I would like to read with you from Psalm 95. Psalm 95. Our theme this evening is our worship services, and here is a Psalm 95. about worship, actually. Many of the Psalms are about worship, aren't they? Because they were used in the worship of God already in the temple and among the people of Israel and still today. But let us read together from Psalm 95. O come, let us sing unto the Lord. Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. let us come before his presence with thanksgiving and make a joyful noise unto him with songs. For the Lord is a great God and a great King above all gods. In his hand are the deep places of the earth. The strength of the hills is his also. The sea is his, and he made it, and his hands formed the dry land. O come, let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker, for he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand. Today, if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart, as in the provocation, And as in the day of temptation in the wilderness, when your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work. Forty years long was I grieved with this generation, and said, it is a people that do err in their heart, and they have not known my ways. Unto whom I swear in my wrath that they should not enter into my rest. As I said, this psalm is such a call to worship, isn't it? To come before His presence in the worship of His name. And it gives reasons for the greatness of God. And that is what also is the focus of worship, who God is in His greatness. That call, in verse 6, to kneel before the Lord, our Maker. We also see in the final verses that worship And the gathering to worship can never leave a person the same. Either it leads to worship. or to the hardening of your heart against the glory of this God, exactly because it's about the glory of God. Therefore, the worship of His name can be the greatest delight, but also the most serious thing to harden. And that is why there is that call, isn't there, in the end of this song. We have this topic on the worship services. You can begin by saying that worship services are a custom for, if I look around, then I would dare say all of us, a custom to go to church on Sunday. Perhaps it's been your custom all your life long to go to church. It's a good custom. We even read of the Lord Jesus, don't we, that he went to the synagogue as was his custom on the Sabbath day. And so it is a very good custom that we may have to go to church on the Lord's day. It's also a great blessing when it's more than a custom in the sense of it's more than just a matter of doing it because that's what you always do and that's what you're expected to do. Because after all, the Lord has given it to us not simply so that we would go through the motions because that's what we're used to doing. It's so much richer than that. And we cannot be content with less than the true worship of His name in spirit and in truth. We hope this evening may point us in that direction. And we do so by answering four basic questions tonight. First, why do we have worship services? Second, what is worship to be? So it's not quite the same as your handout there. And third, from where have our worship services come? Fourth, what do the various parts of our worship services mean? So first, why do we have worship services? Secondly, what is worship to be? Third, from where do our worship services come? And fourth, what do the various parts of them mean? So the first question then is, why do we have worship services? A very basic question. Do we really need worship services? Isn't it enough to simply have a Bible at home and to read that Bible? And today there's a lot of good books that you can read. And on top of it today, you can even listen to many things which you couldn't a hundred years ago. You could even have the best preachers and stream them through the internet. And on Sunday, you could just listen to the best preachers, and then you don't have to listen to someone like me. And that would be, you wouldn't have to pay all the money. You'd say, it would be much better if we didn't have worship services or not. God in his wisdom ordained that people should gather together throughout time. Already in the very beginning of Genesis, we read before the flood already that then men began to call on the name of the Lord. And that expression, call on the name of the Lord, is a term that is used for a gathering for worship already then before the flood. In the Old Testament, the Lord ordained that people would not only meditate on His Word and not only teach their children, but also that they would gather. He established that tabernacle and later that temple there in the midst of the people, and He called the people to gather together for the worship of His name. There they were to come for what was called a holy convocation, or a gathering for holy purposes for the worship of God. For example, in Leviticus 23, we read, six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of rest, a holy convocation. And so they would gather on the Sabbath, they would gather on the feast days for the worship of God. And they were to gather, it says, not only the men, but also the women. And we also read of the children and even the sucking ones. I'll leave out the discussion how that applies today. But the point is that the whole congregation was to gather together. And the Lord