How to Come to Worship

first observation we make about the topic of worship is not IF you worship, but WHAT you worship

This week begins a new series of sermons for the summer. In particular we are going to spend some time focusing on worship. Let me set this up with some observations about worship that will help make this worthwhile for everyone here. Worship is nothing new. God’s people have always been worshippers. Calvin University professor Jamie Smith points out in his book, You Are What You Love that all people are worshippers—we are created for worship, whether we focus that worship upon God or upon other things of this world. So, the first observation we make about the topic of worship is not IF you worship, but WHAT you worship.

the worship of God is nothing new, but that does not mean worship remains the same

And since we are all worshippers and we follow in a long line of Christians who have gone before us who were also worshippers, then the worship of God is nothing new. But that does not mean that worship somehow remains the same. Even though we follow in the steps of the same Christian faith and we worship the same everlasting unchanging God, the way we worship may look different than the way others worship. The Christian Reformed Church as a denomination was not always this way. A few generations ago you could probably walk into any Christian Reformed Church in North America and have a pretty good idea of what to expect in a Sunday worship service. All of our CRC churches sort of operated like a restaurant franchise. You know how it is that you can walk into any Applebees in the country and the layout is always the same, the wall decorations are always the same, the menu is always the same. Our Christian Reformed Churches used to be sort of like that. We all did pretty much the same thing in a Sunday worship service as everybody else.

expressions of Christian worship can be so very wide and cover such variety; then what is it that makes Christian worship what it is?

It is not like that anymore. Worship services from one church to the next can be very different. And it is not as though one church does it right and all the other churches do it wrong. There can be wide variety in how we worship and it still all counts as worship. However, this brings up the question, what counts as worship? If we live in a world in which expressions of Christian worship can be so very wide and cover such tremendous variety, then what is it that makes Christian worship what it is? Or in other words, why do we do the things that we do in church?

we show up and do these things every Sunday; but we don’t know why

because that’s the way we’ve always done it

Here’s the thing, maybe some of us have been doing this Sunday church worship thing for so many years that we don’t ever think about questions like that anymore. I suppose it is entirely possible for there to be people that show up for worship at church every Sunday and completely lost track of why we do the things that we do in worship. We still show up and do them every Sunday; but we don’t know why. If that’s the case, then I suppose the default answer to why we do the things that we do in worship is, because that’s the way we’ve always done it. I wonder how many people fall into that category; a category which says, I don’t know the reason why we do these things in church, I just know we always do it.

Let’s spend some time this summer, then, exploring the reasons why it is we do the things we do here on a Sunday morning when we come together for worship. My hope is that this will then make the experience of coming together in Sunday worship deeper and more meaningful for each one of us, because we will know that every one of these worship activities has a purpose that runs deeper than ‘because that’s the way we always do it.’

Today we begin with the very first action we take in worship. It is something which shows up in our bulletins each week in the order of worship. It is something we name as the Call to Worship.

Psalm 122:1–9 NIV

1 I rejoiced with those who said to me, “Let us go to the house of the Lord.” 2 Our feet are standing in your gates, Jerusalem. 3 Jerusalem is built like a city that is closely compacted together. 4 That is where the tribes go up— the tribes of the Lord— to praise the name of the Lord according to the statute given to Israel. 5 There stand the thrones for judgment, the thrones of the house of David. 6 Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: “May those who love you be secure. 7 May there be peace within your walls and security within your citadels.” 8 For the sake of my family and friends, I will say, “Peace be within you.” 9 For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek your prosperity.

the Call to Worship

Psalm 122 is written as an invitation for God’s people. As one of the Psalms of Ascent, this would have been a poem which was used during one of the several pilgrimages that took place every year in Israel. The people would have recited this song as they traveled to the city of Jerusalem for one of the Jewish religious festivals. We should remember that in Old Testament Israel, before the time of Jesus, the people worshipped God at the temple in Jerusalem. The temple in Jerusalem was the place where God dwelled among his people. This is why the Psalmist in this passage gives descriptions of the city of Jerusalem. It is not just a description of a city, it is a description of God dwelling among his people. And the desire being expressed in Psalm 122 is an invitation to gather within this dwelling place of the Most High God.

