Recovering the lost ground of worship (2)

In the early Church, worship was participatory.

What then, brothers? When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up.
- 1 Corinthians 14:26

A focus on God
Worship among the first Christians was intensely focused on God, on knowing His presence and even participating in Him through the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. The early believers assembled not to be seen by others or merely to hear good preaching or comforting music. They came to meet with God, understanding that He had called them to this assembly and intended to review their lives and further equip them for service in His Name, as we see in Psalm 50.

Further, the first Christians met to worship in two different kinds of settings. They met in private homes most of all, often gathering every day, and even before sunrise, in a home near their own to bring their worship to God. In these homes they were led in worship by their elders and enjoyed the status of being full-fledged churches with all the responsibilities and privileges of every other manifestation of the Body of Christ. We see glimpses into this “house-church” structure in Paul’s epistles to Corinth, Rome, Colossae, and elsewhere in the New Testament and beyond.

But the first Christians also met weekly in a gathering of the house churches by city – a city-church gathering for worship. This is the context Paul seems to be addressing in 1 Corinthians 14, although the instructions for worship we find here would doubtless have applied equally to believers gathered as the church in private homes.

Some offering to bring
The first Christian worship services were highly participatory and varied in their elements. We cannot tell if any particular order of worship was followed, although we can be sure that a logic or pattern of worship was adhered to by those who led. Everybody was expected to come to worship with something to offer the Lord – a psalm or hymn, a lesson God had taught them during the previous week, some interpretation of a text gleaned from their devotions, even a new and sudden insight from the Lord or a prayer to God, whether in a known or unknown tongue.

People would have had to prepare their offering during the previous week, thinking and getting ready to bring to worship whatever they felt they needed to offer to God in order to honor Him. In worship they probably stood around or sat on whatever seats were available. They did not have rows of pews or theater chairs; there would have been rather more mingling and touching of one another, just because of the limited space. A service of worship in an early house church or city-church gathering would have been richly varied, highly participatory, and charged with the emotions of conviction, confession, wonder, excitement, exhortation, admonition, forgiveness, rejoicing, and reconciliation.

We can imagine that these services went on for some time – as long as the Spirit was pleased to draw out and convey before the Lord the gifts and offerings of His people. No one would have offered just to impress someone else. What they would have brought to present to the Lord had to be prepared in such a way as to edify their brethren in the Lord, to build the congregation in unity and maturity and to add to the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry (Eph. 4:12-16). There could be no mere self-serving, pious strutting, or hogging the floor in such a setting. It would have been an environment of eagerness, deference, consideration, and celebration of God’s varied richness and close by glory. We can imagine laughter, shouting, and much embracing and spiritual “high-fiving” in the worship services of the first Christians, as well as much reverence, long periods of silent reflection, and spontaneous outbursts of singing, praying, and clapping of hands. How exciting and wondrous those services of worship must have been!

Altogether now!
Increasingly church services are becoming a kind of spectator sport. Congregations are generally too large to allow for any participation beyond singing or reciting a creed, and in many churches the singing of the congregation is drowned out by the amplified music and singing of the worship band. Churches with a contemporary bent have tended to drop such participative activities as testimonies, responsive readings, prayers from the congregation, sharing from Scripture, and reciting creeds. But then, in many churches where traditional services are the norm, these things have largely disappeared as well.

This tends to consign worshippers to a kind of “observer status” in the service – listening to the music and the pastor, watching the drama, absorbing as much as they can as they sit in polite silence for an hour or so. Whatever participation is encouraged – singing, praying, giving – is structured and rather pro-forma, lacking any spontaneity and leaving little room for the Spirit to move freely among the congregation.

Our need for such tight order and restricted participation is dictated by the size of our congregations, the constraints of time, and the expectations of the people. Let’s face it, we would feel out of place and uncomfortable worshipping with the first Christians in Corinth. But then, imagine how odd they would likely consider what we do each Lord’s day.

For more insight to this topic, get the book, A Royal Waste of Time, by Marva Dawn.

Or read the article, “Improving Worship,” by T. M. Moore.