Worship # 5

Worship: Its priority, Principles, and Practice (continued)

I proceed, in the second place, to show the leading principles of public worship.

These leading principles are so plain and obvious to any thoughtful reader of the Bible, that I need not dwell on them at any length. But for the sake of some who may never have given much attention to the subject, I feel it best to state them in order.

1. For one thin, true public worship must be directed to the right object. It is written plainly, both in the Old and New Testament: "You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve" (Deut. 6:13; Matthew 4:10). All adoration and prayers addressed to the Virgin Mary, the saints and angels, is utterly useless, and  unwarranted by scripture. It is worship that is mere waste of time. There is not the slightest proof that the departed saints or the angels can hear our worship, or that if they did hear it they could do anything for us. It is worship that is most offensive to God. He is a jealous God, and has declared that he will not give his glory to another. Of all His Ten Commandments there is none more stringent and sweeping than the Second. It forbids us not only to worship, but even to "bow down" to anything beside God.

2. For another thing, true public worship must be directed to God through the mediation of Christ. It is written plainly, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me [Christ]" (John 14:6). It is written of Christians, that they are a people who "come to God through Him [Christ] (Hebrews 7:25). The mighty Being with whom we have to do, without controversy, is a God of infinite love, kindness, mercy, and compassion. "God is love." But it is no less true that he is a Being of infinite justice, purity, and holiness, that he has an infinite hatred of sin, and cannot bear that which is evil. He is the same God that cast down the angels from heaven, drowned the world with a flood, and burned up Sodom and Gomorrah.

He who carelessly presumes to draw near to him without an atonement and a mediator, or by any other mediator than the one Mediator whom he has appointed, will fin that he worships in vain. "Our God is a consuming fire" (Hebrews 12:29).

3. For another thing, true public worship must be either directly scriptural, or deducible from Scripture, or in harmony with Scripture. It is written plainly concerning the Jews of our Lord's time, "In vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men: (Matthew 15:9). No doubt there is a conspicuous absence of particular injunctions about New Testament worship. No doubt there is a reasonable liberty allowed to churches and congregations in their arrangements about worship. But still the rule must never be forgotten:

Nothing must be required of men contrary to God's Word.

~J. C. Ryle~

(continued with # 6)