attached his special blessing to the gathering of the people together for worship. Puritan David Clarkson, he wrote a book entitled public worship to be preferred before private, saying the public worship is a worship that God is especially pleased to bless. And he based that on Psalm 87, where it says, the Lord loveth the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob. They all dwelled in their dwellings. And the gates of Zion is where they came together to worship him. And it says the Lord had a special delight in the gathering of the people. We see that already in the Old Testament. In the New Testament, worship in Acts and on was no longer centered on Jerusalem. The Lord Jesus said, the hour is coming where they will no longer worship in Jerusalem, but then the focus becomes worshiping in spirit and in truth. It's no longer about one place, but there is still that same principle that they were to gather together to worship. Whenever the apostles came, they gathered a people and they preached. And then when congregations formed, again, they would gather together. You see that in Acts 20, when Paul is in Troas, and then we read, upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together. That was a common thing on the first day of the week, for the disciples to come together. Say it was a common thing. There were also those who neglected. And that's why Hebrews 10 says, Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together as the manner of some is, seeing as you see the day approaching. So there is that call in Hebrews 10, isn't there, not to forsake the gathering together for the worship of his name. Because of it, it was dangerous. When you fail to gather, Then you are left with your own thoughts and your own feelings, and so easily you drift away from his truth, from God. Come together, he says. Why then worship services? Because God ordained that the church was to meet publicly throughout history. It's God's ordinance, which he is pleased to bless. Second question tonight is, what is public worship to be? You think of how the Old Testament calls public worship the solemn assembly or a holy convocation. Why solemn? Why holy? It's because that gathering is not just a gathering of people, a gathering of religious people to talk about religious things. That gathering is ultimately a people coming into the presence of the living God. The worship service, and if there's one thing you leave with tonight, let it be this, the worship service is to be a meeting between God and the congregation. Just think of that. When you think of who God is in His glory, in His majesty, in His unsearchableness, in His holy purity, in His…and to think that that God is the one in whose presence you come in the worship service. It's to be a meeting with Him. Is it any wonder then that Psalm 95, which we sang, says, O come, let us kneel, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord. It says worship, bow, kneel. And all three of those express something of great reverence for the one in whose presence you come. Can it be otherwise? If he is the one, in whose presence we come, that deep reverence when we come into church, not because the building is holy, but because when the congregation gathers, it's in His name. That's why the psalmist says in Psalm 5, in thy fear will I worship. Worship is a deep, heartfelt reverence for the majesty of God. Won't that show? When that is there, in our posture, in what we do, and how we behave, and how we dress, and everything else, reverence. Not only reverence, but an adoration of God. It's worship, adoration of God. The posture of worship is falling down, not just reverence, but adoring who God is. Could someone get me some water, please? Adoring who God is, again, Is he not excellent? Is he not majestic? Is he not so worthy of all adoration? Isn't that what he says when we come into his presence? The psalm from Psalm 81, worship and adore me. What a blessing if that may be in your heart. we sing within thy temple sacred courts with loving and adoring thought. We contemplate thy grace, O God, and all thy deeds with mercy fraught. What a blessing. Well, that may be the song of your heart. That is worship. Then it's a joy, reverence, adoration, joy. Philippians 3, when it speaks of those who worship God in spirit. It connects it with those who rejoice in Christ Jesus. That's at the heart of worship as well, isn't it? True worship. You realize you come into the presence of a God of glory. You realize you cannot stand before that God. You realize you have every reason to be consumed. And the Lord shows you that mediator. Thank you. And when he does so, there's a joy. Worship is not then a, when we think of solemn, it doesn't mean joyless, rejoicing with trembling. It's what Psalm 2 says, isn't it? Thy sacred altar bending, Psalm 43, God My God, my boundless joy. Now, if this is what true worship is, then it's clearly much more than going through some motions, isn't it? And we clearly cannot be content with less than this true grace of God that leads us to bow in our hearts before the living God. But that also has something to say about what is to characterize a worship service. If the worship service is the place where people come into the presence of God, then that worship service is to be God-centered. Then worship is not just entertainment. Then it must be filled with who God is and