Worship Helps Biblical Faith Mature into Genuine Discipleship
mmalanga | June 26, 2008Although not fully consistent in the practice I am often found reading a book. It is equally the case that when reading a book I am usually equipped with a yellow highlighter, a red pencil and a mechanical pencil. Such equipment should clue you into the fact that the books I read are neither novels nor are they to be found on the bestseller lists of most major newspapers. One such book that is in the early stages of being highlighted, marked and underlined is Above All Earthly Powers by David F. Wells. Having read his previous works on a similar theme (No Place for the Truth, God in the Wasteland, and Losing Our Virtue) I was prepared to be challenged. I was not disappointed.
Those of us in pastoral ministry who are serious about piercing this present post-modern darkness would do well to mind Dr. Wells’ trenchant observations regarding on the state of the evangelical church in America. One observation in particular which I have underlined, and has found its way into more than one sermon, is the following: “It is very easy to build churches in which seekers congregate; it is very hard to build churches in which biblical faith is maturing into genuine discipleship,” (Above All Earthly Powers, page 119, italics mine).
One way in which biblical faith can mature into genuine discipleship is through worship. Seekers tend to congregate in churches where contemporary worship is the rule. More often than not this format employs a musical style in which just about any instrument is permissible except an organ. And just as typically the songs which are sung tend to be theologically shallow, embarrassingly self-centered and borderline Gnostic. Now, before you do think this is turning into a Reformed rant, I am the pastor of a church in which contemporary worship is the predominant style. Therefore this is a subject about which I am both acutely familiar as well as particularly sensitive. No pastor, including me—especially me—wants to preside over a congregation in which biblical faith fails to mature into genuine discipleship. No pastor wants to preside over a congregation with a faith that is “a mile wide and an inch deep.”
Good worship needs to be supported by good preaching. For now I will leave the discussion about good preaching for another post. For this post I want to exhort us to consider the importance of worship as it pertains to biblical faith maturing into genuine discipleship. Covenant is not a church in which seekers congregate. While we are a friendly bunch and welcome seekers, we do not tailor our services to seekers. Yet we are growing. I attribute our growth to the fact that as serious students of the Word every member is seeking to walk by the Spirit so as to be led by the Spirit in the fervent hope that our biblical faith will mature into genuine discipleship. We are also a worshiping church. While we do not have an organ, we are blessed to have a growing guild of talented musicians, songwriters, singers and worship leaders. More importantly they are worshipers. They lead us in singing old hymns—some updated, some as originally written. They lead us in singing contemporary songs but ones with lyrics like liquid bread. They inspire me to listen actively to worship music, to read lyrics and highlight artists with the same tenacity with which I highlight and underline the books I read.
There is a guild of Christian artists which has developed a style of worship that builds biblical faith so that it can mature into genuine discipleship. They are called Indelible Grace Music and they first came to my attention as “bumper” music which I heard coming out of commercial break while listening to Dr. Michael Horton’s program The White Horse Inn (www.whitehorseinn.org). Indelible Grace Music has a website, www.igracemusic.com which is worth visiting and when you do be sure to click on the “Listen to the Sound Clips” link. I further recommend you listen to Indelible Grace V, Wake Thy Slumbering Children, but all five CDs are worth your attention. The song that compelled me to go to their website is Hear Our Prayer (track 8 on IG V). You have to listen to it.
Imagine my delight, therefore, when I discovered that the lyrics to Hear Our Prayer are adapted from an old hymn written by Robert Grant, circa 1815. The lyrics of the hymn are below. They are updated, as is the music in the recording by Indelible Grace, but the power is there just the same.
Savior, When in Dust to Thee
by Robert Grant
Savior, when in dust to Thee
Low we bow the adoring knee,
When, repentant, to the skies
Scarce we lift our weeping eyes,
O by all the pains and woes
Suffered once for man below,
Bending from Thy throne on high,
Hear our solemn litany.
By Thy helpless infant years,
By Thy life of want and tears,
By Thy days of sore distress
In the savage wilderness,
By the dread mysterious hour
Of the insulting tempter’s power,
Turn, O turn a favoring eye,
Hear our solemn litany.
By the sacred griefs that wept
O’er the grave where Lazarus slept,
By the boding tears that flowed
Over Salem’s loved abode,
By the anguished sigh that told
Treachery lurked within Thy fold,
From Thy seat above the sky,
Hear our solemn litany.
By Thine hour of dire despair,
By Thine agony of prayer,
By the cross, the nail, the thorn,
Piercing spear, and torturing scorn,
By the gloom that veiled the skies
O’er the dreadful sacrifice,
Listen to our humble cry,
Hear our solemn litany.
By Thy deep expiring groan,
By the sad sepulchral stone,
By the vault whose dark abode
Held in vain the rising God,
O from earth to heaven restored,
Mighty, re-ascended Lord,
Listen, listen to the cry
Of our solemn litany.
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