Preparing the Heart and Soul for Worship
Learning to Take Seriously Our Praise Unto the Heavens On the Lord's Day
Good Morning,
To close out August and to put off the start of our walk through the directory of church government to September as I have a bit of OCD. I need to start on the first of the month when beginning a fresh part of the Westminster Standards. To accomplish that I want to say one more word about worship and what we do and why we do it. In order to help us keep the pattern here for our Thursday confessional teaching time we are going to go to the twenty-first chapter of the Westminster Confession of Faith, section one particularly.
The WCF Ch. 20:1 says:
The light of nature showeth that there is a God, who hath lordship and sovereignty over all; is good, and doeth good unto all; and is therefore to be feared, loved, praised, called upon, trusted in, and served with all the heart, and with all the soul, and with all the might. But 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 the suggestions of Satan, under any visible representation or any other way not prescribed in the Holy Scripture.
Key to understanding what we believe at Bethany and in the Reformed faith in general about what is required of us as human beings is that the whole creation, both that which we see with our eyes and we read in the bible, tell us that God alone is worthy of worship. That tells us that any matter, person, or activity that we put in front of the worship of the Lord is an idol that is the source of God’s displeasure with us. All people worship something. It is evident in what they give time to, what they sacrifice for (both literally and figuratively), and spend their money on. The opening sentence of the section also reminds us not only of what the light of nature shows us, what we can learn from the mountains, the ocean, and the bounty of the earth, but it also reminds us that we can also learn from these visual testimonies that God loves us and is good, and therefore is to be . . . feared, loved, praised, called upon, trusted in, and served with all the heart.
Ergo if you are a Christian, or at least testify yourself to be, there should be no question that you know more about why you are to worship, sing, and glory in the awesomeness of God than someone who only have the light of nature. Those who have the witness of Holy Scripture are held to a higher standard. There is no ignorance allowed in those who received the covenant sign and have eaten of the flesh and blood of the Son of Man. Ananias and Saphira receive a greater judgment than Simon Magus. You cannot fake it with God. He will not deal well with hypocrisy, especially in His worship. If you spend your time at the 11:00am hour on your phone cycling through memes, tik-tok, and/or insta reels while the preacher is revealing the will of God for your life, then you have your reward. But it is worth noting that it is not just you who shall suffer the consequences. Those who rely on you for Christian testimony, those at your work, those who work for you, friends, neighbors, children/future children/grandchildren, all will be affected if you are not willing to learn at the font of blessing. We do not nearly take seriously enough the reality of what is happening in worship, and why we are there. We do so at our own peril.
When it comes to the phrase . . . the acceptable way of worshipping God we have a tendency to only think about the stuff we do. Things like the order of service, the content of our praise, the kind of activities we engage in, etc. . . and that would be correct. However, there is more going on here than just that. To piggy-back on what we talked about in the last paragraph there is a heart issue at the center of the statement. How many times do we hear the Lord say in His word that He is not interested in sacrifice, even perfectly done, that does not have along with it the faith and trust required of the one offering it. In the book of Isaiah describes false heart worship as “stinking His nostrils”. Is that really how you want to be thought of by the creator of the heavens and the earth? When you get up on Sunday morning is your goal to do the bare minimum in the praise of Christ and then think that such is sufficient to be accepted by Him? If you are then the phrase above needs to be hit in your heart. Do you care? If the answer is no, then it is not just the second commandment which should be convicting your soul. Christians should not need motivated to spiritually prepare to be in the presence of their savior. The more we understand the massive blessing of grace unto sinners the more excited we will be to be reminded of these mighty works of awesomeness and will respond with joy unspeakable.
In closing, another part of the section that is helpful for us to spend a moment on before wrapping up. We read a warning which says we are not to do anything in worship that smells of, “. . . the imaginations and devices of men, or the suggestions of Satan”. Any time you read the word Satan it is bad. He is the great deceiver, and most especially when he is disguised as an angel of light. Here we see yet another reason why everything we do in worship needs examined by heart, soul, and mind in preference and submission to the word of God. We can never find ourselves in a place where we are saying to ourselves, “God wouldn’t mind” or “God would like this” without consulting the word revealed in the Bible. Humility is a key part of everything we do and that is especially the case when we come to worship. It should be the highlight of our life.
Here is a final word:
https://www.reformationscotland.org/2020/07/15/preparing-our-hearts-to-worship-god/
Blessings in Christ,
Rev. Benjamin Glaser
Pastor, Bethany ARP Church