The Preparation of Worship!

As I drive down the road from time to time it is interesting to notice the signs on church properties. One I keep seeing is an additional service being added often times called a “Contemporary Service.” I am assuming it is an effort to make the church service more profitable to a younger audience. Now I don’t want to go into the dangers I see in our effects at a better church service as we fragment our churches but I simply want to address the effort for better church services.

We all want better church services. We all want to leave a service at church and say, “Wow!” We all want church services that leave us with a desire to return. So when I read Nehemiah 8, I could not help but be drawn in to this fantastic church service they had. And I want to, over the next few days, make some comments about this great church service that might be integrated into our services to make them great.

As I read about this church service, I could not help but notice before worship began, there were preparations that were put in motion so that this great service could happen. We have many today who are hostile toward worship preparations instead wanting things to be spontaneous. But clearly here in Nehemiah 8 preparations were made.

There was a Prepared Preacher. Ezra brought the law to the people. No doubt he was well versed in the law. Certainly, this was not the first time he had read the law. But when he stood before the people and read the law, he had prepared himself for the task. The great need of our day is for men of God to submerge themselves in prayer and the study of God’s Word. The preacher should labor for the correct understanding of God’s Word so that he may properly expound it and apply it to the audience. We have far too many preachers who depend on books like, “52 Snappy Sermon Starters” and the like instead of doing the hard work of exegesis and exposition. Worship fails to happen many times simply because the preacher has failed to prepare himself and the word he will bring.

There was a Prepared People. The people gathered themselves as one to hear the Word. There must be the gathering of the people who are motivated to come and hear the Word. So many people come to church out of habit or out of guilt. We need people to want to come so that they may hear the Word of the Lord. Their desire was centered upon God. They were not coming to be seen or coming to see their friends or to hear their favorite music style but coming to hear from God. Their hearts were prepared for His Word!

There was a Prepared Place. Nehemiah says that Ezra stood on a wooden platform that was made for that purpose. This pulpit was made for the prepared preacher to read the word to a prepared people. That was its only purpose. It was not to be used for political purposes. It was not to be used for entertainment purposes. It was not to be used to deliver philosophical ideas. It was for the reading and expounding of the Word of God. If it is His house should we not talk about Him? Who cares who is playing football or what is on television? What God says is of vital importance.

This service was a great service because there were preparations made for it greatness.

"Bad Christians"

As John Calvin was re-called to the pastorate in Geneva, he was greatly concerned about the lives of the church members there. Here is a quote from his address to them as he considered once again assuming the position of pastor:

“I consider the principal enemies of the Gospel to be, not the pontiff of Rome, nor heretics, nor seducers, nor tyrants, but bad Christians.”

What was Calvin’s problem in the mid 1500’s is still the problem today. We think that the threat to the Gospel and to Christianity comes from the Roman Catholic church or maybe the Jehovah Witnesses or the Mormons or maybe Islam. But they are not the primary enemies of the Gospel. The enemy is not outside the church but firmly fixed inside it. It is those who profess to be Christ-like and then evidence by their life anything but Christ-likeness that are real enemies. It is those who are “Christian” in word only and not in deed.

More people will be dissuaded and disillusioned about Christianity by those who profess a relationship with Christ and then that relationship involves no commitment or change on their part. Yes, they claim Christ as their Savior but then this Savior gets only a small portion of their attention. Usually, when there is nothing else going on or nothing else to do.

Yes, I agree! I shout a loud, Amen! The biggest problem the church faces today, in sharing the Gospel to the unconverted, is “bad Christians.” They are those who profess knowledge but are void of a true relationship with Christ. These “bad Christians” deceive themselves and discourage others. The unconverted have for far too long seen professing Christians who have the same appetites as they do, go to the same places they do, speak the same language as they do, dress the same way they do, and are wrapped up in materialism and pleasure to the same extent as they are. There is no difference between the professor and the unconverted.

May God give us the boldness to deal with this mortal enemy to the Gospel. And may He help us, who have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit, live lives worthy of our high calling.