A searchable, downloadable PDF of the original article appears below. Bill Steele is pastor of Burch Church, Fort St. John, B.C.

“And we lift our hands before You as a token of our love,” sang the congregation. The Minister and a few less self-conscious worshippers did that very thing. It seemed appropriate to do what we were singing that we were doing, even if it was somewhat unusual for a Presbyterian worship service. The gesture was spontaneous and expressed a feeling of some freedom within the ordered worship offered with dignity in which we pride ourselves. Was there also just a little flutter of emotion expressed in the lifting up of the hands? Some people felt uncomfortable with this small expression of feeling. Others said, “Our service is too stiff, it’s nice to see some feeling coming into it.”

THE MOOD OF WORSHIP

Stiffly formal and intellectual, as if we were gathered for an academic lecture bracketed by obligatory singing and cold prayers, is the mood that one sometimes encounters in church worship. School assembly on the first morning of a new principal, when staff and students gather to collectively meet this unknown individual, would have a mood of greater expectancy than this kind of service. One would think that we had gathered to meet some unknown individual for some kind of impersonal transaction, rather than the Heavenly Father who is nearer to us than our own breath, and who personally participates in our joys, sorrows, anger and fear, whose very nature is love, and who has bound us to Himself as His covenant community.

Noisily emotional and mindless, as if were at an orgy, all pursuing our own spiritual (?) or emotional orgasm; a mere collection of individuals who happen to be in the same building having an emotional high on Jesus, is the mood that one has encountered in some churches. This is not only disordered, but also indecent. The place for spiritual and emotional ecstasy is in private!

Relaxed and easy, like the mood of a group of people gathered for a floor show before lunch is served; lots of performances, applause, recounting experiences with our “buddy” Jesus, and sharing a message from Scripture, is yet another mood one has met within other evangelical churches.

What is disturbing about all the moods that have been mentioned above is, that in worship which reflects these moods, there is no sense of joyful awe. This mood of joyful awe is what I suggest as the appropriate mood of worship; joy because we are together in the presence of Love Himself, in whose presence there is fullness of joy, and awe because we are gathered before the LORD. These two moods do not exclude one another. We may mistake stiff formal intellectual worship for awesome worship, and we may mistake noisily emotional and mindless worship for joyful worship, but the first is not awesome, and the second is not joyful.

Joyful awe can be noisy or it can be quiet; it can laugh or it can be solemn; it is not stiff before the Lord, nor is it “buddy buddy” with the Lord; it is not “laid back” in God’s presence, nor is it “up-tight”. It is a mixture of the mood expressed by Isaiah when he said, “Woe to me … I am a man of unclean lips . . .”; the mood of the psalmist in Psalm 86, “My soul yearns, even faints for the courts of the Lord, my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God”; and his mood in the cacophonous Psalm 150 where he calls out for brass, string and percussion instruments to praise God in accompaniment to His people dancing His praise. It is a mixture of the fear of the Holy and rejoicing in Love, of repulsion before the Judge and attraction by the Father who loves us with a Mother’s love.

CREATING THE MOOD?

Singing slow and mournful Scottish Metrical Psalms can contribute to a mood of gravity, but it cannot give us awe. Singing lots of fast up-beat choruses can make us feel light and happy, but it cannot make us joyful. We may be able to engineer many moods in worship, but not the mood of joyful awe. We may do things, and have attitudes, however, which hinder and prevent the mood of joyful awe.

If as individuals we have not been spending time in personal communion with our Lord and have little sense of devotion, then we will not bring any feeling of affection and reverence with us when we meet with the Church. If as families we have not been enjoying God’s fellowship and have not been conscious of His majesty in family worship, then we will not bring with us any sense of familial love when the greater family of God gathers to celebrate with our Father. If there is bad feeling within the congregation the sense of joyful awe will be destroyed. Perhaps a member of the worship committee is discontent because she did not get what she wanted in the service, and she spreads that discontent by stirring others up, so that when these people gather for worship they focus on what they feel is missing or on what they dislike and refuse to feel free in the service as it has been planned and is being conducted. Their feeling of constriction will be communicated to the congregation and bring an atmosphere of tension. Perhaps someone dislikes the Minister and instead of focussing on the Word of God being preached, he looks for faults and sits with a judgemental attitude. then gathers with his friends at the back of the church building after the service to criticize. That attitude and those actions will bring a mood of tension into the worship service, and prevent the congregation sensing the joyful awe that we ought to feel in God’s presence.

We feel joyfully awed in worship when we realize Whom it is that we have gathered to serve, and who we are who have gathered to serve Him. It is the Lord Yahweh, our covenant Lord Who has called us to be a community of His people and who has promised to be our God, that we have gathered to serve. As individuals and families, our whole life is to be lived in covenant communion with Him and service for Him; whether washing dishes, scrubbing the toilet, working in the factory or office, or having devotions, speaking to a friend about Christ, or leading the prayer of worship in the church service, we are serving our Lord, and He is with us. When we gather together as the Church, all that individual and familial devotion comes to a concentration point in the service of worship of the community. This service of worship of the community is also the base for all our other activities as a community, and for our service as individuals and families. Experiencing God as the source and focus of our lives as individuals, families, and a congregation is how we feel joyful awe in worship.

