Worship centred on the Word

God appoints how he is worshipped

After a service we tend to ask what we got out of it. The Reformed tradition teaches us to ask a prior question: what has God asked for? If the first commandment tells us whom to worship, the second tells us how.

You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in the heavens above, on the earth below, or in the waters beneath. You shall not bow down to them or worship them;

Exodus 20:4-5

The Heidelberg Catechism explains that this commandment forbids us to represent God by any image and to worship him in any other way than he has commanded in his Word Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 96. Matthew Henry reads it the same way: "All kinds of superstition are here forbidden, and the using of mere human inventions in the worship of God" Matthew Henry. Moses told Israel, "See that you do everything I command you; do not add to it or subtract from it" (Deuteronomy 12:32). Nadab and Abihu died when they "offered unauthorized fire before the LORD, contrary to His command" (Leviticus 10:1), and Jesus rebuked those who "teach as doctrine the precepts of men" (Matthew 15:9).

The Westminster Confession gathers this into what is called the regulative principle: "the acceptable way of worshipping the true God is instituted by himself, and so limited by his own revealed will, that he may not be worshipped according to the imaginations and devices of men … or any other way not prescribed in the holy Scripture" Westminster Confession 21.1. This is not meant to make worship narrow. It gives a church confidence that what it offers pleases God, because he asked for it, and it frees worshippers' consciences from rules that people have invented. Not everything needs a verse, though. The Confession grants that "there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the Word" (1.6): the time of the service, the building, the order of the parts. Paul's rule covers these: "everything must be done in a proper and orderly manner" (1 Corinthians 14:40).

The Word at the centre

What, then, has God appointed? The Confession names prayer with thanksgiving, the reading of Scripture with reverence, sound preaching and attentive hearing, the singing of psalms with grace in the heart, and the sacraments Christ instituted (21.3–5). The first churches also set aside their gifts on the first day of the week (1 Corinthians 16:2). At the centre of it all stands the Word. When Ezra's generation gathered, worship looked like this:

So they read from the Book of the Law of God, explaining it and giving insight, so that the people could understand what was being read.

Nehemiah 8:8

Matthew Henry comments: "Reading is good, and preaching is good, but expounding makes reading the better understood, and preaching the more convincing" Matthew Henry. Calvin and other Reformers liked to preach through whole books of the Bible, passage by passage. Paul's charge to Timothy was simple: "Preach the word" (2 Timothy 4:2).

How then can they call on the One in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in the One of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone to preach? … Consequently, faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.

Romans 10:14-17

So the Reformed call preaching a means of grace. The Shorter Catechism says: "The Spirit of God maketh the reading, but especially the preaching of the word, an effectual means of convincing and converting sinners, and of building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith, unto salvation" Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q. 89. Bullinger's Second Helvetic Confession goes further: "The preaching of the Word of God is the Word of God." When a preacher lawfully called proclaims the Word faithfully, it explains, God's own Word is proclaimed and received; and it adds that the Word remains true and good even when the preacher himself is evil and a sinner Second Helvetic Confession, ch. 1. The Thessalonians received Paul's message "not as the word of men, but as it truly is, the word of God" (1 Thessalonians 2:13). Hearers, then, have their part too: to come prayerfully and listen for God's voice. As Matthew Henry puts it, "it is only hearing the word, as the word of God that will strengthen faith" Matthew Henry.

The Lord's Day and simple worship

The first Christians gathered "On the first day of the week" (Acts 20:7), and John was in the Spirit "On the Lord's day" (Revelation 1:10). The Westminster Confession teaches that since the resurrection this first day of the week is the Lord's Day, "the Christian Sabbath" (21.7), to be kept by resting from ordinary work and recreation and giving the day to public and private worship and to works of necessity and mercy (21.8). The Heidelberg Catechism puts the accent a little differently: on the day of rest we are to gather diligently to hear the Word, use the sacraments, pray and give to the poor, and every day of our lives we are to rest from our evil works and so begin the eternal Sabbath already in this life (Q. 103). Within the one tradition, then, Presbyterian and continental churches have kept the day with different degrees of strictness.

They also differ over how strictly the regulative principle applies. Calvin's Geneva is known for singing metrical psalms, mainly without instruments Genevan Form of Prayers, and some Presbyterian churches in Scotland and North America still sing only psalms, unaccompanied. Most Reformed and Presbyterian churches read "psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs" (Colossians 3:16) more broadly, sing hymns faithful to Scripture, and treat instruments as an aid to singing. Some Presbyterian churches, following the Westminster Directory, which set holy days aside, also do not keep the feast days of the church year Directory for the Public Worship of God, while most Korean Presbyterian churches sing hymns with accompaniment and keep Christmas and Easter. Lutherans and Anglicans follow what is often called the normative principle: what Scripture does not forbid, and what agrees with God's Word, may be used to build up the church. The doctrine course's lesson ‘Worship and prayer’ sets these traditions side by side.

Therefore, since we are receiving an unshakable kingdom, let us be filled with gratitude, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe. "For our God is a consuming fire."

Hebrews 12:28-29

The plainness of Reformed worship is not a dislike of beauty. It is meant to keep anything from hiding the Word and the sacraments. The centre of worship is not our feeling but the God who speaks and the Christ who brings us into his presence. Matthew Henry again: "Only the grace of God enables us to worship God aright" Matthew Henry.

Practice