Identity Mark Number Four: THE WORSHIP OF THE CHURCH.

In the worship of the 1 st Century, they were committed to glorifying God. Worship was NOT a spectator sport! When I go to a basketball game that I’m interested in, and my favorite player is scoring a point, I am thrilled, and I watch him. And when my team wins, I cheer…“YEA! My team’s winning!” I don’t do that when I go to church.

Suppose a man gets up to lead a prayer: YEAAAA!! A great prayer there, brother!! Give me a high five!! Is it alright? We have somebody that serves the Lord’s Supper, and he pass the fruit of the vine: WOOONDERFUL there, man!! I’ve NEVER seen a better passing of the fruit of the vine!! You’d say, “There’s something wrong here. The fruit of the vine isn’t something we use as a kind of spectator sport! We’re worshipping God, here, friend.”

Well, what do we do when we glorify God? We glorify God by doing what He tells us to do in His worship. You see, to worship is to ascribe honor and reverence to God in an act of submission directed by His revealed Will. Jesus said we are to worship in spirit and in Truth, John 4:24 [“But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and Truth: for such doth the Father seek to be His worshippers. 24 God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and Truth” John 4:23-24.].

We worship God “in Spirit.” How? “In Spirit” is the attuning of our heart, our will, our spirit, with the spiritual nature of God revealed in His Word. And our hearts are attuned to that. We recognize the blessings in our lives, and that these blessings come from God; and out of the reverence, the respect, the devotion, that we have in our hearts for God’s goodness and mercy and love, we are attuned to God’s nature to the limit of our ability. That’s “in spirit.”

What about “in Truth”? “In Truth” is in keeping with His revealed Word concerning worship. Now, that becomes a fascinating matter to understand.

In the 1 st Century, we read in Acts 20, and verse 7, that they took the Lord’s Supper on the first day of the week. Now, what ought we to do about that? Every time the first day of the week comes, loyal, faithful people of God will partake of the Lord’s Supper.

In Ephesians 5, and verse 19, they had singing of “psalms, hymns and spiritual songs,” addressed to God in the Name of Christ to praise and honor God, and to edify each other. We do that today.

They gave of their means, 1 Corinthians 16, verses 1 and 2 [“Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I gave order to the churches of Galatia, so also do ye. 2 Upon the first day of the week let each one of you lay by him in store, as he may prosper, that no collections be made when I come.”].

They had prayer, Acts 2:42 [“And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers.”].

And they had the teaching of the apostles’ doctrine,also Acts 2:42.

That’s what we do. That’s what should be done.