We have been looking at some common problems people experience in which they go through a deconstruction of their faith. This series is put forward as a way to help reconstruct the faith of those who are considering leaving God, leaving Jesus, leaving the faith, leaving the church, or leaving the scriptures. In our lesson we talked about the challenges that are made against the local church. Do we even need the church? Why do we have to do this? I hope the primary take away from the last lesson was that we need each other and to be faithful to him, we must work together, worship together, and love one another. God does not tell us that we can practice our faith before him in isolation. Rather, we are repeatedly taught that we belong to a body in which each part is important and is needed for the body to function and grow properly.
Does It Matter?
One of the questions I asked a few lessons ago what this: Does it matter? Does it matter how we live before God and does it matter how we worship God? I spent some time going through the reasons why we must accept that it does matter to God. It does matter how we live before God because God gives us so many directions and teachings about the Christian life. In the same way, we also understand that it does matter how we worship God. God has never told us that we can do whatever we want and he will receive it as worship. God has never remotely left the impression with his people that we decide how we can come to him. God showed this very early with his people. When God determined to come down and be with his people in Exodus 19, he made it clear that the people needed to be consecrated and they needed to not come near the mountain (Exodus 19:9-13). God was immediately showing the world that this is not a God that you approach in any way you choose. This point was further confirmed in Leviticus 10 when, in the first act of worship, two of Aaron’s sons were consumed by God for using an unauthorized fire (Leviticus 10:1-3). All of the details that we read in Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy give the clear message that God cares about the details. It is an unavoidable conclusion. Why does God go through all the tiny details about the people, the tabernacle, the altars, the animals, and the worship if precision did not matter to him? God did not change when we come to the covenant of Christ. Listen to Jesus’ own words about the worship that was happening.
You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said: “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.” (Matthew 15:7-9 ESV)
Jesus saw the opposite problem as just as important. The Pharisees were careful with the details but their hearts were far from God. So their worship was also useless. We are being shown again and again that how we worship matters to God. God cares about what we do and God cares about the motive behind it. Please let me make this point very clear because it is the foundation for this lesson. It is not enough to get the worship details right. God knows the hearts of the worshipers and the motives matter. But it is also not enough to have the heart. God wants the details right. This should make sense to us. If we truly have a heart for God and have the right motives, then we are going to seek to do things the way God has asked us and shown us. It is a false idea to proclaim that we can have a heart for God but do things wrong. Doing wrong reveals that we do not have a heart for God. This is the point that the prophets of God were consistently proclaiming. The right heart will lead to right worship. Knowing God will cause you to seek to obey him in life and worship him properly when we gather.
Key Principle
As we seek to do God’s will and understand what he wants us to do, there is a very important truth that we must remember as we carry on this pursuit. We are under the new covenant in Christ, not the old covenant also called the Law of Moses. The Law of Moses was given to physical Israel and not to the Gentiles or to the rest of the world (cf. Deuteronomy 5:1-3). The prophet Jeremiah proclaimed that a new covenant would come in which God would forgive sins (cf. Jeremiah 31:31-34). The writer of Hebrews quotes this prophecy in Hebrews 8:8-12. He then draws this conclusion:
In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away. (Hebrews 8:13 ESV)
A new covenant means that the prior covenant is now obsolete. In Hebrews 9:15 the writer of Hebrews draws this point further that Jesus is the mediator of this new covenant and it was established at his death (Hebrews 9:16-17). This can be jarring to people to think about but the scriptures are clear that we are not under the old covenant. We do not follow the Law of Moses. It was not given to us. The ten commandments were not given to us. All of the old covenant is obsolete now that Christ has come and established his new covenant upon his death and resurrection. People will say, “So does that mean we can murder because you said we are not under the old covenant?” But the new covenant also teaches that we are not to murder (cf. Matthew 15:19; Romans 1:29; James 2:11). The point is that we must look to the new covenant because Jesus fulfilled and made obsolete the old covenant.
