Worship and the Lord's Day

The day the Lord rose

When you start going to church, the gathering of people who belong to Jesus, the first thing you meet is Sunday worship: bowing before God for who he is, and answering him with heart and life. Christians call Sunday the Lord's Day because Jesus rose "early on the first day of the week" (John 20:1). The Sabbath, the day of rest God gave Israel, was the seventh day, Saturday. That same evening Jesus stood among his disciples and said, "Peace be with you!" (John 20:19).

From then on the church met on that day: "On the first day of the week we came together to break bread" (Acts 20:7). Paul had gifts for believers in need set aside "on the first day of every week" (1 Corinthians 16:2), and John received his visions "on the Lord's day" (Revelation 1:10). Luke sums up the first church's life:

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.

Acts 2:42

The apostles were the witnesses Jesus sent out; their teaching comes to us in the Bible. Fellowship is sharing life together in the faith, and the breaking of bread lives on in the Lord's Supper, the meal of bread and cup that Jesus gave his church. You can pray alone, but God gathers his people:

Let us not neglect meeting together, as some have made a habit, but let us encourage one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Hebrews 10:25

The Didache, a church manual from around the year 100, says (in Hall and Napier's translation of 1884; ‘ye’ means you): "But every Lord’s day do ye gather yourselves together, and break bread, and give thanksgiving after having confessed your transgressions" Didache 14.1. In the mid-second century Justin Martyr described a Sunday of reading from the apostles and prophets, the leader's exhortation, prayer, bread and wine given thanks for and shared, and a collection for the needy. They met that day, he said, because God made the world on the first day and Jesus Christ rose on it Justin Martyr, First Apology 67.

What happens in worship

Jesus said, "God is Spirit, and His worshipers must worship Him in spirit and in truth" (John 4:24). Worship is not tied to a place; it is the heart turned to God, in line with the truth he has shown. Nor does it end with the service: Paul urges us "to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, which is your spiritual service of worship" (Romans 12:1).

Order and names differ, but many services move like a conversation: God speaks and his people answer. A call to worship from Scripture summons us, and praise follows as we "sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God" (Colossians 3:16). We confess our sins and hear God's promise of forgiveness; many churches say the Apostles' Creed, an ancient summary of the apostles' teaching. Scripture is read, and in the sermon the pastor opens the passage for us today. An offering is given in thanks, for spreading the gospel, the good news of what God has done in Jesus Christ, and for people in need, and the pastor ends with God's blessing (Numbers 6:24-26). The sacraments, the holy rites Christ gave his church, are baptism, the washing with water that marks a person as Christ's, and the Lord's Supper, which some churches share every week and others less often.

The Reformed churches grew from the sixteenth-century Reformation, a movement to renew the church by Scripture, in the line of teachers such as John Calvin. Presbyterians are the best known; the Reformed churches of continental Europe are another branch, and among Baptists the Reformed Baptists confess the same faith. Their confessions, written statements of what a church believes, teach that God himself appoints how he is worshipped. The Heidelberg Catechism (1563), a catechism that teaches by questions and answers, asks what God requires in the second commandment, which forbids making idols, and answers:

That we in nowise make any image of God, nor worship him in any other way than he has commanded in his Word.

Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 96

‘In nowise’ means in no way. The Westminster Confession (1646) teaches the same 21.1 and names the ordinary parts of worship: reading Scripture, preaching, hearing the Word with faith, singing psalms and the sacraments 21.5. So Reformed worship is simple, with the Word, prayer, song and sacraments at its centre: Worship centred on the Word, in the Reformed course, teaches it at length.

Others build on the same frame. Lutherans, who follow Martin Luther, and Anglicans, the family of the Church of England, keep the church's rites where they can be kept without sin and nothing in them is against God's Word Augsburg Confession, art. 15, Thirty-nine Articles, art. 34, and pray time-tested prayers through the church year, the calendar that follows Christ's life from Christmas to Easter. The Catholic Church teaches that the Eucharist, its name for the Lord's Supper, is the heart of the Christian life, from which all of it flows and toward which all of it moves, and gathers for it at Mass Catechism of the Catholic Church; the Orthodox churches of the East gather every Sunday for the Divine Liturgy, centred on it too. Pentecostal churches, believing that the Holy Spirit, God with the Father and the Son, still gives his gifts, such as healing and speaking in tongues, make room for free praise and prayer. See Worship and prayer in the doctrine course, and What is worship?

Keeping the Lord's Day

The Reformed differ in how strictly they keep the Lord's Day. The Westminster Confession and the Second London Baptist Confession of 1689, the Reformed Baptists' confession, teach that since the resurrection the first day is ‘the Christian Sabbath’ Westminster Confession 21.7, 1689 Confession 22.7: with hearts prepared beforehand, believers rest all day from everyday work and recreations, giving the time to worship and to ‘the duties of necessity and mercy’ 21.8, 22.8. The Heidelberg Catechism, on the fourth commandment, "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy" (Exodus 20:8), says God requires:

That I, especially on the day of rest, diligently attend church, to learn the Word of God, to use the holy Sacraments, to call publicly upon the Lord, and to give Christian alms. … that all the days of my life I rest from my evil works

Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 103

Alms are gifts to the poor. The Heidelberg puts its weight on the gathering and the giving, and on a rest from evil all life long. Both emphases are Reformed, and both keep the day for God.

Either way, the day is a gift of grace, God's kindness to people who have not deserved it, and not a burden. Jesus said, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mark 2:27). The English pastor Matthew Henry wrote, "The sabbath is a sacred and Divine institution; a privilege and benefit, not a task and drudgery" Matthew Henry. We do not keep the day to earn salvation; the saved come gladly before God.

Get ready on Saturday night: go to bed in good time and pray for the service. Listen to the sermon with your Bible open, and afterwards talk over one thing from it with family or a friend. Rest, and call or visit someone ill or alone. If your work makes Sunday hard, do not carry the worry alone; talk to your pastor.

This week

Arrive a little early. Sit down ten minutes before the start and pray briefly. If the order is unfamiliar, follow the printed order of service or the people around you.

Read the passage beforehand. If you know which Scripture will be read, read it on Saturday night; if not, read Acts 2:42-47 and see how the first church met.

Stay to greet someone. Ask one person's name and say hello; that is enough. The church is not a building but the people who gather. The next lesson looks at temptation and trouble.

Practice