Acceptable Worship (Ewan)

History

The early church faced many problems in presenting the gospel message.  Judaism was a barely known religion in the Roman empire, restricted to a fairly small group of people of Hebrew descent in Palestine.  It was unknown elsewhere and of no concern to those that knew of it.  Christianity was new, and even though it was related to Judaism it was a complete unknown.  What strange activities Christian converts might indulge in was a matter of speculation and even slander among those who became aware of it.

Imagine then the attitude of a new convert in those days.  They have heard the gospel message, that God (the only true God) loves us so much that He sent His Son Jesus to die so that we might be reconciled to Him.  And the proof that Jesus was the Son of God was that Jesus was raised from death!  Once they came to believe this, how should they live their life?  What did God expect them to do?  How should they worship God?  Other religions of the day featured sacrifices, and even orgies.  Did God want those?

Micah was one of the prophets who tried to set Israel straight on worshipping God.  He said: “He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” (Micah 6:8)

However, the early church had relatively few who knew the Jewish scriptures.  And the Jews were poor examples in their worship.  Despite many efforts by the prophets, Israel repeatedly failed to meet God’s requirements.

Paul spent a lot of his time and writings trying to explain what the Christian life meant.  He emphasised love as the guiding principle as in 1 Cor 13.  If God loved us so much, then we should show love to others.  For Jews, this went back to the second commandment “You shall love your neighbour”.  Jesus also taught that your “neighbour” was anyone you may encounter, with the story of the good Samaritan.  Your neighbour’s appearance or beliefs are not important, but their need is.

Christian teaching

So how did this work in the church?  In his letter to the Galatians, Paul pointed out that (Gal 3: 26-29):

“You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, ²⁷ for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. ²⁸ There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. ²⁹ If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”

Clearly then our lives and worship should reflect our attitude to other Christians in particular, because we are all one in Christ. 

This teaching made a difference, but even today we see Christians who do not put it into practice.  Our Old Testament shows that loving your neighbour was never a guiding principle for the Jews over the centuries since the commandments were given, and mankind does not practice it readily today.  Christians find it hard to regard all Christians as one in Christ regardless of status or sex, let alone treat non-Christians as neighbours.  For that matter, Christians are not all in agreement as to what constitutes a Christian, because we cannot know the heart as God does.  Agreeing how to treat those who are not Christian is a step further.

James tackled one aspect of this weakness in his letter.  He said (James 2:1-4):

“My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. ² Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. ³ If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but say to the poor man, “You stand there” or “Sit on the floor by my feet,” ⁴ have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?”  

Between them, James and Paul dealt quite firmly with discrimination between Christians.  Paul demolished the foundation of discrimination by pointing out that Christians are all one in Christ.  James took a specific example of discrimination and pointed out how wrong it was.  Living lives that reflect these points is another matter!

Jesus, however, had gone further.  In his story of the good Samaritan, he told us that anyone who is in need is our neighbor.  You see, Jews and Samaritans were enemies and normally would go out of their way to avoid each other.  Yet Jesus talked about a Samaritan who was prepared to see a Jew as his neighbor in need, and helped him.  The Jews who heard him would rather restrict the definition of neighbour to a more comfortable group.

We are not neighbors only to Christians.  Jesus taught that anyone in need is our neighbour, and challenges us today to meet their needs.

The why

The reason we find it hard to follow the teaching of Paul and James, let alone Jesus teaching, is because of our limitations.  The only person we can know really well is ourselves, and to each of us comes a bit of self-belief that says that we – and our ideas – are always “right”.  We look at others and see their outward appearance, words and behaviour, and we base our opinions of them on those.  And they have “different” ideas from us that are probably “wrong”!

However, God does not look on our outward appearance.  He is not concerned about whether we are smartly dressed, male or female or even clean.  He sees our heart.  If our heart truly belongs to Him, then we are one of His “sons” – as Paul puts it.  John records Jesus saying:

“John 4:23 – ²³ Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. ²⁴ God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.”

If we worship God in spirit, our outward appearance is not important.  God wants our love and worship to come from our heart, not from our appearance.  If our heart belongs to Him, then our worship is acceptable to Him and our appearance is of no concern.

There is an Old Testament story that illustrates this point further, when David welcomed the ark of the covenant into Jerusalem. (2 Samuel 6 16-23)

“¹² Now King David was told, “The Lord has blessed the household of Obed-Edom and everything he has, because of the ark of God.” So David went down and brought up the ark of God from the house of Obed-Edom to the City of David with rejoicing. ¹³ When those who were carrying the ark of the Lord had taken six steps, he sacrificed a bull and a fattened calf. ¹⁴ David, wearing a linen ephod, danced before the Lord with all his might, ¹⁵ while he and the entire house of Israel brought up the ark of the Lord with shouts and the sound of trumpets.

¹⁶ As the ark of the Lord was entering the City of David, Michal daughter of Saul watched from a window. And when she saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord, she despised him in her heart.

¹⁷ They brought the ark of the Lord and set it in its place inside the tent that David had pitched for it, and David sacrificed burnt offerings and fellowship offerings before the Lord. ¹⁸ After he had finished sacrificing the burnt offerings and fellowship offerings, he blessed the people in the name of the Lord Almighty. ¹⁹ Then he gave a loaf of bread, a cake of dates and a cake of raisins to each person in the whole crowd of Israelites, both men and women. And all the people went to their homes.

