June 2007 New Horizons

A New Directory for Public Worship?

by George R. Cottenden

The Seventy-fourth General Assembly (2007) marks the climax of a task that has been under way in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church for almost six decades—the revision of what we now call our Book of Church Order (BCO). In June the Committee on Revisions to the Directory for Public Worship will submit its Amended Proposed Revised Version (APRV) of the Directory to the General Assembly for approval. If approved, it will then be sent to the presbyteries for ratification. This is a momentous event for the Committee, some of whose members have been working on this task since 1989. It is a momentous event for the whole church as well. Once the Assembly has completed dealing with this matter, it will have brought to a conclusion a process of revision that began in 1948, when the Assembly erected a committee to revise the Form of Government. That work was completed in 1979. Revision of the Book of Discipline was completed and became effective in 1983. That left the Directory for Public Worship (DPW) to ... Read more

Worship in the OPC

by D. G. Hart and John R. Muether

The Orthodox Presbyterian Church was born in 1936 from a doctrinal controversy. As J. Gresham Machen and his allies escaped from the modernism of the mainline Presbyterian church into "a true Presbyterian church, at last," there was much work to be done in establishing the doctrine and practice of the new denomination. The church began by debating which version of the Westminster Confession of Faith should be adopted as part of the church's constitution. In 1937 the General Assembly determined to eliminate the compromising amendments of 1903. Also during the church's second year, the Assembly provisionally adopted a Form of Government and a Book of Discipline. Standing committees were erected to oversee the church's work in home and foreign missions and in Christian education. Because worship was not the crisis out of which the OPC was formed, its regulation was not an immediate priority for the church. This is confirmed in reviewing some histories of the OPC. From Robert Marsden's The First Ten Years ... Read more

The Real Point of Worship

by Larry Wilson

People who inquire about a church often ask, "Is your worship contemporary or traditional?" Whenever I hear that, I feel like the guy who's just been asked, "Are you still beating your wife?" How can you answer a question like that? It starts with wrong assumptions. It's the wrong question! It misses the real point of worship. Is It Really That Important? It's common in our day, however, for believers to avoid facing the real point of worship. Disagreements are smoothed over as mere preferences regarding "style." Even so, few things can occasion greater discord in the church than such "preferences." In such a climate, any effort to revise the OPC's Directory for the Public Worship of God (DPW)—which will be on the agenda of the General Assembly this year—seems to fall somewhere between quixotic and malicious. Is it really worth it? It should give us pause to learn that John Calvin said that there were two main reasons why the Reformation was needed. The church needed "a knowledge, first, ... Read more

The Heavenly Pattern of Worship

by Peter J. Wallace

Most discussions of worship today focus on style: contemporary or traditional? But while the church has been fighting over worship style, she seems to have forgotten what worship is all about. As our theology of worship has disappeared, it is perhaps not surprising that our practice of worship has become so fragmented. The theology of worship is perhaps best expressed in the practice of worship. So let us consider the practice of Christian worship from the Garden of Eden to the New Jerusalem. Worship in the Old Testament Worship in Eden was simple. Adam and Eve heard the word of God, responded with faith and obedience, and partook of the tree of life. At least, that was the way it was supposed to be. But instead, they listened to the serpent and partook of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The first corporate worship detailed in the Scriptures was that of the assembly of Israel at Mt. Sinai. Exodus 19–23 recounts the establishment of the covenant between God and his people, and ... Read more

Helps for Worship #19: The Sacraments

by William Shishko

"As many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death." (Rom. 6:3) "Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you." (John 6:53) The sacraments of the New Testament are baptism and the Lord's Supper. These, and these alone, were instituted by Christ to be part of the ministry of his church (see Matt. 28:19; 1 Cor. 11:26). The written promises of God are not enough for us. If they were, God would not have instituted sacraments as visible forms of his promises and his work of redemption. So what do they add? The answer is that sacraments give objective signs and seals of those promises to all those who are entitled to receive them, and to all who receive them in faith. Your personal faith can be a very subjective thing. Sacraments, by their very nature, are objective. The written promises go to all people who read or hear them. But baptism is given only to those who are entitled to be regarded as part of the Christian ... Read more