If I were an outsider looking at the life of most churches, I would conclude that Sunday morning “worship service” was the most important thing we do. In one sense I live in pragmatic fear of saying anything about this because I know that most hassles in churches arise from disagreeing with someone’s view of what goes on in that time. Churches have split over what to sing and how we sing it during the “worship service” and I’m not even talking about the instrumental music question. We have split about whether we stand up or sit down … about whether there are pews or chairs, one song leader or a group, carpet of wood floors, four part of one part harmony, children’s church or not. And the list goes on.
If there is a more contentious battleground, I have yet to see it. You would think there are whole chapters in the New Testament speaking of worship services, how to leader prayer, singing four part harmony, how to conduct the Communion (beyond the emblems and prayers), how long to preach, offering invitations along with invitation songs and how to make announcements. Despite all of what is said and done in the name of these things, do you know how many times these terms are mentioned in the New Testament. Not once. I may be wrong. You might find one or two verses that allude to them but you will never find a structural description of this time of worship in the New Testament.
In my mind that leads to many questions but I will only focus on one in this section. What was a gathering for worship like in past church 33 to 65 AD? The following is not an exhaustive study of this question but it is meant to give us a reasonably clear picture of a gathering of our brethren in the early church. There is one other note. The word, worship, is never used in the New Testament to describe any gathering of Christians. Is that significant? I don’t think so except to observe that even our language about this subject isn’t even biblical in its origin.
It is past church, first century. Your friend has invited to come with him to hear about Jesus. You don’t know why you go, but you do. When you arrive you start to notice some things.
Unlike other religions you are aware of, you do not go to a temple or holy place. You go to Peter’s place. There appears to be a lot of encouraging going on in the group before anything else happens. After a while they begin to sing. The songs sound like chants. They aren’t the best singers you have heard (musically) but they sure seem to enjoy it. Their hearts seemed to soar as they sing of God and Jesus. They almost seem to be teaching other. This happened to be a Sunday evening after you had got home from work. They began to have a ceremonial meal that they said was in memory of Jesus. You didn’t understand it but they spoke of his body and his blood. You have so many questions. One of the men starts to teach and starts reading a letter from someone they call an apostle. You don’t catch the name exactly. It sounds like Paul.
The teaching is interesting and is answering some of your questions. It seems to always focus on this Jesus who they say was resurrected from the dead. After a while someone starts to pray with his hands raised and everyone listens intently and they all say “amen” at the end. There are many languages spoken but no matter which one is used there always seems to be someone to translate so we all understand what is being said. Someone tells of a famine someone and that the “brethren” need some help. They gather a collection on money and commission someone to the task of delivering it. Then, just when you think everything is coming to an end someone else gets up and starts teaching. It seems to you that it is going to go until midnight. Your mind wanders a little from the teaching and you begin to notice that this is a varied bunch of people. There are slaves, women, wealthy, poor, Gentile, Jew, Greeks and even some Romans. The teacher seems to be preaching now and speaks of God’s love for the whole world. You have never heard of such a thing.
You ask your friend, as the meeting appears to be ending (although no one seems to be leaving), “What is the name of this group?” He tells you they wear only one name, Jesus. He says that they are called many names. Sometimes, Christians. Sometimes the church of God. Sometimes, disciples. Sometimes the way. It all seems a little vague and unorganized to you.
Do you think you would feel at home in the first century church meetings? I don’t know if I would. I like having an order of worship, the songs on the screen in shaped notes, a neat twenty-five minute lesson with a designated time for a “response”, four part harmony in the singing and the formality. That first century church sounds so different to the one I go to. In fact they never speak of going to church. What’s with that? My tongue is a bit in my cheek but I genuinely feel I would feel out of place in their assemblies. I wouldn’t be out of place because I would be with my brothers and sisters in Christ but I would feel out of place because of my unfamiliarity with their culture. Like when I went to an African American church recently. Boy, they sure did things differently to what I was used to. There wasn’t anything wrong with the differences. The eternal things were the same. The cultural things are the different things.
I know we joke about Paul using the King James Version. But for some this thinking is normal. Someone called this “present mindedness”. It is reading our present experiences into accounts of the past and thus coloring our view of the past. When it is a joke it is pretty funny. When it’s not a joke it is sad. We have to guard against reading into the accounts of the first century church our twenty-first century experience. Let the documents from the past speak for themselves. I know it makes us feel uncomfortable but that probably is not a bad thing for you and me.
All this has an extraordinary significance when we consider what church will be like. The significance is simply this. Just as our present church assemblies are different from past church assemblies in cultural ways, future assemblies will be different also. They will not differ in the eternal components but they certainly will differ in the cultural ones.
More on this in my small book, Future Church, which is on my website.
