A Review of Pagan Christianity (Part 3): Worship
The third chapter of this work by Frank Viola and George Barna concerns what takes place during worship. Although the authors document their findings with copious citations, the thesis of this chapter is tremendously flawed, which demonstrates that research per se serves no guarantee that it will be applied correctly. This part of the book also explains what an organic church is, and when it is finally defined, it is exceedingly disappointing. The chapter does begin with an excellent quotation, however, from Tertullian: “Custom without truth is error grown old” (47). This was the message of Jesus Himself when He said: “In vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men” (Matt. 15:9). For all their research, the authors did not make this connection or cite this verse.
The Restoration Plea (which they also fail to mention) has always been to set aside the traditions that men have developed over the centuries and return to what the New Testament teaches. Barna and Viola seem to be headed in this direction, but they swerve suddenly into subjectivism. When someone departs from the original system ordained by God, the only proper response is to restore the original pattern. Hezekiah and Josiah displayed this attitude when the kingdom of Judah strayed from the Law of Moses. They led people back to what God had originally established.
Elements of Worship
The authors set forth elements of worship common to most Protestant churches today. (Members of the Lord’s church do not consider themselves Protestants; we strive only to be Christians.) They list as worship the greeting, prayer, Scripture reading, the announcements, the song service, the offering, the sermon, and the benediction. Then they add that “for the last five hundred years, few people have questioned it” (49). As those who have been taught to question everything, we are apparently among the few.
Brethren do not consider the greeting a part of the worship; it is simply a matter of being friendly. Theoretically, we could just let people walk in and ignore them, but that seems foolish. Certainly we greet one another, as is enjoined by the teachings of the New Testament (Rom. 16:16). However, in no way is this friendly action considered part of our worship. Neither are the announcements. They are usually presented at the beginning or at the end of our worship together, and their design, as is that of the church bulletin, is to keep the church informed.
The book says that the prayer or Scripture reading is usually given by “the pastor or song leader” (48), but in the churches of Christ, this is rarely the case. Prayers are offered by various men of the congregation, as is the Scripture reading. They also show unfamiliarity with us when they say that the offering is usually accompanied by special music, such as a choir, worship team, or soloist (49). We do have an offering, however, as well as a sermon.
Among optional items are “an altar call,” prayer for the sick, and “the Lord’s Supper” (49). It is surprising to see the observance of the Lord’s death as “optional,” since that was the reason cited for brethren coming together in Acts 20:7. The authors do not cite this verse either here or in a later chapter discussing the Lord’s Supper. Their research seems to fail them at times (or their knowledge of the Scriptures). Praying for the sick is included in most prayers that men give, but they are included every time we meet.
If by an altar call, the authors mean that people are given an opportunity to obey the gospel and become a Christian or that they have an opportunity to repent of sin, we stand guilty as charged, but again this is not an optional matter. Everyone has that opportunity every time that the church meets. We do encourage and exhort each other, as the Bible teaches we ought to do.
The Character of Worship
When Barna and Viola say that much of Protestant worship is a “static ritual” (50), they may have a point, but they are incorrect in saying that approved worship should be spontaneous and unpredictable, since this would contradict what the New Testament teaches. Jesus did not tell the woman at the well, “True worshipers shall worship the Father spontaneously and in an unpredictable manner.” He called for worship to be “in spirit and in truth” (John 4:23-24). Furthermore, the authors use as a model for worship 1 Corinthians 14, in which Paul actually condemns chaos, saying that all things should be done decently and in order (1 Cor. 14:40).
This chapter devotes several pages to the various practices of the church today and attributes them to the innovations of various reformers. The authors write: “Luther gets the credit for making the sermon the climax of the Protestant service” (43), and they cite quotations by him which praise the preaching of God’s Word. First of all, the sermon is not always last; many congregations conclude with the Lord’s Supper, but the Bible does not prescribe an “official” order in which things are done. Sometimes singing begins worship; it could also be a prayer. Most of the time, a song or a prayer concludes worship—not the sermon. Second, the fact that Luther emphasized the sermon is irrelevant. His emphasis came from what the Bible teaches.