God's greatness. And if that is so, then it also must be Christ-centered, because He is the only way of access unto the Father, and He is the one who reveals the Father. He is the one who reveals and declares God. He is the one who reconciles to God. And therefore, a worship service must not only be God-centered, but also Christ-centered. And if it's to be Christ-centered, then we also need it to be, can I say, Spirit-filled. Because it's the Spirit who takes the things of Christ and reveals them unto sinners. Then that Spirit must fill the worship service for it to be a true worship service. And if it's to be Spirit-filled, what must it be? Word. Word-based, word-centered, because a spirit always uses a word. That's his means. If true worship is a falling before God in reverence, in adoration, in joy, then worship is to be God-centered, Christ-centered, spirit, spiritual, and word-based. That's what characterizes. our worship. Then it's not just about a custom, is it? It's so much more. Our third question, where did we get the idea having a greeting and singing and prayer and scripture reading and preaching and all those other things, where have our worship services come from? That's our third point. In the worship of God, an important principle is called the regulative principle. It's a big word. Regulative principle simply means we are only to worship God in the ways God has commanded us to worship Him in. In other words, we don't think up something and think, well, nowhere in the Bible does it say I'm not allowed to do this, so therefore I can do it. No, instead we are to search the scriptures and ask, what does scripture tell us to do in the worship of God? And if Scripture tells us to do it, then we are to do that and only what Scripture tells us. That's something that we confess in the Heidelberg Catechism when it comes to the second commandment about not making images. And then it says, what does God require? We are in no wise to represent God by images nor worship him in any other way than he has commanded in his words. so as he commands us. We see that stressed in the book of Exodus, for example. When you read through Exodus, you notice all the commands that God gives to Moses. This is what he has to do in terms of making the tabernacle. And then you read everything that Moses does, and every time it's according to the word of God. He did exactly what the Lord said to him, because he was not to change the worship of God in any way. In fact, when people did so in the Bible, we read of God's judgments coming upon them. Remember Nadab and Abihu? That call they took was not from the altar, but they were still going to worship God, but it wasn't according to his will. And therefore that fire came down and killed That's how seriously God took worshiping according to his will. You can think of David as well with the ark. Remember bringing the ark into Jerusalem and he put it on a cart. He was meaning to honor God, but it wasn't according to the will of God and therefore that man, when the ark shook and he touched the ark, he was killed. Again, showing how important it is to worship God. not according to our own ideas, but according to His Word. Well, what do we find in the Word of God in terms of what He asks us to do? You see various elements of public worship. Already if you go to the Old Testament, think of the dedication of the temple in the Old Testament. with Solomon. Then we read of how there was singing and music and they were praising and thanking the Lord when they lifted up their voices with the trumpet and the cymbals and the instruments of music. We read of Solomon standing on a pulpit of wood in the midst of the people and there was a blessing. He turned his face and he blessed the whole congregation, it says. There was an address. There was a sermon. He preached to them. There was also prayer as Solomon kneeled before the people and he prayed to God with them. There was also the response of adoration. When that fire consumed the sacrifice and the cloud filled the temple, the whole congregation, we read, bowed themselves with their faces to the ground upon the pavement and worshiped and praised the Lord. And then there were also Thanksgiving offerings brought for the temple. Now that day when the temple was dedicated was very different setting from what we have today. And yet you see some of those same elements, don't you? There's a difference between our services and Old Testament worship. In that then, everything was more visual and more focused on the ceremonies and the senses and everything else. And now, worship is simpler in the New Testament. Some of those same elements are still there, the same activities. Our worship is actually patterned, especially after the synagogue worship. Especially in the exile, there were many people could not go to Jerusalem. They were scattered. They would gather together in synagogues to worship the Lord on the Sabbath. And when they came back from exile, then they also established synagogues in Israel to the point that when the Lord Jesus was there, came, there were many synagogues and he would go to the synagogue. And also the apostles, when they went preaching and acts, they often began in the synagogue. And therefore, it's understandable that the early Christian church would worship in a similar way to they were used to worshiping in the synagogue. There are certainly