The Integrity of New Testament Worship

The Integrity of New Testament Worship THE INTEGRITY OF NEW TESTAMENT WORSHIP
By F. B. Shepherd

Worship is defined as homage rendered, adoration offered, praise ascribed, and thanks given, to God. It comprehends all thoughts, feelings, purposes, words and deeds in which the soul of the creature reaches the direct and conscious point of contact and transaction with his Creator. Worship is offered directly and ex-clusively to God without regard to man. As the word is used by Christ in Mark 7:1-9, worship includes everything done as a ceremonial religious act whose ob-ject of its performance is to worship Him (1 Corinthians 10:31). Formal recognition of the necessity of God in our lives and the manifestation of the estimate we place upon Him, and the esteem in which we hold him: is acknowledged in worship. The Bible has always rec-ognized two kinds of worship, e. g., that which is ac-ceptable, or “True”; and that which is vain or “False.” From the reading of Mark 7:1-9, and Matthew 15:9, it is a self-evident truth that there must be a divinely circumscribed system, or order, of Christian worship, since all worship is characterized as vain that God does not authorize, or which originates in human idea or authority.

If there are not divine prescriptions regarding what will be acceptable in the New Testament dispensation: then nothing can be disorderly, and there can be no in-novations, no error or sin in the acts performed as such (Romans 4:15; Romans 5:13). Since the Lord, however, is possessed of the sole right to prescribe or regulate the things that shall be done as worship to Himself, if he has so prescribed, then all human regulations are presumptuous and sinful (Colossians 2:20). Let it be fully understood, and unreservedly recognized, that an action may be entirely legitimate within itself as a social function or a personal operation, but when such act is performed as one of worship it then becomes a flagrant violation of God’s law. It was perfectly legitimate for the Jews to wash their hands, bathe their bodies or wash cups and pots and brazen vessels after coming from the market places, since such were not only commended in the law, but were, and are, necessary things for physical cleanliness, and come under the primary rules of hygiene; however such are vain worship when performed as religious acts to glorify God. Undoubtedly Christ would not forbid personal purity or cleanliness. Neither did he. There was positively nothing wrong, but everything right, in Jew or Gentile, saint or sinner, Pharisee or Sadducee, washing the body or bathing the hands after contact with all classes in the marketplaces, if such an act was only one of common personal purity. It was only when these things were offered as worship that they are characterized by Christ as vain. This principle would be easily recognized and understood if we were advocating toast and coffee on the Lord’s table, Lord’s Day, either as a substitute for or in addition to the bread and fruit of the vine. Everyone recognizes Toast and Coffee are legitimate as sustenance and stimulants for the human body, but no one would think of using them on the Lord’s Table to represent the body of Christ. When it has to do with one act of worship we seem to be perfectly normal, but in other things there is extreme dullness of comprehension. No one will dispute me whep I affirm that in settling any question, secular or religious, theoretical or practical, there must be a standard and final court of appeal agreed upon and adopted. This is the. only means through which any matter of controversy can be settled safely, sanely, and correctly: whether it be personal, civil, or religious. No question is settled until it is settled right; and no question is settled right until it is settled according to applicable law. Necessarily then, it is easily seen, and should be freely conceded that in all questions pertain1 ng to the worship, government, discipline, faith and practice of the body of Christ, the New Testament alone must be the final standard, since it contains the sole and only information we have today regarding the will of (tod for the church of the Lord (John 12:48-50; John 14:25-26; John 16:13-15). The New Testament is as perfect--and if possible more so—a rule of faith and practice for the New Testament institution as was the Old Testament fo** the Old Testament institution. Nothing is warranted, or may be practiced authoritatively as worship in the church today, which does not have the express authority of this standard. There must be an actual assertion, a necessary inference or implication, or a divinely approved precedent for any act of worship or article of faith before such can be considered authoritative. Merely that a thing is “not forbidden” or “not condemned” by the New" Testament is not' sufficient. Such reasoning as we all too often find to justify things done as worship would allow every kind of innovation, since there are a thousand and one things that would be illegal that are not “condemned” in so many words of the New Testament. The Waltz, Lancers, or even the Black Bottom in worship is not expressly condemned in so many words. Poker or dice are nowhere forbidden by name. Would anyone who is halfway religious affirm such things are becoming a Christian, or could be done to the glory of God, just because God does not tell us in so many words he will not accept them? But what condemns them? One hundred exhortations to keep one’s self unspotted from the world provide conclusive command against all such pastimes for a child of God, even though all too many do indulge themselves in them. The acceptance of these self-evident premises drives to the conclusion that the use or nonuse of mechanical instruments in the worship of God under the Christian dispensation is not optional or a matter of expediency, but belongs to a class of things which are expressly condemned in the New Testament. The playing of mechanical instruments in the worship of God must be either scriptural or unscriptural, authorized or unauthorized, commanded or not commanded: because part of