Reading the Word of God publicly to the congregation is the duty of those especially called as ministers of the Word.” …Reading the Scriptures ‘publicly to the congregation’ is a part of conducting the public worship of God, and therefore it is . . . Continue reading →
Worship
Heidelcast 122: Rise, Make For Us Gods (With Chris Gordon)
This past Lord’s Day morning we began the new week by hearing a sermon, an exposition of God’s Word and a proclamation of the law and the gospel. In our congregation we heard a sermon from the first part of Exodus 32. . . . Continue reading →
New: Mini Psalter 2.0
What I find in my mailbox at work is rarely delightful but I was delighted to get the mail today. The good folks at Crown and Covenant sent me a copy of their Mini Psalter 2.0. It’s personalized. It’s well bound. Best . . . Continue reading →
Of Levites, Sacrificial Blood, Burnt Offerings, And Musical Instruments In Worship
Then Hezekiah the king rose early and gathered the officials of the city and went up to the house of Yahweh. And they brought seven bulls, seven rams, seven lambs, and seven male goats for a sin offering for the kingdom and . . . Continue reading →
An Appreciation Of Messrs Murray And Young On The Rule Of Worship
When we think about John Murray we might think first of his defense of the biblical doctrine of The Imputation of Adam’s Sin or we might think of his judicious application of Scripture in Principles of Conduct. Others might think of Mr . . . Continue reading →
The 1946 OPC Minority Report On The Regulative Principle And Songs In Worship
Minority Report of the Committee on Song in the Public Worship of God Submitted to the Fourteenth General Assembly of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.The above-mentioned committee presented to the Thirteenth General Assembly a report bearing upon the question of the regulative principle . . . Continue reading →
Gillespie: Liberty Is More In The Abstaining Than The Using Of Things Indifferent
Chrysostom, speaking of such has are subject to bishops, says, it is in their power to obey or not. Liberty in things indifferent, says Amandus Polanus, is that through which Christians are free in use of or abstinence from indifferent things. Calvin, . . . Continue reading →
Knox On The Regulative Principle
All worshipping, honoring or service invented by the brain of man in the religion of God, without his own express commandment, is idolatry. The mass is invented by the brain of man without any commandment of God: Therefore it is idolatry. —John . . . Continue reading →
What The Heidelberg Liturgy Teaches Us About Grace, Faith, And Sanctification
The medievals had a saying: the law of praying is the law of believing (lex orandi, lex credendi). By it they meant to say that what we do in worship affects our theology. If you want to change the theology of the future . . . Continue reading →
William Perkins On Will Worship
VI. Will-worship, when God is worshipped with a naked and bare good intention, not warranted by the word of God (Col. 2:23; 1 Sam 13:9,10, 13).1 Hitherto may we add Popish superstitions in sacrifices, meats, holidays, apparel, temporary and bead-ridden prayers,2 indulgences, . . . Continue reading →
Bay Psalm Book On Uninspired Versus Inspired Songs
…must the ordinary gifts of an private man quench the Spirit still speaking to us by the extraordinary gifts of his servant David? —Preface of The Bay Psalm Book (1640) (HT: Bob Godfrey)
The Decline Of Psalmody In The Netherlands: Anabaptists, Remonstrants, And The State Church
In the Roman Catholic church the choir sings and the congregation was silent. Calvin also introduced singing by the congregation, and collected for it a bundle of Psalms of Clement Marot and Beza. He had the tunes composed by Louis Bourgois and . . . Continue reading →
In Depth Of Spirituality The Psalms Excel The Hymns
The Christian Reformed Church holds it as one of its distinctive principles that the psalms are to be used in public worship as the chief manual of praise. There is divine authority for this use of the psalms, as shown by 1 . . . Continue reading →
The Lord’s Day In Eclipse
The earliest reason given for celebrating Sunday is that it is the day of the resurrection (Ep. of Barnabas, 15.9), but in the Jewish understanding of the week the first day commemorated creation and this idea was taken over even by Gentile . . . Continue reading →
Overturning The Reformation In 1617–18
The government of the Scottish Church was thus completely subverted in its external aspect. The crown was now determined to see whether with equal ease it was possible to introduce the ceremonies of the English Church. James ordered repairs to be made . . . Continue reading →
The Difference Between What We Know And What We Think We Know
…much of what is commonly written on the history and development of the western liturgy is dependent upon reconstructions…. —D. M. Hope, “Liturgical Books” in Cheslyn Jones, Geoffrey Wainwright, and Edward Yarnold, ed. The Study of Liturgy (NY: OUP, 1978), 66.
The Constantinian Turn Was Definitive
The conversion of Constantine marks a watershed in the patristic period. In the second and third centuries the Church was a relatively private community, suffering from time to time the threats and the actuality of imperial persecution and looking for the end . . . Continue reading →
Some Anglican Practices To Which The English Reformed Objected In 1603
In the Church service: that the cross in baptism, interrogatories ministered to infants, confirmation, as superfluous, may be taken away; baptism not to be ministered by women, and so explained; the cap and surplice not urged; that examination may go before the . . . Continue reading →
How We Lost The Psalms
In the course of time the constraint of Calvin’s ideals has gradually come to be less felt in the worship of the Reformed Churches. A modification of view as to the relations of art and worship has permitted the harmonization of congregational . . . Continue reading →
Reformed Psalmody: Inspired Songs To The Exclusion Of Uninspired Songs
But the Calvinistic Psalm took its authority and its appropriateness from its divine inspiration. It must be Holy Scripture, first of all; and then it became metrical merely to facilitate its congregational rendering. Calvin had determined to make the Psalter the praise . . . Continue reading →