Now this does not mean that the old covenant and the Hebrew scriptures have no value. Jesus said that he came to fulfill the Law, not destroy the Law (Matthew 5:17). Everything in the old covenant was pointing to Jesus and he would accomplish and fulfill all its requirements. We learn about who God is and we learn about how he operates with his people by reading Genesis through Malachi. Remember that the apostle Paul twice made the point that these things were written down our instruction, giving us examples, to encourage us in hope (cf. Romans 15:4; 1 Corinthians 10:11).
Let me draw out an example to show this important principle. Can we worship God with incense altars and animal sacrifices today to be pleasing to God? Can we build an altar and bring our unblemished animals and we will offer them up as sacrifices? Can we have an incense altar and bring our incense to burn to the Lord? Now I want us to carefully consider why we would teach that this is not what God wants us to do. First, we would observe that we see altars for incense and animal sacrifices used for worship commanded under the old covenant. Second, the new covenant does not say that we cannot have incense altars and animal sacrifices today. There is not a clear prohibition. Third, we could even point out that we see altars of worship in the book of Revelation being used. So why would we stand against incense altars and animal sacrifices today given these points? Why don’t we see churches doing this? The point I want us to see is that God did not tell us, show us, or imply to us that we are to offer animal sacrifices in the new covenant. Even though we see it commanded in the old covenant, we need it said to us, show to us, or implied to us in the new covenant. Even though the new covenant does not explicitly prohibit it does not mean we can do. Also, just because we see altars and sacrifices in Revelation does not mean it is given to us to do this because we recognize that the book of Revelation tells us that it is a highly symbolic book. The images of the altars and their worship are symbolizing other truths as the book points out.
Some Challenged Teachings
I do not have time in this lesson to go through all the details explaining every teaching that we see in the new covenant of Christ. So what I want to do is quickly show some of the key teachings we see about our approach to God and our worship of God under the new covenant.
First, those who would come to God must repent, confess, and be baptized as responses of their belief in Jesus. There are so many scriptures in the New Testament that directly tell us this and show us these key points. The book of Acts is filled with people who are believe in Jesus, are convicted by sin, and respond with repentance, confession, and baptism. Colossians 2:12 makes the point very clear that these are not our works but God’s work as we submit in faith to him. But I want to underscore that we cannot say that people “should” do this. God said to do this from the heart and from faith. I will ask this question a few times as we consider our approach to God. Is there anything God says we are to do that we can willfully ignore and believe that we are saved? What command can we skip and say that we are right with God? We are not right with God if we are not approaching God in repentance, ready to exchange our ways for his ways. We are not right with God if we are not confessing Jesus to be the Son of God, Savior, and Lord and acting on that confession. We are not right with God if we are will not be buried in water in faith believing that God is washing away our sins. These are teachings and pictures that are found all over the scriptures. So we cannot ignore them, call them important, but then make them optional. Why would we be part of a church that was not doing what we see in the scriptures?
Second, since God cares about our worship, then we must remember the death and resurrection of Jesus every Sunday. I always make the point here that even if we had nothing to go on, why would we not want to remember what Jesus has done for us when we come together on the first day of the week? What is more important than Jesus and his sacrifice? Now people can point out that we do not have a lot of information about the Lord’s Supper in the scriptures. This is true but I do not need a lot of information. I see in Acts 20:7 that Christians came together to remember Jesus on the first day of the week and Paul made an effort to be with those Christians and join with them. Why would we be part of a church that was not doing what see the apostles and first century Christians doing?
Third, since God cares about worship, then it is not our goal to meet physical desires. The reason we do not hand out coffee and donuts is because our purpose is spiritual. Paul condemned the Corinthian church for making that worship time all about eating and drinking (cf. 1 Corinthians 11:34). Paul said that you have your homes to enjoy your meals. Unfortunately, we are so fleshly that we want to make worship about eating and drinking. Jesus even condemned the crowds for being excited about the food when he fed the 5000 rather than being excited about him because the sign was supposed to mean something to them (cf. John 6:22-27). Worship is not an appeal to our fleshly desires. Worship is our appeal to the Almighty God. So let’s not make the focal point of our gatherings about potlucks, barbecues, bingo, coffee, or whatever else would appeal to the flesh. Let’s leave the distractions at home and come into the presence of God for a couple hours of devoted worship. Why would be be part of a church that is actively appealing to your flesh rather than actively appealing to your soul?
