WEAKNESSES IN WORSHIP By Rev. Maurice J. Roberts The basic unit of human society is the family, and the strength ofreligion lies very much in family worship. Where families worship God only onceor twice on the Lord’s Day and not also at home in the week the power ofreligion can only at best be average and mediocre. Its influence will bestunted in the lives of men and of the Christian community at large. If we areto progress to spiritual maturity we must be daily engaged in the worship of God and daily disciplined in our habits offamily, as well as of personal and private, devotion. We take for granted that Christian families will organize life inthe home so that each member of the family will be daily at his and her Bibleand daily on their knees in private. It is inconceivable that believers wouldbegin their day without first kneeling before God in adoration, confession andintercession. The renewed soul craves fellowship with God early and late. Theinstinct therefore of a regenerate man is to seek God’s face at the start ofeach new day. How else dare we launch forth into life’s duties and conflicts?Where shall we find fresh supplies of grace and wisdom except out of thefulness of God’s presence? Those who habitually neglect their morning devotionsmay expect a rough ride through this life. Similarly at night we kneel down before we retire to our beds inorder to plead for pardon for our many sins during the day and to thank God forour many mercies since we rose in the morning. Prayer and Bible reading openand close the day, and when we lay our head on the pillow we turn our thoughtsto one or other passage of God’s Word which we have committed to memory. It is important, in addition to this habit of private worship,also to have stated times for devotions in the family. The father gathers hisfamily together morning and evening in order to recall the thoughts of everymember to the eternal truths of God. He reads a chapter, leads in the singingof God’s praise and then engages in prayer with and for the family as a whole. We do not for a moment mean that our devotions are restricted toprivate and family worship and nothing more. There are, of course, the Lord’sDay services. It is our duty also normally to be present at the weekly PrayerMeeting. Every believer should have it in his normal weekly routine to be atboth of the Lord’s Day services and at the main Prayer Meeting (the name ofwhich may vary from church to church). If business or ill-health at times interrupt this pattern of lifethey should not, as far as possible, be allowed to make us adopt any otherpattern of life as our normal practice. The Christian lives and works in orderto worship God and to enjoy him. Grace in the soul is not automatic, likeelectric current from the national grid. It is rather to be compared toelectric current from a battery, which needs to be regularly re-charged. Lastweek’s grace, like last week’s manna in the desert, is no use for today’s ortomorrow’s tasks. The question might suggest itself to our mind, "Why should somuch of a Christian’s time be taken up in worship, either public, or private orin the family?" The answer is, ‘Because the Christian is in this lifepreparing for eternity, where all will be worship and adoration of God’. Howelse can we fulfil the inward aim of our existence except by making our life asbelievers one long service of devotion and praise to God? One reason why so many children born into Christian homes are lostto the gospel is because they have not been brought up to regard the worship ofGod as the one thing in life which supremely matters. Where children arenaturally brought up to regard the worship of God as the priority of life, theyare likely to follow in the footsteps of their parents and to respect theirexample. This is not always so, but it is often so. There is something about the modern world which tempts manyChristians to settle for a lower measure of worship in their lives than ourforefathers regarded as normal for converted persons. However we explain it, itmust surely come down very largely to our lower measure of love for Christ. Asa generation we may have wider knowledge than our fathers had and we may be busierthan they, but we generally fall shorter in the main thing, which is our hungerfor fellowship with God. Hence, many allow the things of the world to have aplace and an importance in their lives which they should not have. The greatest hindrances to our worship of God are, however, notexternal things but our own indwelling sin. All coldness towards the worship ofGod in our heart arises from the unmortified remnants and roots of worldlinesswhich remain in our nature. Generally speaking, neglect of worship in thechurch and in the home springs not from excess of necessary work or frompressure of other duties so much as from a secret reluctance to stir ourselvesup to do what we could do if only we would. It is the nature of sin to make all spiritual duties seem sour andunwelcome to us. Sin suggests a score of reasons why we should not commenceattending to our duty to conduct family worship. It is so much easier to sit infront of the television, to listen to a favourite piece of music or to amuseourselves in a thousand trivial ways. To marshal our mental and spiritual faculties and to disciplineourselves to take out the Bible and to get the children to sit quietly for awhile (all toys and playthings put away) is a task which goes against ourcorrupt and fallen natures. It also goes against the easy-going spirit of ourage, which is ready to give in to pleasing self at every opportunity. But it isnot the way