the worship. If such is commanded, then when playing is omitted or neglected by one or all there must be sin, because one is disobedient when he fails to obey a command. If such playing is not commanded or authorized by positive assertion or necessary implication of the New Testament: when used it is a transgression of the law and presumptuous, because the one playing is acting without authority and God once said: “Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as idolatry and teraphim” (1 Samuel 15:22-23). Every command to perform a specific act within itself forbids any addition, subtraction, or substitution. It is a truism, that should be readily accepted, that whenever the scriptures fail to furnish men with every detail of an act of worship, then only such things as are inevitably necessary to the execution of the prescribed act can be scripturally admitted. Singing is a specific command prescribing an act to be performed as worship of God. Such specification necessarily excludes within itself all ideas and practices not essential to vocal music. I am perfectly willing to admit that the Greek may inherently involve instrumentation, but if so the instrument to be used is specified, since the “Psalloing” is to be with the heart. To use any mechanical instrument made by man ' is nothing short of presumption. (Read Hebrews 13:15). Actually the issue between those who use mechanical instrumentation in the worship of God is not so much the matter of playing or not playing, but what is the instrument that is to be played. Those of our own brethren who have added to the original purity of the New Testament know full well that for the Lord to command immersion of penitent believers into the name of Father, Son and Holy Spirit positively forbids the sprinkling or pouring of water upon adult or infant, believer or imbecile; or to immerse any but believers. I marvel they cannot apply their own rule as perfectly in other things. Neither will to object that Ephesians 5:19, and Colossians 3:16, have reference to social singing help them at all, since the expressions, “To the Lord” and “unto God” definitely place these exhortations or commands as referring to acts of worship. Nor is it legitimate or fair to compare the tuning fork, the song book, church house, windows, carpets, etc., etc., with the instruments, since these other things have absolutely no part in the actual worship, while the instruments do become part of the worship according to the ad-vertising of the people using them and the observation and recognition of all. The tuning fork is used only to get the pitch, and pitch is inevitably necessary to obey the command to sing. This pitch must be secured one way or another, and any way not within itself unscriptural or antiscriptural may evidently be used. A song to sing comprising notes and words, is equally as necessary, and hence some sort of song book must be used if we would obey the command. The argument on the lights, house, etc., is too evidently fallacious to even notice. The very fact that the apostles who were led into all truth and who knew all things omitted it and allowed it not in the early churches, though mechanical instrumentation seems to have been prevalent under the old covenant is highly significant that it is not au-thorized by any command of God, Christ, or the Holy Spirit now. Even a casual reader will readily perceive the practice is wholly lacking in authority by anything done or taught in the New Testament. Christ did not appoint it either before or after his crucifixion; the apostles never sanctioned it; nor did any primitive church ever practice it: so far as Biblical record is concerned. Neither does profane history give any intimation of such practice for a considerable number of years after the close of revelation. The informed ones among the users of instrumental music themselves freely admit the New Testament is silent on the subject. The Schaff-Herzog Cyclopedia gives A. D. 787 as the date of the introduction of the first" organ into the cathedral at Aix la Chapelle by Charlemagne, and indicates that the Council of Trent in 1545 would have abolished organs from the churches but for the influence of the Emperor Ferdinand. Many of the great religious leaders and reformers of bygone days such as Aquinas, Erasmus, Calvin Beza, have expressed themselves as opposed to instrumental music in the worship as unscriptural. After all the controversy is not upon the question of interpretation, for no scholar has ever arisen to claim divine warrant for it in the New Testament1 churches. The matter is purely one of the authority. And the sole authority for it now is that of Councils, Synods, Boards, Conventions, or the Pope and church. All such things exist in opposition to, and in competition with, the simple and original arrangements of our Lord. The integrity of the 'New Testament worship is a question no child of God can afford to seek to be neu-tral toward. The unimpaired soundness of the worship must be maintained and sought after with all our might, since the church of our Lord Jesus is the “Pillar and ground of the truth”. We cannot be too careful in seeking to learn the limitations in worship acceptable to God now.

God is true, genuine, real and unimpeachable. Hence He can only be pleased with those things that resemble himself. Anything that is assumed is counterfeit and presumptuous, unlike God and so is insulting to Him. He is not material (human) so cannot be honored, pleased, or propitiated with the things that appeal to the flesh such as mechanical instrumentation, ceremonies, chanting doxologies, and burning candles or incense. All rites and ceremonies, temples and sacrifices of former dispensations were arranged for the benefit of man and with regard to impressing man with the majesty of the Deity. The virtue and honoring power of all such acts performed in former dispensations lay in the implicitness of the obedience, not in the elaborateness of their fleshly and material grandeur. May we all learn to worship in spirit and truth and be satisfied with God’s way in childlike implicitness and unhesitating trust.