Christian Worship

ISAIAH 1:11-17

THROUGH Moses, God gave instructions with respect to building the tabernacle, and the nature of the various sacrificial services for which it was to be used. These services included the offerings of various kinds of animals, as well as the use of incense and oil. The Lord was very particular that every detail of these ceremonies be carried out properly. To Moses he said, “See … that thou make all things according to the pattern showed thee in the mount.”—Exod. 25:40; Heb. 8:5; 9:23

In the New Testament the Apostle Paul explains that the tabernacle and its services were designed as a “shadow of good things to come,” that they were not the “substance” of the divine plan but merely the pictures, or illustrations. Nevertheless, it was important that these “shadows” be properly executed—so important that the penalty of death was attached to any infraction of detail in connection therewith.

In view of these specific instructions which the Lord gave involving the sacrifice of animals, the sprinkling of blood, the offering of incense, etc., we might wonder why, as shown in our lesson, the Lord asked his people: “Who hath required this at your hand?” It is not strange, however, when we examine the circumstances. God’s instructions relating to the offering of sacrifice placed this service in the hands of the priests to be performed by them as instructed with regard to time and circumstances.

Our lesson indicates that the people had to some extent taken these matters into their own hands and were offering animal sacrifices to the Lord in a promiscuous manner not authorized by him. We have an example of this in the case of King Saul. Saul was not a priest of Israel, but in disobedience to the Lord through failure to destroy Israel’s enemies, together with their possessions, he reserved some of the best of the cattle to offer to the Lord as a sacrifice. The Prophet Samuel rebuked Saul for this, and said, “Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.”—I Sam. 15:22

In Micah 6:6,7, we have another indication of the unauthorized offering of sacrifice. Here are mentioned “thousands of rams,” and “ten thousands of rivers of oil.” The prophet asked the people if they thought, apart from other considerations, these sacrifices were what the Lord required.

More important than the possibility that in these passages the Lord is condemning the unauthorized offering of sacrifice, is the fact that in presenting them to him, the people were doing so with the thought that it fully discharged their responsibilities toward God and toward one another, and satisfied the righteous requirements of the Law. The Prophet Micah wrote: “What doth the Lord require of thee but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?”—Micah 6:8

In our lesson the Lord presents a similar thought, saying, “Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.” James may well have been thinking of this passage when he wrote to the Early Church, “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.”—James 1:27

In condemning the scribes and Pharisees, Jesus expressed a similar thought. “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,” he said, “for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the Law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.” (Matt. 23:23) “These ought ye to have done”: whatever the Lord has asked in the way of ceremonial service should be done. But this is of no value unless the spirit of the offerings, “the weightier matters,” are recognized and observed.

This is true of the Lord’s people today. God has favored us with an understanding of his plan. The doctrines of the truth are of vital importance, for they reveal God’s will to his people. Learning those doctrines and being loyal to them is of value only if we apply their principles in our lives and by them are inspired to faithfulness in laying down our lives in the divine service in keeping with the divine will which they reveal to us.

JOHN 4:19-24

JESUS’ first advent occurred at the end of the Jewish age—the age of types and shadows. The ceremonies of that typical age which constituted the divinely arranged illustrations had been pleasing to God when practiced in harmony with his instruction, and in the proper spirit. But now the time had come for his plan to move forward from type to substance, hence forms and ceremonies would no longer be a necessary part of divine worship and service.

“God is a Spirit,” Jesus told the Samaritan woman at the well of Jacob; that is, he is invisible to human eyes, and does not dwell in tabernacles or temples or church buildings made with human hands. The only true way to worship such a God is “in spirit and in truth,” that is, in our minds and hearts, appreciating the great attributes of his character—his wisdom, justice, love, and power—not by means of material illustrations, but through the truth of his loving plans and purposes for the redemption and restoration of the lost race.

When we get this proper thought in mind we will recognize that divine worship does not call for elaborate church edifices, or for pageantry of color and lights and robes. The Early Church as instituted by Jesus and the apostles had none of this. They held their meetings mostly in the homes of the brethren, and without fanfare and pomp. They worshiped God “in spirit and in truth,” in homes, sometimes in prisons, in “upper rooms,” or wherever opportunity permitted, and the Lord hearkened and blessed them according to the abundance of his grace.

COLOSSIANS 3:16

“LET the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom”: Christ is the center of the divine plan of salvation, and we cannot worship and serve God acceptably unless we recognize this, and accept the provision of divine grace represented in his atoning work. We meet together in his name. We pray in his name. All of our teaching and admonishing should call attention to his place in the divine arrangement and to the provision of God’s love whereby we are made members of his body and given the privilege of suffering with him, and if faithful, of reigning with him.

Paul writes that we should admonish one another with “psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,” and that we should sing “with grace in our hearts to the Lord.” This suggests that the study of the truth and our fellowship with one another is not to be on a cold, formal basis, that a certain degree of emotional fervor is desirable. Our singing, however, is not to be to one another in the sense of entertaining the brethren, but with grace in our hearts “to the Lord.”

QUESTIONS

Why did the Lord condemn the offering of sacrifices by his typical people Israel?

How do we worship God in “spirit and in truth”?

Where, and under what circumstances, did the brethren of the Early Church hold their meetings?

What position should Christ occupy in relation to our worship and service of God?

Is emotionalism desirable in the meetings of the Lord’s people?

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