Recently I was shown a copy of the work done by the Christian Reformed Liturgical Committee for Worship Reform. In pamphlet form, three suggested methods for the change of our worship service were presented. I am sure that much thought and physical observation of other denominations’ services were put in before the final draft was published, but it seems to me that one part of the service has been forgotten. That part being the proclamation of the Word of God.
All three suggested outlines give line after line of ritualistic formalities and repetitious responses but allow only about 15 minutes time for a sermon. There is a Chinese proverb that says, “It is with words as with sunbeams; the more they are condensed, the deeper they burn.” But 15 minutes for an exposition of the Word of God can only be favored by two groups: ministers who do not like to preach and parishioners who do not like to be told that they are not living in accordance with the laws of God. It was John Calvin who said that people should “go to sermon.” He never said that people should go to a formal service and listen to a quickie sermon. The office of the Church is to preach the Word and to administer the Sacraments, not to go through a long list of formalities and end with a short exposition of the Word of God. “We have said that the symbols by which the Church is discerned are the preaching of the Word and the observance of the Sacraments, for these cannot anywhere exist without producing fruit and prospering by the blessing of God.” (Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book Four, Chapter 1, section 9.)
People learn to he Christians by listening to sermons and hearing the Word of the Living God, not by going through long dialogues and saying a set of preprogrammed responses. The Pharisees uttered long prepared prayers, but our Lord said that this is all the reward that they would receive in this world or the next. When will we mortals ever learn that we must worship God and proclaim and listen to the proclamation of His Word and not go through a series of man made services that seek to glorify the people who use them and not God in heaven? Again Calvin said, “Wherefore, if faith declines in the least degree from the mark at which it ought to aim, it does not retain its nature, but becomes uncertain credulity and vague wandering of mind.” By removing the Word from our services, or by considerably reducing it, we are removing the source of our faith, the Word. For surely by adding all these ritualistic trappings and responses we are only filling up time and removing the source of our faith. The only result of this can be a reduction of faith by those people whose homes already rest on sand and to those people who have not heard the Word yet, far they surely will not hear it during the proposed modern worship services.
And why do we need a new set of worship services? To make the Word more palatable or to make Sunday worship more meaningful to the young adults in our congregations? The Word does not have to be made more palatable, for it comes from God and needs nothing added to it or subtracted from it. If you will pardon the expression, “it tells it like it is.” And that is exactly what we as a People of God need, a forthright, honest and soul-searching presentation of the Word. When you have a good thing you do not water it down and search for something better, but you shout it from the rooftops and let everyone know about it. I suggest that the worship services not be changed but that people let their lives be changed. Let Jesus Christ come into your life and watch how life becomes more meaningful and how all things can be related to Christ. If all we want to be is Sunday Christians and have a beautiful service of responses and dialogues then we might as well hang the whole thing up and go out and sin it up because we will have chosen our own judgment. But if we want to he 365 day Christians then we had better get down to the task of proclaiming and listening to the Gospel of Jesus Christ for in that and only that is there salvation.
As for the matter of making the service more meaningful to our young adults, I submit that they will receive the preaching of the Gospel with open arms as opposed to the second class Christianity and formalism as offered by the proposed changes of our Liturgical Committee.
If preaching is not the focal point of our worship service then we had better throw out our three confessional standards because they are based on the preaching of the Word of God. And should anyone think otherwise then I suggest that they reread them, unless of course they propose to change the confessional standards also. Granted that more participation is needed by our youth, only it should come in the area of works and not group responses. To go “to sermon” twice then on Sunday won’t be a chore, but a real chance to hear what life is really all about. In Isaiah 3 God says, “Hear, and your soul shall live.” Not, “Respond, and I shall listen.”
Robert Viviano is a member of the First Roseland Christian Reformed Church, Chicago, Illinois. He had been a Roman Catholic prior to his coming to the Christian Reformed Church.
All three suggested outlines give line after line of ritualistic formalities and repetitious responses but allow only about 15 minutes time for a sermon. There is a Chinese proverb that says, “It is with words as with sunbeams; the more they are condensed, the deeper they burn.” But 15 minutes for an exposition of the Word of God can only be favored by two groups: ministers who do not like to preach and parishioners who do not like to be told that they are not living in accordance with the laws of God. It was John Calvin who said that people should “go to sermon.” He never said that people should go to a formal service and listen to a quickie sermon. The office of the Church is to preach the Word and to administer the Sacraments, not to go through a long list of formalities and end with a short exposition of the Word of God. “We have said that the symbols by which the Church is discerned are the preaching of the Word and the observance of the Sacraments, for these cannot anywhere exist without producing fruit and prospering by the blessing of God.” (Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book Four, Chapter 1, section 9.)
People learn to he Christians by listening to sermons and hearing the Word of the Living God, not by going through long dialogues and saying a set of preprogrammed responses. The Pharisees uttered long prepared prayers, but our Lord said that this is all the reward that they would receive in this world or the next. When will we mortals ever learn that we must worship God and proclaim and listen to the proclamation of His Word and not go through a series of man made services that seek to glorify the people who use them and not God in heaven? Again Calvin said, “Wherefore, if faith declines in the least degree from the mark at which it ought to aim, it does not retain its nature, but becomes uncertain credulity and vague wandering of mind.” By removing the Word from our services, or by considerably reducing it, we are removing the source of our faith, the Word. For surely by adding all these ritualistic trappings and responses we are only filling up time and removing the source of our faith. The only result of this can be a reduction of faith by those people whose homes already rest on sand and to those people who have not heard the Word yet, far they surely will not hear it during the proposed modern worship services.
And why do we need a new set of worship services? To make the Word more palatable or to make Sunday worship more meaningful to the young adults in our congregations? The Word does not have to be made more palatable, for it comes from God and needs nothing added to it or subtracted from it. If you will pardon the expression, “it tells it like it is.” And that is exactly what we as a People of God need, a forthright, honest and soul-searching presentation of the Word. When you have a good thing you do not water it down and search for something better, but you shout it from the rooftops and let everyone know about it. I suggest that the worship services not be changed but that people let their lives be changed. Let Jesus Christ come into your life and watch how life becomes more meaningful and how all things can be related to Christ. If all we want to be is Sunday Christians and have a beautiful service of responses and dialogues then we might as well hang the whole thing up and go out and sin it up because we will have chosen our own judgment. But if we want to he 365 day Christians then we had better get down to the task of proclaiming and listening to the Gospel of Jesus Christ for in that and only that is there salvation.
As for the matter of making the service more meaningful to our young adults, I submit that they will receive the preaching of the Gospel with open arms as opposed to the second class Christianity and formalism as offered by the proposed changes of our Liturgical Committee.
If preaching is not the focal point of our worship service then we had better throw out our three confessional standards because they are based on the preaching of the Word of God. And should anyone think otherwise then I suggest that they reread them, unless of course they propose to change the confessional standards also. Granted that more participation is needed by our youth, only it should come in the area of works and not group responses. To go “to sermon” twice then on Sunday won’t be a chore, but a real chance to hear what life is really all about. In Isaiah 3 God says, “Hear, and your soul shall live.” Not, “Respond, and I shall listen.”
Robert Viviano is a member of the First Roseland Christian Reformed Church, Chicago, Illinois. He had been a Roman Catholic prior to his coming to the Christian Reformed Church.