No source is known for a compendium of ’12 reasons why I don’t wash (or go to church), though it sounds as though it must have come from a small boy. It goes like this:
1. I was forced to wash as a child
2. I’m not dirty
3. I’ll wait until I’m older, then I’ll be dirtier
4. There are too many brands of soap to choose from
5. People who wash are hypocrites
6. None of my friends bother to wash
7. Washing is boring
8. I’m too busy to wash
9. The water is always too cold
10. Washing is a soap manufactures’ conspiracy to make money
11. There are other ways of dealing with dirt, and I sometimes wash on special occasions
12. You have to get up too early.
None of this was, of course, true in first century Israel. Or at least, on the occasion of the Feast of the Passover, all males who lived within 15 miles of Jerusalem were required to go up to the city to celebrate the feast, and all Jews’ lifetime ambition was to be in Jerusalem at least once for Passover. In many ways it was the highlight of the Jewish religious year, when they remember (as required in the Pentateuch) to remember their forefathers’ deliverance from captivity in Egypt
Our reading this morning tells of when Jesus went up to Jerusalem for Passover and of how, when he entered the Temple he found the tables of the money-changers and the sellers of animals in the outer Court- the Court of the Gentiles. Immediately he was roused to anger. And if we would query the teaching of God’s wrath let’s remember this incident. There’s nothing to suggest that Jesus actually struck anyone, but his anger was such that, as other Gospel accounts tell us he overturned the tables of the money-changers. But what caused this anger? William Barclay suggests three reasons for this anger, and lying behind it all there was a more basic cause. But, it’s instructive to look at what Barclay says, and see what it has to say about our worship and our approach to worship.
Firstly, God’s house was being desecrated.
The artist Edward Seago tells of an occasion when he took two gypsy children on a visit to one of England’s cathedrals. If you’ve ever come across gypsy children you’ll know that they are wild, unruly children- hardly the sort you’d take into a cathedral. But, the moment they entered the cathedral they became unusually quiet and only on returning home did they resume their normal boisterous nature. A sense of reverence had touched their uninstructed and normally unruly natures.
Reverence is an essential element of worship, and one which is missing from so much of today’s church. Our worship can be formal; familiar words can be repeated without any feel for their true meaning. It can become very ordinary, very mundane. We can so easily become too ’pally with the deity’. I sometimes wonder how much we lose in the modern habit of sitting for prayers. When we address our Lord and Creator, is it not more appropriate to be on our knees? What have we lost by addressing God as "You" rather than ’Thou’?
Yes, our worship should reflect the fact that we are God’s children. Scriptures do tell us that we may approach God with boldness- but never with irreverence. And should we not come to worship with hearts and minds prepared, not rush in at 9.59 with a whole load of clutter and unfinished business. I know all about the pace of modern life, but doesn’t the Bible tell us to be still and know that I am God?
Secondly, Temple worship had become exclusive
To see what was happening here, we need to understand the Temple courts. The Temple was built with a series of courts. The outermost court, the Court of the Gentiles- will, this by name, anyone could enter. God intended that all nations should have the opportunity to worship him. Then came the Court of Women, The Court of the Israelites, then the Court of the Priests and at the very heart the Holy of Holies. Mark’s account gives us an insight into what upset and enraged Jesus, where he says that My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations. But you have made it a den of robbers (11:17)
How could any Gentile enter into an attitude of prayer or worship with all the commotion and clutter of the trading that took place in this their outer court; beyond which they were not permitted to go. They were effectively excluded! Is there a trace of anything in our worship, in our attitude to strangers and visitors which makes them feel excluded; that they’ve strayed unbidden into a closed clique? Does our mode of worship; maybe our plethora of books make them feel they have come somewhere which is like foreign country; where they feel out-on-a-limb. They feel like intruders!
Perhaps the biggest riddle we have to solve is to make our worship both reverent and heartfelt and yet user-friendly. It may feel like a ’Catch 22’, to have worship where we are open to the presence of God, yet we don’t alienate the outsider. If we get it right it can do both; in fact what will our worship achieve if the visitor or outsider is not exposed to the presence of God?. If we get it right, lively preaching of the Word and dynamic worship will do what will never be achieved if we merely take the easy option of watering our worship down, and finishing up with the Lowest Common Denominator.
Thirdly, Jesus acted to show that the whole paraphernalia of animal sacrifice was redundant
Surely, I can hear someone saying: ’Wasn’t the whole of the Old Covenant tied up with the sacrificial system?’ For the cleansing from sin-yes. But Jesus had come to show, and eventually effect by his death, that which no sacrificial system can do: to put man right with God. Some weeks ago, Paul reminded us some weeks ago, that when this penny drops, then we will want to worship; our hearts will overflow with worship; will want to be lost in God-adoring and God-honouring worship.