The very first Christians were instructed by the apostles: “And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine…” (Acts 2:42). Paul reminded the elders of Ephesus that he had taught them “publicly and from house to house” (Acts 20:20). Paul exhorted Timothy to take heed to his doctrine, “for in doing this you will save both yourself and those who hear you” (1 Tim. 4:16). All of these suggest there were times of instruction for brethren. Some of the teaching could be done in private, but it is obvious that the teaching in public was through sermons. Luther didn’t invent the sermon; it was part of worship in the first century. Whether he over-emphasized it or not is a matter of opinion; that it was emphasized in the New Testament is not.
Incredibly, the authors state that Luther “introduced congregational singing” (55). Really? He may have re-introduced it for many (if Catholics did not practice it), but Christians have always practiced congregational singing. How else can one understand that brethren should speak “to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs” (Eph. 5:19)? In what other way would members of the body of Christ fulfill “teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs” (Col. 3:16), if not by congregational singing? Luther could scarcely have introduced what was originally taught in the New Testament.
Zwingli is supposed to have introduced the Communion Table, which is nothing more than an expedient, even if it is the case. The authors aver that two “candles typically sit upon it” (57), which will be a surprise to most brethren who have never seen such a sight in all their lives. Incredibly, they add: “Zwingli is also credited with championing the ‘memorial’ view of the Supper” (57). Perhaps after the Catholics had taught that the literal body and blood of Jesus were in the bread and the fruit of the vine, it might seem as though Zwingli thought of it, but the view comes from the Bible, not Zwingli. Jesus said:
“Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me….”
“This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me” (1 Cor. 11:24-25).
Most people would agree that what Jesus asked for was a “memorial” of Him. This idea, then, did not come from Zwingli, but from our Lord Himself. What did come from the reformer was having the Lord’s Supper only four times a year; he certainly did not get this idea from the pages of the New Testament.
Calvin, Knox, and Bucer are credited with putting the collection of money following the sermon (58). Churches of Christ seldom, if ever, have it at that time, but the offering itself is found in the Scriptures (1 Cor. 16:1-2, 2 Cor. 8:1-5; 2 Cor. 9:6-7).
When describing the singing, the authors almost bring a ray of sunshine to the readers, but then they quickly cloud it over. “Because musical instruments were not explicitly mentioned in the New Testament, Calvin did away with pipe organs and choirs” (58). (Zwingli also shared this view.) At last we have someone who is honest enough to admit that there are no explicit mentions of musical instruments in the New Testament worship. However, the authors soon ruin whatever euphoria their readers might have had over the inclusion of this fact by adding: “Some contemporary Protestants, like the Church of Christ, still follow Calvin’s rigid noninstrumentalism” (58). Wow! How many things are wrong with this statement?
First, we are not Protestants but Christians. Second, we are not following Calvin on this or any other doctrine that he taught. We are following the principle of Colossians 3:17, which occurs immediately following a verse concerning singing: “And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” Perhaps the authors would like to explain what “in the name of the Lord” means if not by the Lord’s authority. What the New Testament authorizes us to do, we can safely practice, and what it does not authorize we may not do. They have already admitted that the New Testament does not explicitly teach that instruments can be used. Third, they know us well enough to know that we do not use instruments of music to accompany singing, but they do not seem to know that we do not fit into the Protestant mold. Nor do they cite the volumes of materials that brethren have written on these subjects or any of the debates we have conducted.
To attribute our worship practices to John Calvin is simply reckless, and it casts a reflection on all their “research.” If their lives depended on it, they could not find one member of the Lord’s church who has ever cited John Calvin as the reason we do not use musical accompaniment. Equally erroneous is that the idea of doing everything by the Word of God is a Puritan sentiment (62). No, Viola and Barna, it is a Biblical principle (Joshua 1:6-9; Deut. 4:2, Gal. 1:6-9; et al.).
Apparently, the Puritans actually “punished church members who missed the Sunday morning sermon”; the authors quip that the “next time your pastor threatens you with unbridled wrath for missing ‘church,’ be sure to thank the Puritans” (62). No, thank the writer of Hebrews 10:25 and the Holy Spirit who inspired the verse. The Puritans in this instance only recognized the importance of what the Scriptures teach.
