What To Do With the Joy That Wells Up Within?

Responding to the Gospel with God's Word

Aimee Byrd at Housewife Theologian asks a great question about what to do with ourselves after a baptism. How do you celebrate this moment? Let me ask you readers, do you clap in your church after a baptism? Our church congregation doesn’t. . . . Continue reading →

How Historic Reformed Worship Is Multicultural

Racial division is reality, and it’s a tragic reality, when it isn’t necessitated by language barriers. During the Apostolic era, Jews and Gentiles joined hands and worshiped alongside one another. The cultural gulf that had separated them was every bit as extreme . . . Continue reading →

God Cares How We Worship

Furthermore, Protestants are not concerned with the manner, or how, of worship, with the forms and circumstances of public praise, simply for their own sake, but for the sake of the object and aim of worship. In other words, Protestants understand that . . . Continue reading →

1920s Arguments Over Absolution In The CRCs (2)

Perhaps a few words regarding the context of this service of reconciliation will not be amiss…. Note first of all that it follows the opening service. In this service the Lord and His people greet each other. After the greeting comes the . . . Continue reading →

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 →

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.

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 →

Killing Worship (1)

Years ago I was challenged by a churchgoer that I have no right to critique another church’s worship unless I have personally attended and witnessed for myself what is happening. I took this challenge and visited the local evangelical church in which . . . Continue reading →

The Antecedent To Worship

We all agree there should be truth in worship. But shouldn’t worship also be in truth? There’s a big difference between having truth in worship and worshipping in truth. Having truth in worship means you got some Bible in there. But worshiping . . . Continue reading →

Review: Ryan M. Kelly, Calls to Worship, Invocations, and Benedictions

The first question of the Westminster Shorter Catechism asks, “What is man’s chief end?” The answer, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.” I know, you know the answer already. You have heard it innumerable times. But . . . Continue reading →