similarities there, because in the synagogue there was prayer, there was psalm singing, there was confession of faith, there was a priestly benediction, there was scripture reading, there was preaching. There are those basic elements that we still have today. What do we find in the early church as to what they did? We find them. preaching, and reading Scripture. You think of 1 Timothy 4, Paul's charge to Timothy, preach the words. He was saying that to Timothy as a young minister. Preaching had a central place in the worship of God, in the book of Acts, and in the epistles. Linked with that was the reading of God's words. Another important element is sacraments. Why do we have two sacraments? You know those texts, right? Matthew 28, go into all the world, baptizing in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. You know those texts from 1 Corinthians 11? I have delivered unto you that which I have received of the Lord, that the Lord Jesus in the same night in which he was betrayed took bread. Those sacraments were ordained by Christ to be performed to the end of time, and that is why we still have them today in our worship services. Another line element is prayer. We read after the Spirit was poured out in Acts 2 that the early church continued in prayers. And Paul, teaching Timothy again as that young minister, he exhorted that supplications and prayers and intercessions and giving thanks would be made for all men. He's also singing. Practice in the synagogue, furthered in the early church, Colossians, Ephesians. Remember we studied Ephesians a little while ago, and we came to that text about singing Grace in your hearts to the Lord. Colossians says, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. That teaching and admonishing one another shows that that's to be done in the gathering of the congregation. Another is the greeting or benediction. which are also at the beginning and end of the epistles, were linked with early worship. And when you hear all these parts of worship in the New Testament, then you recognize these are things which we still do today. Again, that doesn't mean that our worship service looks exactly like the worship that took place in Corinth or in Colossae or in other places. The exact ordering and the exact manner and that may vary, but the same elements are there because they are rooted in the Word of God. In terms of our more precise way of doing it, That is drawn especially from the time of the Reformation, especially Calvin, Geneva. We have drawn much of our structure, how we order things in the worship service from the time of the Reformation. Think of how before the Reformation, the church had greatly degenerated, and the worship of God was no longer Word-centered, Christ-centered, God-centered. It had become a matter of ritual. Hearing things they didn't understand because they were in Latin. Going through the motions and thinking that if I go through the motions and I'm there at the Mass, I will receive my weekly supply of grace. But it was the Reformation which God used in order to show once again what true worship was about. Because in the Reformation, God revealed through His Word and by His Spirit to sinners who He was, and that affected also the worship of His name. So where did our worship services come from? All worship must be based on Scripture, only what God commands. The elements of our worship service come from Scripture, were patterned after the synagogue service, and especially formulated in the time of the Reformation. Our last question tonight is, what do the various parts of our worship service mean? And then I just want to go through a worship service, see why we do what we do. Maybe I should actually begin before a worship service because that's where we prepare, isn't it? You think and you get up in the morning, you realize it's the Lord's Day and you prepare, right? Repair means not sleeping in till the last minute and rushing and scrambling and getting to church just in time. But you wake up, you have that time to pray, to read something, to realize that you're about to go into the presence of God. It also affects preparing, also involves dress, right? When you realize you're coming into the presence of God, then that reverence and respect for God should also show in our dress and how we dress for that very special occasion. Preparation. You come. That's why it's good to come, not just two minutes before. so that you have time to sit down, you have time to settle your thoughts, that you have time also to maybe read the scripture passage which you see on the board, or you have time to listen to those psalters and you think of the words of those tunes you hear, time to also pray and realize what it is all about. In the meantime, in the consistory, the consistory prays together, prays for a blessing, prays for you as a congregation, prays that the Lord may work with His Spirit in the congregation, in themselves, prays for the minister, and then they come out, and you notice that an elder shakes the hand of a minister, and if you're close enough, then you may hear him say, blessing, Why does he do that? It's something of Galatians 2 which speaks of the right hand of fellowship. The consistory through that elder is showing that they recognize the authority of that man to preach the word and to lead the service because the consistory actually has oversight over the