LITURGY AND THE GOSPEL
BY RICH LUSK
Worship is a controversial topic among Christians in our day. Strong,
passionately held convictions often clash over even the minutiae of how we
should worship God. Considering the centrality of gathered worship in the
Scriptures, and the current fragmentation of the church, this is probably
inevitable in our day. At TPC, we strive to be a worship-centered church because
we strive to be a God-centered church. But why do we worship God the way we
do?
Understanding the liturgy (our order of worship) is critical. The liturgy tells a
story – the story of the gospel. Every time God gathers His family for worship
He reenacts the glorious drama of His work of redeeming a community of
sinners to be his treasured possession. Consider the pattern we follow each
Lord’s Day:
We are sinners, and so our first act of obedience in worship is to confess our sin.
Our sin excludes us from God’s sanctuary. Under the Old Covenant,
worshippers who brought animal sacrifices to the temple would lay their hands
on the head of the animal and confess their sins before drawing near to God
(Leviticus 1:4, 4:4). Similarly, Old Covenant priests had to wash themselves
every time they approached God in the temple (Exodus 30:20-21). In the New
Covenant, all believers form God’s royal priesthood (1 Peter 2:5). But before we
can offer Him acceptable sacrifices of praise, we must be cleansed. Worship
begins with the sacrifice of a broken and contrite heart (Psalm 51:17, Isaiah 66:2),
rejecting all confidence in the flesh (Philippians 3:4). Before we enter God’s
house, we have to wipe our feet on the welcome mat.
Having confessed our sin, God grants us forgiveness and accepts us into his
presence. He declares this forgiveness to believers through His representative,
the pastor. We are assured through this authoritative declaration that fellowship
with our Father has been restored and as His children we may enter His
sanctuary. It is important to understand that New Covenant worship takes place
in the heavenly sanctuary, the Holy of Holies. When we speak of worship as
“heaven on earth” we are not simply using a metaphor. In a real, though
mysterious sense, the worshipping congregation has been drawn up into the
heavenly realms. In worship, we come “to the heavenly Jerusalem, to an
innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the
firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of
just men made perfect, to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the
blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel” (Hebrews 12:22-
24). There’s more to worship than meets the eye! In the Old Covenant, only the1 of 3
