Worship

Bowing down

The Bible's words for worship come from a posture. The psalmist calls, "O come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD our Maker" (Psalm 95:6), and the New Testament's proskuneō (προσκυνέω) first meant to bow low. Worship is the creature bowing before the Creator, and its glory belongs to God alone. Jesus answered the tempter with the words "Worship the Lord your God and serve Him only" (Matthew 4:10), and the worshippers of heaven sing, "Worthy are You, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power" (Revelation 4:11).

Jesus told the Samaritan woman that worship is not bound to any mountain:

But a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father is seeking such as these to worship Him. God is Spirit, and His worshipers must worship Him in spirit and in truth.

John 4:23-24

Matthew Henry comments: "The spirit or the soul of man, as influenced by the Holy Spirit, must worship God, and have communion with him" Matthew Henry. Nor is worship confined to an hour on Sunday. Paul urges believers to offer their bodies as living sacrifices, "which is your spiritual service of worship" (Romans 12:1). The word there, latreia (λατρεία), means service, so that the whole of life, at work and at home, becomes worship.

How the church has worshipped

The first believers "devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer" (Acts 2:42). Around 155 Justin Martyr describes Christians gathering on Sunday to read the memoirs of the apostles and the writings of the prophets, to hear the president's exhortation, to pray together, and to give thanks over bread and wine Justin Martyr, First Apology 67. Word, prayer, song and sacrament have been the frame of the church's worship ever since. The Westminster Shorter Catechism even states the purpose of human life in terms of worship:

Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him for ever.

Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q. 1

In 787 the Second Council of Nicaea distinguished the worship given to God alone from the honour shown to holy images Second Council of Nicaea, Definition on the Holy Images; the distinction remains a key to Orthodox and Catholic worship today.

Where the traditions differ

All traditions agree that worship belongs to the one triune God, and that we come to the Father through the Son in the Spirit. But worship takes different shapes. The Orthodox, Catholic, Anglican and Lutheran churches worship liturgically, with prayers refined over centuries, set readings and the church year, and place the Eucharist at the centre. Many Reformed and Presbyterian churches put the reading and preaching of the word at the heart of worship and follow the regulative principle, that only what God commands in Scripture belongs in worship. Lutherans and Anglicans follow the normative principle, that what Scripture does not forbid and agrees with the word may be used for edification. Many Baptist, Pentecostal and free churches are less bound to a set order and prize heartfelt prayer and praise, and Pentecostals look for the gifts of the Spirit in worship.

The Orthodox and Catholic churches distinguish the worship due to God alone from the veneration of saints and icons, and practise both; Protestants generally do not accept praying to saints or venerating images. Every tradition seeks to obey the word that "everything must be done in a proper and orderly manner" (1 Corinthians 14:40). See the lesson Worship and prayer and What is worship?