Barna and Viola have the nerve to say that the elements of worship they have discussed cannot be found in the New Testament (64)! This is just too absurd to refute, and Scriptures have already been presented to show the error of this type of thinking.
The book states that the Methodists were the first to have Sunday evening worship, invitational hymns, an altar call, and the mourners’ bench (64-67). In the New Testament, brethren in some locales had to work all day, and they met in the evening—but for several hours. We live in a different culture. Most of us can meet on Sunday morning for a briefer time, but a few cannot and need Sunday evening. God gave us the flexibility to choose our own times of meeting. As far as giving an invitation (and accompanying hymn) for people to respond goes, we see people wanting to obey the gospel from the very first sermon on Pentecost (Acts 2:37). The goal of preaching is to cause people to obey the gospel, and usually there are some in the assembly who may decide to do so with encouragement. No Scripture mentions a mourner’s bench.
The reader will be astounded to read footnote 125:
Properly conceived, the goal of preaching is not the salvation of souls. It is the birth of the church. As one scholar put it, “Conversion can only be the means, the goal is the extension of the visible church” (69).
What kind of gobbledegook is this? The very name Jesus means “Savior” (Matt. 1:21). Paul wrote that he was not ashamed of the gospel of Christ because “it is the power of God unto salvation…” (Rom. 1:16). He also said that he preached “Christ crucified” (1 Cor. 1:23). One is made part of the church when he is baptized (Acts 2:47); so salvation and the church are related, as also evidenced by Jesus being Head over His body, the church (Eph. 1:22-23). But the goal of preaching is, first and foremost, the salvation of the soul. The one who is saved then enters the kingdom of heaven, the church, and receives all the blessings God has designed for him.
This de-emphasis of evangelism continues in footnote 146, where it is stated that the apostles
were in no hurry to evangelize the world. Equally, the church in Jerusalem did not evangelize anyone for the first four years of its life. They, too, were in no hurry to evangelize the world (71).
Wow! One can hardly believe his eyes. Did not Jesus command the apostles to go into all the world (Matt. 28:20)? Apparently, we missed that part where He added, “Be sure to take your time.” If they were lax in getting into all the world, the persecution they received solved that problem (Acts 8:1, 4). But what about the assertion that Jerusalem did not evangelize for four years? Could we have a Scripture to support that claim, please? So, what happened after the first 3,000 obeyed the gospel on Pentecost (Acts 2:41)?
After Peter and John healed the lame man, “the number of men who believed grew to about 5,000” (Acts 4:4). Was that four years later? If so, how would it be proven? How about the fact that “believers were increasingly added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women” (Acts 5:14)? Why do we read that in those days “the number of the disciples was multiplying” (Acts 6:1)? If all of these things were occurring without any evangelism being practiced, then we ought to learn their secret because we cannot get this kind of momentum going with evangelism!
The authors find fault with the “in one generation” concept of preaching the gospel to the whole world. They say that Christians in the first century did not think this way. They were not “pressured into trying to get the entire world saved in one generation” (71). One wonders how they were so successful then. Paul said that the gospel had come to Colosse “as it has also in the whole world” (Col. 1:6). He later admonishes them not to be moved away from the hope of the gospel, “which was preached to every creature under heaven…” (Col. 1:23). For apostles who were in no hurry—not to mention complacent Christians with the same attitude—it is amazing that they got the job done!
Summary
By this point in the book, it is obvious that the authors seek to promote their agenda by badmouthing the origin of several religious practices—even if the criticism is unfair. In the previous chapter, they showed the origin of the church building from pagan elements, which made sense. In this chapter, they take issue with the content of worship. We have proclaimed for years (rigidly so) that denominationalism is not authorized by the Scriptures—that Jesus established only one church—His. Neither are we defending them now—or practices that have a pagan origin. But it is essential to distinguish between unauthorized traditions of men (of which instrumental music is one) and something that actually has a basis in the Bible. The authors fail in this regard, acting as though something that is found in the Scriptures was originated by men. The careful reader sees it.