a declaration — God decrees it to be so

An invitation. That is where I want us to start today: worship begins with an invitation. Perhaps that is a thought we need to recapture and remind ourselves about when entering worship each Sunday. We are invited to be here. But even that language is not enough. Because an invitation seems to suggest that it is up to you to accept or decline. When you receive invitations to things in the mail, sometimes they include a way to RSVP. You can accept the invitation or decline the invitation. But the way we begin worship is something slightly more than an invitation for you to accept or decline. We say it is a Call to Worship. You are here today because you were called to be here. God is the one who calls us to worship. This is more than a simple invitation; it is an urging. You might even say it is a declaration, that God declares it to be so. I began today by referencing a book by Jamie Smith which describes the way in which all people are made to worship, and all people do focus their worship upon something in this world. The Call to Worship which opens our time of worship each Sunday is a declaration in which God decrees that the worship which we all naturally and inherently embrace and offer up in our created beings should rightly be directed to God alone. We are not the ones to decide whether or not God is worthy of worship; God is the one who calls it to be so.

an invitation — God includes all creation

Yet, at the same time, this Call to Worship is still an invitation. It is a call which goes out to all people. It is not reserved for only those who reach a certain spiritual status or meet certain moral criteria. It is a call which goes out to all of creation—every one of us. You are here because God called you to worship, not based upon anything you do to merit the invitation, but because we are created by God.

Now then, let’s workshop this a little bit today. Let’s consider how it is that the truth of this calling into worship makes an impact for what worship means as we gather together on Sunday. The passage I used at the beginning of today’s service as the Call to Worship was Psalm 95

Psalm 95:1–7a NIV

1 Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord; let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation. 2 Let us come before him with thanksgiving and extol him with music and song. 3 For the Lord is the great God, the great King above all gods. 4 In his hand are the depths of the earth, and the mountain peaks belong to him. 5 The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land. 6 Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker; 7 for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care. Today, if only you would hear his voice,

the Response — singing

Do you notice that in Psalm 95 God calls us into worship simply based on the fact that he is the creator and we are his created people? And also we note that this call to worship suggests a response—singing. So many of the Psalms that are used by God’s people as a call to worship note the response of singing. Make a joyful noise to the LORD. Shout to the LORD. Play the trumpet and harp and all sorts of musical instruments. This call from God to come before him in worship looks for a response—a response of singing and music. It is the answer to why we sing in church. We sing because it is our response to God’s calling us into worship. For the time we have left today, I want us to consider, then, how music and singing fit into our activity of worship as a response to God’s calling.

music is a response to God’s calling

Some of you who are older and perhaps have been going to church for many decades might remember church services being a little different many years ago. There was a time when most churches put together their entire order of worship using a formula that is known as the dialectic. It is similar to our English word dialogue, which refers to a back and forth conversation between two people. And that is what the activity of worship is all about; it is a dialogue back and forth between God and the people of his church. The worship conversation begins with God speaking the first word—the Call to Worship—as we have already talked about. The next thing that happens is that the people respond—most often in music; we sing together.

the music which we sing in church has a purpose; it is a response to God, the one who speaks first

This means the music which we sing in church has a purpose. It is a response to God, the one who speaks first. We have songs that address God directly as though they are prayers we all sing out together. There are songs which recall and talk about God’s mighty deeds and actions. There are songs that remind us of God’s love and God’s grace. There are songs that tell stories and walk us through significant moments in the Bible, such as Christ’s birth his or crucifixion and resurrection.

‘traditional’ worship — back-and-forth statements ‘contemporary’ worship — longer sections focus on a theme

Whether the song is a hymn with organ and choir or power-ballad with electric guitar and drums does not change its purpose and function in worship. It is still an expression of worship in which God’s people respond to God. I find it curious how this dialectic worship formula has changed over the years. A few generations ago, the majority of the population were farmers. An agrarian society lived in seasonal monotonous routine. There would be long days of running the same chores over and over again. Life could be long and slow that way on the farm. Sunday worship was an opportunity to speed that up a bit. It was a chance to lift out of the slow monotony of farm life and be reminded of our place in the much bigger picture of God’s cosmic history.