pulpit. And they are the ones who give that Can I say, let that minister preach and they show that by shaking his hand. They also say blessing because the desire of the minister and the consistory is the blessing of God. Well, they come in and they sit here in the bench and maybe you wonder why do they sit in a bench like that looking out over the congregation every so often. Another word for elder is actually overseer. I guess in this church, it's quite literally they're over the congregation. Some other churches, they're not quite that high, but that's the way it is here. But the point is that they are to have a concern for the congregation, that people are there, how they're there. without losing sight of the fact that they are sitting there in the first place for themselves and not for others. That's all at the beginning. Then comes, oh yeah, there's also that moment of silence, right? Moment of silence in which you and I can offer up those brief petitions. They don't have to be long sentences. Have mercy. Speak. Bless. Work. Realizing we're coming into the presence of God. And then come those words, our help is in the name of the Lord. which has made the heavens and the earth. What a way to begin a service. Because you're confessing, in us is no help. In a minister is no help. Our help is in His name. That God who has made the heavens and the earth, the God who is so mighty, that it's about Him. That is a confession of dependence on him. There, the minister is a mouthpiece of the congregation to express that dependence on the Lord. And then, the next moment, the minister is a mouthpiece of God to bring a message to the congregation when he says, grace, mercy, and peace be unto you. He's not just expressing his own wish, he is there speaking on behalf of God, in the place of God, God who is greeting the congregation with words of grace and mercy and peace. That's what makes that an astounding thing. When you think of how we come into church, we come into the church stained with sin, and we deserve God to only pronounce curse upon us. And God comes in his first words of greeting. Grace, mercy, and peace. To know that, then you have a message already before what most people would say the service hasn't even begun. There already is a message, isn't it? And there is singing. We sing, we sing the Psalms. We had a topic on that a few years ago, why we sing the Psalms and the value of singing the Psalms. And that singing is, again, a singing unto the Lord, isn't it? It's a speaking unto Him in song. It's returning to Him those very words that He has given us in the book of Psalms. And that's what makes it so beautiful, that those are so often prayers, aren't they, and confessions to the Lord. And at the same time, those words already can be means by the grace of God to speak unto you, singing. Then in the morning, after we've sung to God, then we listen to what God says to us, and that is the law. Every Lord's Day, the law. Ten commandments. So we must have it all memorized very well, right? Because we pay very good attention and we say it along in our minds as a minister is saying the law. Why the law? Someone could say, we know it all so well. Do we not need the law? Isn't that what Lord Saitou says, where does the knowledge of misery come from? Out of the law of God. Do we not need the Lord to use that law to show us who we are? For the first time, we're in a deeper way to see our unworthiness, to see our sin, to, as Lord's Day 44 says, to more and more humble ourselves before God and seek for remission and forgiveness of sins in Him and also be renewed by His Spirit to walk in His way. That's why we have the law. In the afternoon, we have the Apostles' Creed. The law is God speaking to us. The Apostles' Creed is us speaking to God because we are confessing that to God. What are we confessing there? It's actually a summary of the gospel, isn't it? Again, if you read Lord's Day 7, then you see it's a summary of the gospel. It's the summary of the opposite of the law. The law commands us. And in the gospel, God comes and He promises and He declares what He will be and what He will do as a triune God of salvation for sinners. So, we hear the law in the morning. We confess the gospel in the afternoon. Law and gospel as the two main parts of scripture are embedded in our worship services. Then there is, after the law, there's a singing. Often that is a response to the law. Pay attention to that. You've heard the law. That song is to be the response of your heart to hearing the law. We have scripture reading. Again, that's essential because worship is to be Word-centered. How are you to know God? It's through His Word. That's why we read the Word. Then there is also prayer. And prayer in the church is not just the minister praying. It's to be the congregation praying through the mouth of the minister to God. That's why it's often said, let us pray, right? At that time, it's not to doze, to pray with the minister for those things we so need, for ourselves, for others, to give thanks and also to adore him, prayer. There's also the collection. Maybe we wonder, why do we have a collection in a worship service? That's about dollars and cents. Well, hopefully not cents, but dollars and whatever else. Why do we have that in a worship service? That giving is to be an expression of worship. It's to be an expression of thankfulness to God for