Acts 20:7

PUBLIC WORSHIP

‘And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them.’

Acts 20:7

In the present day there is a marked decline in the habit of people, generally, to attend public worship regularly, yet the present tendency is not peculiar to this age; it appeared in an aggravated form in the eighteenth century, which was commented on by Bishop Butler in the introduction to his Analogy of Religion.

I. There is a tendency in the present day to regard a service in church far too much as a human performance.—When it is over, people converse about the service just as they would about the merits of a concert or any other entertainment. They praise or blame the eloquence or the dullness of the preacher, they discourse on the solos or the choruses of the anthem, or on the reading of the prayers, or on the size and quality of the congregation; but when do we find the main thought of the departing congregation to be centred on the spiritual presence of God which they have felt and realised? Yet this is the one all-important consideration. The most suitable remark at the conclusion of a service would be, ‘It was well seen to-day how God, our God and King, went in the sanctuary.’

II. Those who really pray to God and meditate on His goodness cannot be satisfied without the visible manifestation.—In some careless, worldly families there is no gathering of the household for family prayer, and no public acknowledgment of God’s bounty in grace said before meals. The religious tone of a household is profoundly influenced by these observances. If a Christian family gave them up, and arranged that each individual was to say his or her prayers in private, and think his or her grace in silence, it would not be long until it was manifest that all difference between the family life of the godly and the careless households had disappeared. Public worship and public thanksgiving bear the same relationship to the nation as family prayer and grace at meals do to the household. Both to be effective must be ‘well seen.’ When they are not seen there is sure evidence that the decay of true religion has begun, which, if allowed to continue, must result in spiritual death. France is an example in the present day of the truth of this fact.

III. There are two ways in which we may take part in a service.

(a) Either as mere spectators coming to be entertained by music or to receive gratuitously the enjoyment of a service for which other people have paid; or

(b) We may come as true worshippers who desire to take our full share in promoting the glory of God, both by our presence and our offerings.

The services of the Church cannot be maintained in efficiency without the offerings of the people by which they are made real partakers in the whole service. Then, along with our offerings, we present ourselves, our souls and bodies, to be a reasonable, holy, and lively sacrifice unto our Lord God.

—Dean Ovenden.

Illustration

‘For many years past the men of France have forsaken public worship, especially in the towns, where women and children formed the bulk of the congregations. The natural result has been a growing disbelief in the religion of that Church of which they were nominal members. We have reason to fear that the growing tendency of men among ourselves to absent themselves from public worship shows a tendency in our day which may lead to similar results in our land. Sunday work and Sunday amusements are certainly on the increase, and especially we may note the increase in family entertainments on Sunday, the result of week-end gatherings, which all point in the same direction, viz. the forsaking of the habit of attendance at public worship.’