I want to focus in this article on the subject of true worship. I do so for I am greatly concerned that what increasingly passes for worship in the contemporary church is not true worship but false worship. Let us look then at what the psalmist has to teach us about true worship.

Firstly let us recognise that true worship is Theocentric. True worship is always God-centred and God-focused: “I will praise thee ... before the gods will I sing praise unto thee”. It has God, not self or man generally as its object. “I will praise thee”, that is, the triune God – one God in three glorious persons; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Our chief aim is to glorify God; to exalt His name and that includes all that His name constitutes – all His glorious attributes.

The fourth question of the Shorter Catechism asks what is God and gives the response: God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth’. We must praise Him accordingly. We must praise Him for who He is. We must praise Him for what He has done and continues to do and will do as the One who alone is sovereign.

We must praise Him and magnify His grace, love and mercy. We must praise Him with a due regard for His infinite and awesome transcendence: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come” (Rev.4:8). We must worship therefore with a due sense of godly fear which is reverence and awe for we worship the one, true and living God (Heb.12:22-29).

We must also worship God however with a due sense of His immanence, that is of His nearness and favour toward us. And therefore there must always be this balance. There must be intimacy for our relationship to Him must be a personal and filial one. Only the believer can truly worship God. There must be what the Puritans described as experiential faith. God has not only revealed Himself to us but He has drawn near to us. He has chosen, called and saved us for this very purpose. Only in Christ can we “draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water” (Heb 10:22).

True worship emanates from the heart. We must be able to say along with the psalmist: “I will praise thee with my whole heart”. The heart in the Bible refers to the very centre of our being: it speaks to us of our inner man; of the intellect, affections, emotions, will and so on. We must worship God with our whole hearts; that is with our mind, will, feelings and emotions. Let us understand however that true worship is a far cry from the ecstatic, sensual and sentimental worship advocated by many today.

God’s word says: “ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart” (Jer 29:13). “...the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us” (Rom 5:5b). We must worship the Lord with all our heart; not half-heartedly or with divided loyalties and therein lies the problem with so much modern worship. It is man-centred instead of God centred! I’m not referring to the forms of worship here but the focus of our worship. You see, too many people start with the wrong focus: they ask does this please me; does this satisfy me; do I enjoy this; what do I get out of this; does this correspond to what I think or feel worship should be?

Or alternatively, in our seeker friendly age, they might ask will this attract the unbeliever; what will the so-called seeker get out of this? What will they understand by this; will this make and keep him or her happy. The fundamental problem with this approach is that it is wholly unbiblical for it has as its focus and locus man and his preferences and perceived needs instead of the Lord God.

True worship by contrast is always Theocentric rather than anthropocentric. We must continue to stand with our Reformed forefathers and say soli Deo Gloria – to God alone be the glory. Any other sort of worship is not true worship but instead it is idolatry: “before the gods will I sing praise unto thee”.

Just as Israel was surrounded by no end of false religions and all manner of weird and wonderful religious practices so are we. Just as there was always a degree of pressure to conform to the ways of the world and the prevailing culture of the surrounding nations so today we constantly face the same challenges and pressures. Let us not be found wanting. Sola scriptura, not sola cultura must be our cry. The contemporary church’s clamour for relevance which is particularly manifest in its worship practices is only making her an irrelevance! She appears to ignore God’s word which says that the friendship of the world is enmity with God. The psalmist by contrast remains steadfast in his God-given, God-centred and God-focused worship and so must we. Majority or popular opinion does not determine what is right; neither do notions and feelings or what we perceive the desires and needs of others might be. As soon as we are asking the question what might appeal to the world we have lost sight of the truth that our worship must be Theocentric regardless of what others might say to the contrary.

Secondly true worship is Christocentric. “I will worship toward thy holy temple”. In the Old Testament times the Temple was a symbol of God’s presence with His people. It was there that He chose to make His abode and where the Shekinah glory was manifest. The Temple was the place where the children of Israel met with God; it was the place where reconciliation was sought by penitent sinners; it was the place where prayers and intercessions were made to God.

It was also, the place where unity was to be found – all the tribes had to come up to the Temple. Thus even in exile Daniel prayed three times a day facing the Temple: “Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went into his house; and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed, and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime” (Dan 6:10). However as the Lord Jesus makes all too clear, the Temple was merely a type of which He is the antitype, reality and fulfilment. “Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days? But he spake of the temple of his body” (Jn 2:19-21).

God has chosen to make His presence truly known in Jesus Christ: He is Immanuel – God with us. He is the brightness of His glory, the express image of His person. Only in Christ are we reconciled to God for He is the only Saviour of sinners – He alone made atonement for our sins; He alone propitiated the divine wrath against sinners; He only expiated our sin. Therefore only in Christ do we have peace with God; only in Christ can we draw near to God; only in Christ do we have access to God for He alone is our Advocate and Intercessor with the Father. Only in Christ do we have access into the holy of holies and to the throne of grace; only in Christ are we heirs of all God’s promises; only in Christ do have light, life and salvation; only in Jesus Christ is true church unity to be found – and that necessitates believing in and following the whole Christ as Lord and Saviour, as His people’s Prophet, Priest and King. And so we must worship the Father through the Son – our worship must be Christocentric – for out of Christ there is no true worship.

Thirdly true worship is the good fruit of special revelation: “and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth”. Only the believer can truly say “I will praise thee with my whole heart: before the gods will I sing praise unto thee. I will worship toward thy holy temple”. For his faith in God is a living reality; he has a personal relationship with God and the Lord is His chief desire and delight. Why, because God has revealed Himself to him by His word and Spirit.

Only the person who is born again can truly and meaningfully say I will praise thee. Man is born naturally predisposed against God and the things of God. We are born dead to God. The unregenerate man is at enmity with God and hence he needs a new heart and a new spirit. And these are given in the Covenant of Grace:

A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them. And ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God. Ezekiel 36:26-28

And therefore only the recipients of special revelation can worship God aright. Thus the psalmist says: “and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth”. God’s lovingkind­ness speaks to us of His grace, love and mercy; it speaks to us of His favour – undeserved, unmerited as it is for unworthy, hell deserving sinners.

All that we have is from God and it is only those who are recipients of sovereign, saving grace who can truly praise Him aright. By contrast “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Cor 2:14).

Fourthly and finally true worship is fashioned and regulated by the word of God: “for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name”. Let us confess that we cannot truly know God and know His will apart from His word. It must come first for it determines all else. Natural revelation (Creation, Providence, Conscience, Common Grace and such like) is too difficult a map to read in order to reveal God to us and what duty God requires of us.

Even in Paradise, in a state of innocence, man needed the word and thus how much more so we sinners, without which we must ever grope in the dark concerning the doctrine of God, man, salvation and all attendant doctrines. And we are reminded of this truth here in relation to true worship which must be both fashioned and regulated by the word of truth. Thus we Reformed Christians speak of the Regulative Principle of worship in relation to how we worship – in the way mandated by God in His word.

But even more than this it is Holy Scripture that truly reveals the One whom we are to worship. The word reveals God’s glorious attributes, His amazing grace in saving rebels and instructs us in all things pertaining to faith, practice and life. It is for this very reason that the doctrine of Holy Scripture comes first in the Westminster Confession of Faith. It must come first for God has chosen it to be so. Without it we cannot know, worship and serve God aright – “thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name”. Are we true worshippers of God? Is our worship Theocentric? Is it Christocentric? Are we recipients of His amazing grace? Is our worship regulated by the word of truth; that word which makes us wise unto salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. That word which is given by – “inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Tim 3:16-17). It must be to the praise and glory of God alone.