Wednesday, May 26, 2004

‘Lively’ church services are Biblical

By JOHN HATCHER
Religion Columnist

Buckle your seat belts or you may just get shot out of your spiritual seats.

If I were to ask you if you believe the Bible, most of you would answer in the positive. If I were to ask you if you believed in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, you would more than likely say, “Yes.”

However, our actions speak louder than our silent beliefs. St. Francis of Assisi once said that we were to go around preaching the Gospel and only use words if necessary. St. James of the New Testament emphatically proclaimed that faith without works is a dead faith.

Now, some more questions. Do you clap your hands in the worship of the one and true and Almighty God? You know, clapping. It’s that thing we do to demonstrated approbation and honor and to give glory. Do you clap your hands in worship? If you can’t answer “yes,” then your worship is un-Biblical. The mandate is found in Psalm 47:1 - “O clap your hands, all peoples; shout to God with a voice of joy.” I know you clap your hands at the football, basketball, and baseball games and nowhere is it written in the program to clap your hands. But in the eternal program of life, it’s a plain as the nose on your face: clap to God for joy.

I hear your gears grinding an appropriate comeback. And about the only decent comeback with which you can come back is this: we don’t do it that way in our church. Then, who has got it right: the Bible or your church?

In the same verse it declares that we are to “shout to God with the voice of joy.” The word “shout” can be traced to its Hebrew roots which tell us it means to raise a cry. It was used as a battle cry. And in every instance, it’s a loud cry. Now, what happens in your church every Sunday morning? Do you conduct a funeral or just attend a funeral or are you participating in Biblical worship? Biblical worship involves clapping and shouting.

Most of our mainline denominational churches have swallowed a line — hook and sinker — that to clap and to shout is far too provincial. That’s the kind of stuff they do in the lower socio-economic churches. That’s not for refined, Buckhead shopping Christians. So, they opt for a funeral service Sunday after Sunday.

Well, I’ve gone this far. Might as well go all the way. The Bible tells us clearly in Psalm 149:3,4 - “Let them (the congregation) praise him with dancing. Let them sing praises to Him with timbrel and lyre. For the Lord takes pleasure in his people.” To get around this clear mandate from the Bible that we say we believe, we do two things. First, we assert that all those spiritual citations are from the Old Testament and we are a New Testament church. That logic will permit us to throw out the Ten Commandments found only in entirety in the Old Testament. That argument won’t wash.

The second thing we do to accommodate the mandate to dance as a part of our praise and adoration to God, we organize dance troupes within the church. In much the same way as we expect the pastor vicariously to live the Christian life for us, we turn to the dance troupe to do our dancing. Yet, a dance troupe can no longer take your place in dancing before the Lord as the preacher can no in no way get you into heaven.

This funeral thing we do Sunday after Sunday is unscriptural and un-Godly, and makes us look like a bunch of fools in the presence of the Almighty God who seeks his people to worship him with all their hearts, minds, souls, and strengths.

Get honest. Is your church a funeral parlor or a fountain head of praise and adoration? You say, “It’s not our tradition to shout, clap, and praise the Lord.” I suggest that you begin rehearsing now what you will be expected to do for eternity. The last book of the Bible gives us a glimpse of what heaven will be like: “After these things I heard something like a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven saying, ‘Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to the Lamb”” (Revelation 10:1).

When was the last time you shouted “hallelujah” in church? If never, then you are unbiblical. No two ways about it. You are not attending the church of the Almighty, resurrected King of kings and Lord of lords. You’re attending another funeral.

I hear your cerebral muscles flexing again. You are remembering that quote from Psalm 46:10 that says, “Be still and know that I am God.” That verse was not for the church but for the heathens who were in an uproar. God tells them to sit down and think through some things. But, to his people, God directs, “Shout with the voice of salvation.”

I’ve got a hunch. More than a hunch. If churches would stop copying their style and demeanor after funeral homes, more people would show up. After all, everybody likes a party. Let’s party this Sunday. Shout hallelujah and do a dance and liven up the place.

John Hatcher is pastor of Outreach International Center, 1091 South Jeff Davis Drive, Fayetteville, Georgia 30215. 770-719-0303