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Introduction

"An enemy has been at work to destroy our faith in the sacredness of Christian worship." The context of this statement in Volume 5, page 496, of Testimonies for the Church indicates that the author is concerned not only with Christian worship in general but with Adventist worship. A study of the chapter from which this quotation is taken reveals that at the time it was written the sacredness of worship was inadequately appreciated in Adventist churches. If the author were to comment on the situation in many of our churches today, I fear that the verdict would be no different.

I know many of you share with me a deep concern about this problem. The success of the church to which we are devoting our lives depends to a great extent on what happens between eleven and twelve o'clock on Sabbath mornings. We spend millions of dollars on evangelism, and rightly so; but the results of our evangelistic efforts will be dissipated if our new converts are driven away by an irreverent, unsatisfying Sabbath service. We engage in lay activities that take us up and down the streets of our cities with literature and with invitations to enroll in Bible courses. This is good; but are we deterred from the finest possible missionary activity-bringing our non-Adventist friends to our churches-by failure to provide worshipful Sabbath services? We emphasize medical evangelism and encourage physicians and dentists to come to our communities, but do these fine professional men dare to invite their patients and their colleagues to our services?

These questions demand an answer. Some have sought a solution in changing the architectural design of the church buildings and increasing the complexity of the liturgy. Sometimes the results of such efforts, however well motivated, have been disappointing.

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Toombs says in his Old Testament in Christian Preaching that some such churches become "architecturally and liturgically correct prisons for the incarceration of the Holy Spirit."-P. 157.

What is the answer to the problem of worship in our churches? It will not be found in ignoring the problem. If it is true that an enemy is trying to destroy the sacredness of Christian worship, we need to do something about it. Contentment with confusion, meaninglessness, and immaturity will not defeat this enemy. Neither will the answer be found in an uncritical acceptance of the procedures of some other church. We are Adventists, and we must approach worship as Adventists. A worship service that meets the needs of Methodists, Episcopalians, or Presbyterians may be unsatisfactory for us. The answer will be found in (1) a thorough ,knowledge of the Biblical, theological, and historical aspects of Christian worship, and (2) a thoughtful application of this knowledge to Adventist worship today.

Our ministers and our people, by and large, love God and want to worship Him. Many know the reasons for observing the Sabbath. They have sacrificed much to observe a day of worship, but they have often failed to inform themselves regarding the way of worship. We have published hundreds of books on the day of worship, but I don't know of one single Adventist book on the way of worship. I give my students at the Seminary nearly one hundred titles of books on worship, but I haven't found one Adventist book to include in that list. Is it any wonder we haven't developed an Adventist philosophy of worship?

I would not infer that no thought has been given to this problem. At this point I would express my appreciation to Dr. R. Allan Anderson, whose course in Worship I took at the Semi nary many years ago. I am also mindful of excellent articles in The Ministry and the Review. Most of these articles, however, deal with applications rather than basic principles.

The hundreds of books on worship written by authors of various faiths are helpful, but they do not give us the final answer. Most of the books on worship published in America during the past century constitute the literature of a movement called the 

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Liturgical Revival or the Liturgical Renewal. This movement represents a departure from Reformation principles of worship in the direction of medieval patterns. Well-known authors such as Sperry, Underhill, Maxwell, Dix, and Shepherd would substitute in place of the spontaneous, free worship of earlier Protestantism a highly liturgical worship more like that of the Church of England. There are exceptions to this trend, but they are not numerous.

Probably the most articulate defense of traditional, evangelical worship is Ilion T. Jones's A Historical Approach to Evangelical Worship. Unfortunately this book is out of print. Jones is a Presby terian minister and a retired professor of Practical Theology at San Francisco Theological Seminary. I am greatly indebted to him for ideas and materials, and several quotations from his book will be found in these pages.

Although these chapters, in their original lecture form, were intended for the ministers in attendance at the H. M. S. Richards lectureship held at Washington, D.C., in 1964, it is my hope that the ideals of worship presented in this book will be of interest to other ministers and to thoughtful laymen. Hundreds of church elders and other church officers are concerned regarding their services of worship. Thousands of worshipers are seeking a more satisfying worship experience. If many of the readers of this book can be stimulated to seek a greater insight into the meaning of worship, the entire church will be strengthened and the kingdom of God will be hastened.
NORVAL F. PEASE Andrews University 1967