churches that lean on “works” oriented practices and good moral living.  This type of teaching and thinking leads people to hell.

I am not advocating that every song must unpack the Gospel story, but a good portion of what we sing and speak as we gather to worship needs to emphasize the saving work of Christ on the cross.  We never want to move very far away from this theme.

Since our song texts teach us about our faith, we need to be diligent to find songs that effectively explain the doctrines of our faith.  The only theology some of our students learn these days is through our worship songs.  Let’s not fill their minds with vague, cloudy texts.  We need to give them intentionally clear biblical truth.  We need more songs like “How Deep the Father’s Love for Us, “In Christ Alone” and “Before the Throne of God Above.”  These type of songs clearly explain the Gospel and will create a grateful, secure people who are trusting in Christ’s provision for us on the cross.

Worship leader, I challenge you to go the second mile when you are looking for worship music for your congregation and ensembles.  Let’s put the Gospel truth in the mouths and minds of our people by choosing faithful song texts that keep Jesus and His cross in the center. 

Oh… and we will find some great Gospel centered songs for the student singers who come to the Boyce College Heart of Worship Conference in January (http://biblicalworship.com/?page_id=211).

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