Probably the biggest single influence on the church at large and on its worship in the last generation or so has been the so-called ’charismatic movement’ which originated back around 1970 with people such as Michael Green and Michael Harper. Hardly a church the length and breadth of the land has been left untouched- notably in its worship: that includes us here at Christ Church.
The church re-discovered the Holy Spirit as a dynamic element of Christian living. The ’gifts of the Spirit’ were found anew. On the back of all this came a refreshing of the church’s worship. As Bryn Haworth put it at a ’New Wine’ conference some years ago, whereas we were accustomed to singing songs and hymns ’about’ God, now we had re-discovered the value and dynamic of singing songs and hymns ’to’ God. There has since been a plethora of song-writing; some very god, some mundane; some God-directed, some man-directed. Undoubtedly, the original charismatic renewal was of God. But over the years it has become perverted in many ways. There has been an increasing pre-occupation in some quarters with ’signs and wonders’; a desire for excitement and ’fleshly’ stimulation. Satan has got in on the act, and many people got hurt and spiritually wounded. I believe that history is now showing that ’Toronto’ was not a movement of God. Its origins were in occult practices and in Faith teaching, which is a perversion of the Gospel, and thus ’accursed’ (Gal 1:8) By-and-large it is now forgotten, and many sectors of the church have drawn back a step. With that tide, we here at Christ Church have drawn back.
It is sad this has been so. One of the gifts from the charismatic-led worship style was the rediscovery of the truth in the Scripture that ’the Lord inhabits the praises of his people’ When our hearts are first set upon God, good, charismatic worship can be a very powerful way into the very presence of God.
Yes, we still carry on with an admixture of modern hymns and choruses in our worship. But I do fear we have lost out on the way. Just recently our ’PIP’ Group were looking at the Vision and values statement on Execellence,and as we thought about excellence in worship, it was a unanimous opinion that there have been many occasions when modern choruses have been sung- but with what result? Many of these have words that are hard to fit into the music. More than one occasion we have had instrumental or organ accompaniment but no vocal lead, and the result has been, frankly, abysmal. What should have been an act of worship has become a struggle to fit word to music. What impression is created on the visitor? Still more, such worship is more like a lead balloon than something that is God-honouring, and something to lead us into his presence.
The 12th century abbess, Hildegaard of Bingen surely had it right when she said
Be not lax in celebrating. Be not lazy in the festive service of God. Be ablaze with enthusiasm
Let us be an alive, burning offering before the altar of God
Our other reading this morning was the 10 commandments. The initial reaction may be: ’What has that to do with worship?’ The quick answer is that worship is, or should be, an integral part of our lives. If our worship is watertight from the rest we will quickly find ourselves at the end of Jesus’ wrath, as he displayed in the Temple, where the authorities thought commerce and worship could sit cheek-by-jowl. We are currently on these Sunday mornings looking at ’discipleship’, and true worship is a true part of true discipleship.
The first four of the Commandments have to do with our conduct directly vis-�-vis God. Verse 1 of Exodus 17, and before giving the law, God reminds his people:
I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
Passover was the time, as we’ve thought, when God did this. As we come to our main act of worship, we remind ourselves that in Jesus Christ, God brought us out of slavery to sin, out of the world. How much more, therefore, should we have no other gods before him (v2). God calls for a purity of worship. No other ’god’ should stand in his place. There must be no form of idolatry- and that is not to do with statues, of which we have none, but of anything we would worship in place of God himself. So if we put the form of worship, the layout of our building before God, then we are worshipping an idol. These things are important, but in second place.
And this is where we come to the underlying principle of Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple. Before Passover, the Jews were required to get rid of all leaven, all yeast. That was but symbolic. Wherever yeast occurs in the Bible, it is as a symbol of sin. Just as yeast puffs up, so does sin: it puffs up the heart of man, and God gets squeezed out. Jesus inner intent was in ridding the Temple not just of outer corruption but of the yeast or leaven of sin. How much more, as we come to out Christian ’Passover’, the Holy Communion should we not search out and find cleansing from all sin. I fear we may easily go through a form of confession without the inner heart being touched. As we prepare for confession- and that preparation should not necessarily be just in church, let us not hasten; let us take time to allow the Holy Spirit search our hearts out
The other commandments relate to our conduct with other people. But: true worship should change us: we thought of that some weeks ago. But true worship should cause us to live lives that honour God. If we come here and give Him honour for 60-90 minutes on Sunday morning and then live God-dishonouring lives we shall live a lie. Our worship will become unreal; so too will our lives. When worship and discipleship are part-and parcel, then both are enriched and God is honoured.
Let me close on the subject of worship in God’s Word: Psalm 29:2
Worship the Lord in the splendour of holiness
