Christ Our King Presbyterian Church

Worship as Holy War

Pastor Travis Tamerius

We are all aware of the 'worship wars' that occur in churches across the country. But have you ever considered worship itself as war, as holy war perhaps? In the book of Deuteronomy God's people were receiving final instructions before going into the land of promise. Their mission was simple: trust God and conquer your enemies. God wanted Israel to be herself, a redeemed people, a peculiar people, a people set apart for glory and honor.

In recent weeks, I have been meditating on Deuteronomy's message, especially in connection with Christian worship. In our day, we continually meet with people who say something like this: the real problem with the church is that it is irrelevant, it is not reaching its audience. The problem is an irrelevant church with an irrelevant message. The problem with the church is that it doesn't scratch where people itch. Having mustered up the misgivings of religion's 'cultured despisers' (Schliermacher), critics of the church then call for sweeping changes and liturgical innovation.

I often wonder what it would have been like if the Hebrew people had had some enterprising American churchmen with them. The conquest of Canaan might have been very different. If they would have had some marketing moxie, if they would have learned about cultural assimilation, demographic profiling and advertising for results, who knows what could have happened. Conversations around camp might have gone something like this: "The Philistinian men are not too crazy about this circumcision thing, we ought to junk that." "We'll never reach the Amorites without tinkering with that second commandment prohibition against graven images. To reach them we need something with physical presence, something dramatically tangible. We need to carve a little more wood into our liturgy. "The Amalekites dislike our Passover songs – they say the whole 'redemption out of Egypt' theme is not their cup of barley." "The Moabites want to scrap the guilt offering and confession because it seems way too negative."

To what extent does the modern-day church learns it identity and mission from contemporary Philistines and Amalekites? Could it be that instead of the church clamoring to be relevant to a world of unbelief and bordeom that we should just keep on doing our thing? Gathering together in worship, singing the songs of Zion, telling and retelling the Story, confessing sin, announcing forgiveness, eating bread and drinking wine. Could it be that a better approach, one more faithful to who God is and who we are, would be to acculturate the world into our world? Could it be that our task is to help each other be relevant to the world of worship where sin is named, sinners are saved, the Spirit is moving and God is enthroned on the praises of His people? Could it be that our mission is to train people to start itching where the gospel is scratching?

Such a mission might require us to understand worship as conquest. In worship we are conquering the world. Worship is a way of overtaking the kingdoms of earth. As such, worship has a destructive element. We are dethroning false gods, denouncing the powers that wrench a grip on the human heart. This is why we confess sin together and listen to God's Word read and preached. Alongside the occupation of enemy land, worship also includes a good bit of cultivation. When we gather each week in our Lord's Day service, we are working and reworking the soil of belief and praise. We are building a home in the land of God's promises, settling down to a life marked out by grace (Deut. 6:10-11).

Admittedly, worship doesn't seem very efficient or effective. The sermons aren't always crisp. The tunes don't always dance off the tongue. We sometimes forget our rehearsed lines. But God's method of conquest doesn't seem very efficient or effective either. How useful is it to walk around the town of Jericho seven times, singing songs, making loud shouts, and blowing your ram's horn (Joshua 6)? Jericho's watchmen probably peered down from their perch and said "for all their noise, the Israelites can't sing worth a lick. And they sure are dressed funny." It is in these rhythms of obedience to God, however, that walls come down, enemies are overtaken and the good life is enjoyed.

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