Fourth, since God cares about worship, then we need to be mindful of how we use the Lord’s money that is received. Sometimes the idea of the collection is challenged. I would not that the instructions Paul gave to the Corinthian church were also the instructions given to other churches (1 Corinthians 16:1). But let us look at another passage that shows us the idea of the collection. In 1 Timothy 5 describes the need to honor widows who are truly widows in need. Paul three times says that family is to financially care for those who are widows (1 Timothy 5:4, 8, 16). But if there is no family to provide for a widow and she has shown spiritual faithfulness, she is instructed to be enrolled on a list for support from the church. Now here is my question: with what money would the church be able to do this? Clearly there is a regular collection occurring to make it possible for the church to care for a true widow. A few verses later in 1 Timothy 5 we see Paul also teaching that elders who rule well are worthy to be paid for their work (1 Timothy 5:17-18). So I will ask again, with what money would the church be able to do this? Again, clearly there is a regular collection occurring to make it possible to financially support elders and widows. But I want you to look carefully at verse 16. Why are there these careful instructions about when the church should use this money?
If any believing woman has relatives who are widows, let her care for them. Let the church not be burdened, so that it may care for those who are truly widows. (1 Timothy 5:16 ESV)
What is the point? The point is that God does care about how the money collected is used. Paul says that the church should be the place of last resort, not the first. Just as we have made the point over the past few weeks that we need authority for all that we do, then we also need authority for how we use what is collected. We cannot just spend it how we please. There is no authority for a church to send the collected money to another organization or to give the collected money to those who are not walking in the faith. Remember, we cannot decide if we think it is a good idea or not. We need God to tell us, show us, or imply to us how to use it. Why would we be part of a church that does not carefully consider what God has said to do with the money collected?
Fifth, since God cares about our worship, then we do not see any authority for using an instrument except our voices. This is not an issue that each church can decide for itself regarding their use, as sometimes portrayed. Now I want us to think about our earlier example because the same thinking must be applied. People will saw that we see instruments commanded under the old covenant. Yes, but so were altars for incense and animal sacrifices. We cannot bring forward into the new covenant things that were commanded under the old covenant because Jesus fulfilled that covenant and it is obsolete. People will say that it does not say that we can’t have instruments in the new covenant. Yes, but it also does not say that we can’t have altars for incense and animal sacrifices in the new covenant. People will say that we see instruments in the book of Revelation. Yes, and we also see altars for worship in the book of Revelation also. The same reasoning for why we do not keep various commands from the Law of Moses must still be applied to all commands of the old covenant. We cannot bring one command through and leave the others out. We have been set free from the Law. So we must look for God to say it, show it, or imply it in the new covenant. We simply do not see it. The new covenant only tells and shows us to sing. Why would we be part of a church that worships in ways that we do not see in the New Testament? I will remind of us of an earlier point that we made in an earlier lesson. Do we need authority for all that we do for God or only authority for some of the things we do? I cannot willing choose to do things that God has not said, shown, or implied for us to do.
Don’t Leave the Teachings
We could keep doing this for every aspect of what we do in worship to God. But we are out of time. I hope I have shown the principle that we need to use as we think about how we approach God and how we worship him. I want to end with the scripture that was the scripture reading.
1 Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, 2 through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared, 3 who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. 4 For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, 5 for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer. 6 If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed. (1 Timothy 4:1-6 ESV)
People are going to leave the faith. So notice he is not talking about the world. Disciples are going to leave the faith, believing lies and teaching things that are false. I hope these studies have helped you not do as Paul warned would happen that some would do. I want you to see in verse 6 that Paul says that there is a set of teachings and words of faith that must be followed and taught. We cannot do whatever we want. We must follow what God has revealed. Sadly, many will leave those teachings. All we do in worship and all we do in life must be found in the scriptures under the covenant of Christ. God wants our hearts to want him and seek to do what he has asked us to do.