of excellence, and our great need today is for excellentChristians, not just for average ones. The thing then to aim at if we are ever to be perfect in ourhabits of worship is the mortification of our indwelling sin. We must put todeath the residual enmity to holiness which lies in our hearts. "I am tootired to go to the Prayer Meeting tonight," really, when translated, meansthat we are secretly disinclined to go to Prayer Meetings and are glad of anyexcuse to be absent. Every spiritual duty is met with some opposition in our fallennature. To do our duty in worshipping God, whether in public or in private,demands that we do violence to something in ourselves, that is, to our naturaldistaste for worship. The real problem with those who neglect the Prayer Meeting orleave out family worship is that they have no heart for it. This is easy to provebecause in every church those who are zealous for Prayer Meetings are zealousfor every other form of service to God. We make an exception of some whosework-patterns are an obstacle to regular attendance. But in general it is trueto say that attendance at, or non-attendance at, services and Prayer Meetingsis all part of a person’s whole life-style. And our life-style is an index asto where our heart really is. This in turn is the thermometer which registersthe measure of our spirituality and sanctification. Here too is to be seen the deceitfulness of sin in our hearts.When we are reluctant to attend to family worship or to go to church services,we soon find our hearts forming crafty arguments to say that ‘we do not believein family worship or in too much attendance at church meetings’. At the sametime we notice in our heart another evidence of our corruption. We find adislike rising up in ourselves, against Christians who are diligent in theirhabits of worship. Our hearts dislike them because their godliness condemns ourcarelessness and is a rebuke to us which we secretly resent. One of the best starting-points for all personal reformation inthe area of God’s worship is to be sure of this: The Christian and theChristian church are never more influential for good than when they aredifferent from the world. The theory that we should be ‘like the world so as toinfluence it for good’ is fatally flawed. This idea, that the Christian shouldbe ‘in it to win it’, does not stand up to biblical scrutiny. Which of thesaints of the Bible ever sought to shape and conform his life to the outsideworld so as to be a blessing to it? Not Moses! Not Daniel! Not Paul! Least ofall Christ. If the believer does not fill his and her life with the things ofGod, the world will come into their life to fill up the void. Nature abhors avacuum. If Christians are not wholly taken up with their duties of obedience,worship and duty, they will soon be filling in the gap with worldly vanities:cheap music, worthless programmes, a passion for professional sports - suchvanities do not promote godliness but only slow down the believer’s progress ingrace. There is great gain to the believer in attending diligently toworship in the home, in the church and in secret. The father who conductsfamily worship twice daily is reading some seven hundred chapters a year to hisfamily. He is also teaching by his example. His children after him willremember all their lives how a father should lead his household in worship. Ifthere are times when family worship and the Prayer Meeting are not‘exhilarating’ there are also many times when theyare. If an angel were to come from heaven with a plain message to God’speople today, it would not be surprising to hear him say, "Repent and dothe first works!" There are professing Christians everywhere who neglectthe instruction of their young families very culpably. Members of otherreligious communities often far surpass Christians in the time and care whichthey take to instruct their children in their own religious beliefs. Their children go to special classes tolearn by heart their "holy books," while Christians’ children remainignorant of even the elements of our precious faith. "This is alamentation, and shall be for a lamentation" (Ezk 19:14). But these lamentable omissions among many Christians are curable.A holy resolution is needed to put matters right at once. Let every man examinehimself and begin in right earnest to believe that the worship of God is athing so precious that it must come first in our lives. Every day we are toworship God in our own homes. Every Sabbath we are to meet in God’s house.Every Prayer Meeting is a privilege not to be missed. Let this be ourconviction and on this conviction let us act. If all Christians in our nationdid so it would bring a marked change to every congregation. And in answer toour repentance and fervent prayers, who can say what God might do? W [This article was first published as the editorial of The Bannerof Truth Magazine, issue 469, dated October 2002, and is copyrighted by theBanner of Truth Trust. Our republication in this bulletin (paper and internetedition) is by permission granted on 23 September 2002. Pastor Maurice Robertsis an appreciated friend of this church. Although in recent days, the Banner ofTruth Trust has seen some weaknesses and departures from the firm position ittook in her earlier years, we are glad that Mr Roberts, who stands firmly forthe Reformed Regulative Principle of Worship, is still the editor of theMagazine. Indeed, we have often found the best and most edifying article in theMagazine to be the editorial! For order information please write to [email protected]. —JJLim
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