THE PRACTICE OF LITURGY

When the Church worships, we are not simply a collection of individuals who happen to be worshipping in the same building, each doing our own thing, or each individual doing some of the same things as each other individual. We are individuals in the covenant community, and worship is what the community does as a community. So we need to have order in worship, but within that order there needs to be room for individual expression. The two extremes to which we can go here are the highly regulated liturgy of a prayer-book service (though even this can be used with great flexibility) and the apparently unregulated liturgy of the Plymouth Brethren worship. (I say “apparently unregulated” because there is an implicit regulation in this type of service. In actual practice some Pentecostal services are more truly unregulated, because even though there is official pastoral leadership, the congregation may be difficult to bring to order.) Presbyterian worship, with its distinct theology of worship, can provide a balanced liturgy that is mindful and ordered while being appropriately emotional and free.

The foundational premise of our theology and practice of worship is that it is covenantal or dialogical. God speaks and we respond. In a report on liturgy some years ago, the Synod of the Christian Reformed Church articulated four criteria for worship practices: worship should be evangelical, reformed, catholic and biblical. Calvin emphasizes simplicity, decency and dignity in the worship of the Church. The Westminster Directory for the Public Worship of God recognizes that in worship we ought to practise what is in accord with these principles: “. . . such things as are of divine institution in every ordinance; and other things . . . according to the rules of Christian prudence, agreeable to the general rules of the word of God.” Following in this tradition, we can be evangelical, reformed, catholic, biblical, simple, decent, and dignified without being rigid.

Being catholic means that we should be free to draw biblical worship practices from all branches and all ages of the Church. We can draw what is good from the early and the Medieval Church, from the Pentecostal and Roman Churches, and adapt these practices to our reformed theology of worship. For example, in our reformed tradition there is little room for expression of “the communion of the saints”. We nod to one another before the service begins, and we may shake hands after the service is over, but there is little room for “horizontal” communion before the Lord. Oh, in the communion service we pass the sacramental elements to one another and call that an exhibition of “the communion of the saints”, but we must admit that it is a rather thin one. Some churches rectify this by including a sign of Christ’s peace somewhere during the service, and people shake hands with their neighbours and say a few words. Something else that can be done is to include something of “faith-sharing”, somewhat like a testimony that may be given in the Evangelical and Pentecostal churches. We do not need to limit that to witness about our initial experience of conversion, but people may talk about being a Christian in their particular job, or give reports on helpful books that they have been reading.

The Christian Reformed Church has recently published a new service book. This book contains many fine liturgies, which may be used as guides and adapted for use in worship. Being used to somewhat shorter services, it may not be well to include all the elements of worship in every service, but over a period of some weeks, all the elements may be included in rotation, thus giving some variety. For example, instead of having the creed, confession of sin and assurance of pardon, the law, and the Lord’s Prayer every week, the following rotation may be used:

Week 1. confession of faith – Apostles’ Creed;
Week 2. confession of sin – (responsorial or in unison) and assurance of pardon;
Week 3. God’s law to guide us – the Ten Commandments
Week 4. the Lord’s Prayer – (said in unison)
Week 5. confession of faith – Hymn “These Are The Facts” (#66 Praiseways) or some other Scriptural hymn or chorus which confesses the doctrine revealed for the Church;
Week 6. confession of sin – Hymn “Kind And Merciful God”, or selected verses of Psalm 51, or any other hymn or Psalm of contrition, assurance of pardon;
Week 7. God’s Law to Guide us – our Lord’s Summary of the Law;
Week 8. the Lord’s Prayer – (sung).

This is only a suggestion, and other practices may be included in the rotation; but this rotation includes all the elements that for pastoral reasons the Church needs to have included in worship. Even when there is no formal confession of sin and assurance of pardon, this is of such importance that it needs to be included as part of the prayer of worship every week, and this can be done without lapsing into formality.

If as individuals we have not been spending time in personal communion with our Lord and have little sense of devotion, then we will not bring any feeling of affection and reverence with us when we meet with the Church.

THE WHOLE PERSON AND SYMBOLS

An important Presbyterian principle, and a Scriptural one, is that the whole of life is lived out of the redemption secured by Christ. But in our worship we have acted as if only the intellect were redeemed, and as if only the intellect were able to worship God. The whole person, however, needs to be involved in our worship. Thus we ought to worship with our emotions and with our bodies. Kneeling for prayer, raising up our hands in praise, and other physical acts which express feeling may properly be included in worship. What about symbolic acts such as making the sign of the cross, and the use of liturgical dance?

About a century ago. the great Dutch theologian, Abraham Kuyper, gave a lecture entitled “The Antithesis between Symbolism and Revelation.” He traced the growing love of symbolism in worship to a loss of belief in the Personal God and the replacement of that belief with faith in a vague Infinite. From this loss comes also the loss of revelation, the loss of the Speaking Word. To replace God’s spoken revelation of Himself and His relation to the finite, symbolism is used by finite man to sense his relation to the unknown Infinite. Kuyper laid some of the blame for the growth of this kind of symbolism in worship to the denial by Presbyterians of the human need for art and harmony in the worship of God. He proposed a remedy for this by republishing the Calvinistic liturgy of John a Lasco, and suggested that a modern development thus be made, one that takes account of the current public taste.