In those days, the dialectic worship service was pretty rapid-fire back and forth. Every single service contained a time of confession, a reading of the law, a reciting of the Apostle’s Creed, in addition to prayers and scriptures and a sermon. And in those days, music was often spread out between each one of these activities in worship. Worship was dialectic; it was a back and forth conversation. God speaks—people respond—God speaks—people respond, and so forth. Back then, churches didn’t sing three songs in a row. It was all spread out through the service to fit with this back-and-forth dialogue within our worship activity.

Times are different now. It is no longer true that most of us here are farmers. The world we go out and live within for six days every week is quite a bit different. No longer do we slowly mark our way through seasonal chores in a world that never seems to change. In fact, today we seem to live in quite the opposite. We live in a world which is rapidly changing so fast it feels like we are sprinting just to keep up with everything new and different. No longer is Sunday worship an opportunity to break out and speed up a slow life of seasonal monotony. Now Sunday worship offers an opportunity to put on the brakes and find a moment of slowness in a world that never seems to let us slow down any other way.

These days it seems that our expressions of worship activity reflect that change. No longer is worship the rapid-fire back and forth dialectic of God speaks—people respond—God speaks—people respond. Today we find expressions of worship that speak more in paragraphs than sentences. Instead of cramming every single expression of worship into every single worship service, we now work our way through them in a rotation giving time to stop and pause and focus upon this moment of God speaking and us responding. Maybe you have never noticed that before. Some weeks we will have Confession of Sin as part of our service, but not every week. Some weeks we will have God’s Will for Our Lives as part of our service, but not every week. Some weeks we will Profess Our Faith Together as part of our service, but not every week. Each one of these things still gives an important expression of worship. But instead of blitzing through every single one of these every Sunday, we slow it down and selectively focus in on a rotation.

Our music does this too. Our response of song can often be two or three songs together as a way slowing us down to focus on a particular moment or theme. I am struck by the way in which newer church songs of this generation have embraced this. Some may critique newer worship songs as perhaps being too repetitive. But I think it speaks to the desire of a generation of Christians who long to slow down within a crazy-fast always changing world and simply pause in worship to focus on a single thought or idea or phrase or theme.

as long as the worship we bring is an expression of response to God’s calling, then we are answering the call God has given

There is no one right or better way in all of this. As long as the worship we bring is an expression of response to God’s calling, then we are answering the call God has given. In the last church I served we stopped printing the names of the songs in the bulletin. It was a step we took because our Elders were noticing that some people would come into Sunday worship, look over the bulletin service order, and decide right then-and-there if they were going to ‘like’ or ‘enjoy’ worship today based on the song choices. Now, there is nothing wrong with having some preferences and favorites; I don’t thing there is anything we can do to avoid that—we all have musical preferences whether we mean to or not. But to make a blanket decision right at the start which says ‘I cannot worship today because I do not like these songs’ was something my Elders at that church knew we needed to address and change.

we start worship with a weekly reminder of the calling we have from God to come before him as part of his beloved flock

You were created by God for worship. God has called you to come before him in worship; God has declared it to be so. And we come here in order to give a response to that calling God has placed upon us to join with all of creation and worship him. The Call to Worship we use at the beginning of every worship service is not an introduction or a welcome or something we do just to kick things off and get worship going. It is the weekly reminder of the calling you have from God to come before him as part of his beloved flock in worship.

how is this song a response to God’s calling? prayer confession lament declaration narrative

And this calling demands a response. And so, today and in the weeks to come, pull back from the tendency to view church music as songs we either like or don’t like. Instead, look at these songs through the lens of worship. These songs are our response to God’s calling. Ask yourself, what is this song saying about my response to God? Is this song a prayer which directly addresses God? Is this song a confession or lament which cries out to God? Is this song a declaration of God’s holiness or his grace? Is this song a reminder of God’s mighty acts coming from the story of scripture? Look at what it is we are doing when we sing together in church, and let it be our response to the gracious and loving God who has created us, redeemed us, and called us to be here.