²⁰ When David returned home to bless his household, Michal daughter of Saul came out to meet him and said, “How the king of Israel has distinguished himself today, disrobing in the sight of the slave girls of his servants as any vulgar fellow would!”

²¹ David said to Michal, “It was before the Lord, who chose me rather than your father or anyone from his house when he appointed me ruler over the Lord’s people Israel—I will celebrate before the Lord. ²² I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes. But by these slave girls you spoke of, I will be held in honor.”

Personally I take my hat off to David.  If I were to leap and dance in my worship, you would think I was crazy, and I would probably fall over.  But David’s heart belonged to God.

Let’s look again at James in more detail (James 2:1-13):

“My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. ² Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. ³ If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but say to the poor man, “You stand there” or “Sit on the floor by my feet,” ⁴ have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

⁵ Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? ⁶ But you have insulted the poor. Is it not the rich who are exploiting you? Are they not the ones who are dragging you into court? ⁷ Are they not the ones who are slandering the noble name of him to whom you belong?

⁸ If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing right. ⁹ But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. ¹⁰ For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. ¹¹ For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker.

¹² Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, ¹³ because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment! “

James is pretty strong in his comments.  He bases his comments on the second commandment “love your neighbor as yourself”, just as Jesus had done, although his context is a Christian audience.  Paul took a different approach saying we are “all one in Christ Jesus” to give a reason against discrimination, but again his words were in a Christian context.  Clearly they sought to first keep the Church’s house in order.  However, we must further remember that Jesus taught that anyone in need is our neighbour.

Fortunately, the early church accepted that your neighbour is anyone in need, not just Christians.  Helping needy non-Christians was one of the significant ways the church overcame paganism in the Roman empire.

The other side

However, there is another side to this story.  How we appear to others can affect how others view God.  Michal’s response to David shows what can happen.  We are God’s children, and how we behave can change the reputation of our Father in the eyes of non-Christians.  Our behaviour may also influence other Christians who are less strong in their faith.  Non-Christians may think less of God because of our appearance in worship.  The self-belief that can lead us astray is also an influence on non-Christians.

Paul had occasion to advise the Corinthians on this problem in relation to food offered to idols (1 Co 8 4-17):

⁴ So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. ⁵ For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords”), ⁶ yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.

⁷ But not everyone knows this. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat such food they think of it as having been sacrificed to an idol, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. ⁸ But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.

⁹ Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. ¹⁰ For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol’s temple, won’t he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? ¹¹ So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. ¹² When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. ¹³ Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.

Paul took the position that “ if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall”, but clearly the issue is wider than meat offered to idols.  He also makes the more general comment “Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak”. 

We have a freedom in Christ that means we are not bound by earthly customs and beliefs, but we remain bound by love.  A neighbour who is weak in Christ or who is not a Christian needs our love, and Jesus calls us to be a “Samaritan” to them.

How we behave affects others.  Both James and Paul address this point.  Anything we do that might cause a fellow Christian to be weakened in faith is a failure of our love.  Further, if our behaviour affects God’s reputation, we might stop someone from becoming a Christian in the first place.

Clearly Paul is saying that our heart is known by God and our behaviour is understood by God in the light of our faith.  However, what we do influences others who cannot know our heart.  We need to think about how our behaviour is seen by others, and how they may be influenced by it. 

This does not mean we must live lives dictated by the highest common denominator of acceptable behaviour.  We don’t need to wear our smartest clothes to church to establish God’s reputation in the sight of others.  We do need to ensure our behaviour, yes and perhaps even sometimes our dress, does not diminish God’s reputation in the eyes of others.  Remember that Paul put it like this “Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak.”  Our behaviour does not change how God sees us, but it can influence others, and the key is love.  We need to show love to all we encounter, our neighbors both Christian and non-Christian.

There are occasions where we can use the freedom that is part of our faith, but there are also times when we need to restrain our freedom in order to express our love to our neighbours.  One possible recent example of this seen on the news, has been when non-Muslim women meeting Muslims have worn head scarves. 

How should we worship God

So how should we worship God?  What does it mean to worship him in spirit and in truth? 

We tend to think of worship in the context of a church service.  However, if our bodies are God’s temple, our whole life should be an act of worship.  When we gather in a church service, we are sharing together in worship, because each of us brings something in our heart that brings us closer to God.

David gave us what may be the purest guide to worship.  In Psalm 24 he wrote:

         3      Who may ascend the hill of the LORD?

         Who may stand in his holy place?

         4      He who has clean hands and a pure heart,

         who does not lift up his soul to an idol

         or swear by what is false.

         5      He will receive blessing from the LORD

         and vindication from God his Saviour.

         6      Such is the generation of those who seek him,

         who seek your face, O God of Jacob.

We live our lives before God, and our lives should be part of our worship.  Where David’s worship was focused on the ark of the covenant and Israel’s worship came to be focused on the temple, our bodies are God’s temple.  Our worship should be from the heart and founded in love.  It should be part of our spirit. 

We can only approach God because His love made it possible. Despite the commandments given to Israel being based on love for God and for your neighbour, it was only with the coming of Christ that mankind had a clear picture of the importance of love in our relationship with God.

As Paul wrote (1 Cor 13: 13)

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Let our worship reflect our love for God, and for our neighbour, as we live our lives daily.  This is how we worship God in spirit and in truth.  When we gather to worship, it does not matter if we gather in silence or in chaos if our worship clearly shows our love for God and for our neighbour.