Taking a cue from Kuyper, I suggest that there is a type of symbolism which is opposed to revelation, which is premised on the impossibility of a Word revelation from God, and which is intended to give a mystical experience of the Infinite instead of allowing us to grasp what God has to say. This kind of symbolism is not suitable for worship. But in recognition that we need more than ratiocination for knowledge, including knowledge of God, there may be a type of symbol that can be used in worship in response to God’s Word revelation.

The signs of God’s Grace given by Christ Himself, the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, contain bread and wine as symbols as well as signs. Calvin asserts an analogy between the bread and the wine and the body and blood of Christ, as well as recognizing that there is more to them than a mere analogy. It is important to note that according to Calvin, the symbols do not lead us to any knowledge other than the knowledge gained through hearing the Word proclaimed, the knowledge of God’s good will to us in Christ. The sacraments have been given because of the weakness of our faith, and they appeal to the non-logical aspect of our knowing, to the concrete and imaginative. “But the sacraments bring the clearest promises; and they have this characteristic over and above the word because they represent them for us as painted in a picture from life.” “The sacraments, therefore, are exercises which make us more certain of the trustworthiness of God’s word. And because we are of flesh, they are shown us under things of flesh, to instruct us according to our dull capacity, and to lead us by the hand as tutors lead children. Augustine calls a sacrament ‘a visible word’ for the reason that it represents God’s promises as painted in a picture and sets them before our sight, portrayed graphically and in the manner of images” (John Calvin) (emphasis mine).

It seems to me that symbol – objects and actions which refer by analogy to the truth that we also speak – where it performs for us similar functions to the functions of the symbols in the sacraments, is appropriate. Where symbol does not obscure the truth, but serves us better to express it, then it may be used. So we may kneel for prayer as a symbol of our humbling ourselves before God; we may use a cross upon our church buildings and we may sign ourselves with the sign of the cross as a symbol that we are crucified with Christ, and we may use liturgical dance to fuller express the truth of our worship.

Once I served as Student Minister of a congregation where one of the members was a ballet student. At our Christmas Eve service, her sister sang Mary’s Boy Child, while she interpreted it in mime and movement. It was not intended to be entertaining, and the congregation did not regard it as the kind of theatrical performance that Calvin would denounce. It was worship into which the whole congregation entered with a clearer understanding than if the carol had only been sung. There are moments of worship when I wish the whole congregation would dance a hymn or Psalm!

A WORSHIP COMMITTEE

The planning of worship is of great importance. While the Minister is in charge of the worship service in the Presbyterian Church – and rightly so because his education in the theology and art of worship – it opens up worship for greater possibility of creative expression if a Worship Committee helps him plan services. Session should choose the Worship Committee, and it should be taught something of the theology of worship by the Minister. People who give evidence that they are unwilling to learn, and that they have fixed ideas of their own which they would seek to impose on the Committee and Congregation are not suitable. Sometimes such people are included with the hope that giving them a voice will help channel their complaining, and serving on the Committee will challenge them to open their minds to learn, but they can be very destructive and sap the energies of the Committee.

The Worship Committee should be composed of people of a wide variety of backgrounds and experiences. For example, some of the following should be included if possible: someone with some background in music – music teacher or choir leader or music lover who has a wide knowledge of classical, folk, and modern music as well as an appreciation of church music; a “people person’’ – someone who has a good understanding of people and is sensitive to what would be meaningful to various persons in the congregation; someone from some other church background than Presbyterian and who is willing to bring insights from their own background and help us adapt them to our theology of worship – say someone^with a Plymouth Brethren or Anglican background; someone with a good grounding in the Presbyterian worship tradition, but who is flexible and creative enough to be able to help adapt ideas from other traditions.

The most important thing about all members of a Worship Committee is that they should be thoroughly committed to Christ and His Church. Love for the Lord is the basic requirement for any work in the Christian community. Love for the people of God stands next to this.

PARTICIPATION IN WORSHIP

The whole congregation participates in worship, but members of the congregation may also help lead various parts of the service. In fact, when others lead the prayers of worship, the singing, and those parts of the service which are not unique to the office of minister of Word and Sacrament, (i.e. preaching, declaring assurance of pardon. declaring the blessing, and ministering the sacraments) the priesthood of all believers is more clearly seen than when the Minister does it all. Leaders should be trained so that they do a good job, and prepare for their part in leading. People who are unwilling to accept training and who do not prepare should not be included as worship leaders.

NOT THE SUBSTANCE OF THE FAITH

Foundational to worship is that we worship God in Spirit and in Truth, and that we worship Him as whole persons in community. Matters of liturgy are not the substance of the Faith. But it is important that we worship God as renewed people, people of the late twentieth century, people who are evangelical, reformed, catholic, and biblical. Therefore, we do need to give some time to thinking about what it means to worship God in a way that befits His great love and majesty, and that also befits who we are in relations to Him and to each other.