What is Worship?
“All the nations you have made shall come and worship before you, O Lord, and shall glorify your name. For you are great and do wondrous things; you alone are God.” Psalm 86:9
Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever, as the Westminster Shorter Catechism puts it. In worship, we bow down before God because He is worthy. Worshiping God is the most important thing we do.
1. We Worship God
We want to please God in our worship. Worship is not about our preferences and desires. We worship on earth as it is in heaven, and heaven’s worship is enthralled with the holy, holy, holy God. In worship, we join heaven in expressing the worth of God.
2. We Worship through the Son
The throne of heaven, which is central to heaven’s worship, is a double-throne. Our worship of the one God includes the second person of the Trinity: “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain.” Because we have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory, we should be barred from God’s presence by an angel with a flaming sword. Our only access to God was bought by the blood of Jesus, the Son of God. The birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus cleanse our consciences and free us to worship God. At the center of our worship is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
3. We Worship by the Spirit
Jesus enables us to worship by giving us His Spirit. We live in the age of the out-pouring of the Spirit, and in Him we are able and willing to worship God. Prayer is a necessary part of worship; in prayer, we depend on the Spirit for acceptable worship.
4. We Worship according to the Word
The “acceptable way of worshiping the true God is instituted by himself, and so limited by his own revealed will, that he may not be worshiped according to the imaginations and devices of men … or any other way not prescribed in the Holy Scripture.” (Westminster Confession of Faith, 21.1). We worship God, through the Son of God, by the Spirit of God, with the words of God. In worship, we read the word, pray the word, sing the word, preach the word, hear the word, and see the word in the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
5. We Worship as One Body
God calls his people into his presence as a family in the presence of its Father. The whole congregation participates in worship. Our service includes readings with responses from the congregation, a profession of faith, and the Lord’s Prayer. In congregational singing we build one another up, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. In a profession of faith, we join the church through the ages in confessing the same faith. We worship together as a body united in Christ.