Professor: Don’t change worship into performance

According to Daniel I. Block, Southern (Louisville, Ky.) Baptist Theological Seminary’s John R. Sampey professor of Old Testament interpretation, “true worship involves reverential human acts of submission and homage before the divine Sovereign in response to the gracious revelation of Himself and in accordance with His will.”
   
Yet, Block believes many evangelicals have sadly traded this biblically informed God-centeredness for pragmatism and a performance orientation.
   
“The most pressing problem is pragmatism and the drive for obvious success — the assumption that a successful church is a big church, a full building,” Block said. “And so the genre of the worship experience is governed more by what people enjoy than by what the Scriptures teach.”
   
Today’s worship involves more ostentation than awe and more egocentrism than reverence before God, he explained. This entertainment focus often transcends biblical teaching and creates a form of self-idolatry — far from the “worship in spirit and truth” commanded by Jesus. People need to hear God and worship Christ, not see a show, Block said.
   
Block hopes both preachers and music ministers rethink their duties in his class in terms of this biblical notion.
   
For the preachers, Block wants them to realize that if they are the senior pastors, worship is their business.
   
“Worship is about God speaking to us — far more important than us speaking to God,” Block said. “And it is primarily through the proclaimed word that God speaks to us.”
   
For the musicians, Block hopes they examine their efforts with scriptural scrutiny.
   
“I want them to realize that everything they do must be driven by theology as well,” Block said. “God must speak. When speech has happened, people should say something about God and not something about the artist.”
   
For every worshiper, Block also has an admonition.
   
“If true worship is the response of homage and submission to the divine Sovereign, that starts with life,” Block said. “Worship is a seven-day-a-week activity. One cannot compartmentalize life.”
Too many Christians attend Sunday “worship” after six days of self-centeredness, Block explained.
   
“That kind of worship is never acceptable,” he said. “It must arise out of a heart that is fundamentally fearing God and loving Him and expressing that fear and love in a life of grace and compassion and devotion to God and to others. Without that, what happens on Sunday morning is entirely beside the point.” (BP)