Leon Morris on Christian Worship

The basic idea in worship appears to be a proper recognition of the place of the creature visà-vis the Creator. Worship takes place when the worshipper ascribes “worthship” to the Being he worships. This is an inward state but it is normally expressed by means of appropriate ritual acts. As O. Hardman says in his History of Christian Worship, “Worship may be held to consist primarily in a creaturely awareness of God, and secondarily in the expression of aspiration towards God by means of religious exercises and moral obedience.Religious exercises alone may indicate religiosity rather than worship. Moral obedience alone is morality but not worship. But when a sense of supernatural Presence, however vague in its intellectual definition, finds expression in acts of reverent approach and of dutiful obedience, then there is worship.” Worship may be offered in private, but more usually the term refers to a corporate activity. It reminds us of an obligation we share with others.

Worship has a very important place in Christianity, as in other religions. But Christians assign a special place to the Bible and therefore Christian worship, as distinct from other types of worship, is worship carried out according to principles laid down in Holy Writ. Scripture never sets out to prescribe how worship is to be performed. But it has many references to worship and a consideration of these enables us to see some of the basic principles on which all true worship must be based. This paper aims at setting out some of these principles. Of course, it makes no claim to being exhaustive, and probably others would prefer a different selection from the wealth of scriptural teaching. All that is claimed is that the following points are important and we do well to direct our attention to them. Keep reading