32. Why is worship essential to the life of the church?
The assembling of the people of God for worship is necessary to Christian fellowship and spiritual growth.
—
With this question, “worship” has moved from referring narrowly to giving God the honor and thanks that are his due (whether corporately within the context of Sunday morning services or individually throughout the week) to referring more broadly to our coming together to hear the Word proclaimed, to pray together, to celebrate the Lord’s Supper, and, yes, to worship in the narrower sense. This assembling inevitably also includes opportunities for connecting with one another outside of the activities of the service, whether in Bible studies, choir or praise team rehearsals, or just around the tables by the coffee and carbohydrates.
Simply put, we need social reinforcement if we are to persevere in discipleship. The apostles and other voices that we hear in the New Testament knew this. We need to come together for mutual encouragement (Rom. 1:11–12; Heb. 10:23–25). We need the gifts that the Spirit has implanted in our sisters and brothers specifically for one another’s growth and stability in discipleship (Eph. 4:11–16). The full range of the Spirit’s resources are only experienced “as each part [of the body] does its work” (v. 16 NIV). It also falls to us to look into, and look after, one another’s needs so as to facilitate the perseverance of each and every disciple (Heb. 10:25).
The world’s voices and pressures, like an endless gauntlet of potholes on a bad and bumpy road, always threaten to knock us out of alignment. We need to come together to seek reinforcement, in the face of these other pressures, for the Spirit’s priorities in and for our lives. Worshipping, praying, and studying together refocus us; when we thus assemble, we participate in and contribute to one another’s realignment with God and God’s trajectory for our lives. There is genuine spiritual power in our shared experience of God, our agreement in prayer, our common commitment to be shaped by the Word (Acts 4:31).
—
When they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness. (Acts 4:31)
Let us hold onto the profession of our hope unwaveringly, for the One who promised is reliable. And let us pay close attention to one another with a view to extravagant expressions of love and good works, not neglecting to assemble together (as is the habit of some) but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day drawing nearer. (Heb. 10:23–25 DST)
See also Acts 2:41–47; Rom. 1:11–12; Eph. 4:17–18; CoF XIII
—
This is an excerpt from Christian Faith and Doctrine: An Annotated Catechism for the Global Methodist Church. Seedbed is pleased to partner with The Global Methodist Church to offer this companion resource to A Catechism of Christian Faith and Doctrine for the Global Methodist Church.
Perfect for:
- Teachers and leaders discipling and catechizing others
- New Believers in the Global Methodist Church and Christianity in general
- Seekers curious about the Christian faith or the Wesleyan tradition
This resource will help you:
- Encounter faithful teaching about God’s character and his saving work in our world
- Train disciples to understand, recall, profess, and enjoy the church’s essential teachings
- Understand and internalize the beauty of historic orthodoxy
- Become catechized in the richness of Wesleyan faith and practice