all that He has given us, that you return something back to His service as an expression of thankfulness, and also an expression of desire that the Lord would use our weak means and our gifts for His service. And so it fits in the worship of God, and you find it also already in the, I think, Corinthians, it speaks of on the first day of the week, they laid up in store. They had their offerings, and presumably, when they met together in worship. There's singing, there's also the preaching of the word. And that's something we may be used to, that the preaching of the word takes quite a part of the worship service, But it's something that becomes increasingly uncommon today. Why don't you have choirs and you have all kinds of other things to fill a service because preaching, people seem so passive when it's preaching, they just sit there. But preaching is central in the worship service because preaching is God's main means that He uses to work salvation and to stir up the worship of His name. He uses the preaching of the word. It's foolishness, it says, and yet it's his power unto salvation. It says faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. It's through the proclamation of his word that he makes himself known in such a way that people fall down before him in reverence and adoration and in joy in him. That's why preaching takes such an important role in our worship services. And when we think of that, then on the first thing, what reason to pray for the ministers? That they may be just that, messengers of God. That's always, as a minister, you're afraid of. that you say things in the name of God, but you're saying your own ideas, and you're taking away from the Word of God. It's something I have to ask forgiveness for. What reason to pray? Lord, enable the ministers to bring Thy Word. And what reason then to also hear that preaching not simply as a matter of, that's what the minister thinks, but this is a messenger who has a message from God Himself. And the most blessed time in church was when you don't think about a minister anymore, but you hear his voice through his messenger, but it's the Word that does its work, the preaching. Then there is a singing afterwards as a response to that word, and then there is prayer again, and then there is benediction. At the end of the service, the minister stretches out his hands and he pronounces that blessing. And again, he doesn't do so simply as his own wish. but that's patterned after what God commanded the priests to do in number six, that they were to lay the name of the Lord upon the congregation. And there again, you see Israel, that congregation, and that congregation in Israel was a mixed people. There were hypocrites, and there were the true people of God, and there were the rebellious, and there were the God-fearing, and there was this people, and yet the priest was to stretch out his hands over those people and was to pronounce the blessing of God. And when that blessing was pronounced, and when that blessing is still pronounced today, it comes, doesn't it, with that call to receive it prayerfully. Amen. So let it be. Be it unto me according to thy words. When we hear that benediction, isn't that the response? or as a response to be praise to God. That's why the last element in our worship service, at least here, is a doxology. Doxology is literally a song or word of praise, praise to God. And isn't it fitting that the last word would be praise to God, because our worship service is all about Him. that then when you look at the worship service in that light, then you notice that there is something going on. Remember I said that a worship service is to be a meeting of God with the congregation. That's why in that worship service, you see those elements where God is speaking and elements where we speak to God. There's a greeting. There's a law. There's a scripture reading. There's a preaching. It's all God coming to us. And there's the singing and the praying and the confession and the giving where it is us towards God. And that shows that that worship service, it is not about people. It's about you before the living God. That is exactly what makes the worship service so rich when the Lord blesses it. That also is what makes it such a great responsibility, doesn't it, to sit in the presence of God with a heart of unbelief, with a heart of impenitence. It's the most dangerous thing. And that worship service can testify against us. Because God has come so close, we've hardened our hearts. At the same time, when we sit in a worship service and we feel the hardness of our heart, or the power of unbelief, or the power of sin, being in a worship service is the best place we can be. because it's there where God is pleased to work and to break the hardened and to soften and to fill and to melt and to change and to bless by leading to Christ. It's in the worship service that the Father seeks worshipers to worship him in spirit and in truth. So that's why we may come to that service when our hearts are so far from the worship of Him, because there is where He changes hearts. And when there is that hunger for Him, and when there is that desire for Him, or when there is even that wonder and adoration of who He is, then that worship service is such a blessing, or not. Then you understand why that psalm sings, I was glad when they said unto me, let us go to the house of the Lord.