13. To the Praise of His Glory— The Spirit and Worship
13
To the Praise of His Glory—
The Spirit and Worship
The Spirit gathers the newly constituted people of God in worship for corporate praise of God and sharing of gifts to build up the community of faith.
Growing up in a Pentecostal church was a marvelous, and intriguing, experience. Because the experiential nature of our faith appealed especially to many who were otherwise marginalized, both in society at large and in the mainline churches, the diversity Paul speaks of in 1 Corinthians 12 was our common lot. With that diversity came many strange things in church, not all of them edifying to the body, and some of them downright scary for some of us. When those of us from my generation raised in this tradition get together, we often swap stories and laugh till we hurt, not a hurtful, mocking laughter, but in joyous remembrance of the idiosyncrasies of some of God’s dearest people.
There was “ow-ooo Ferris,” a dear brother, who when he got blessed yelled “ow-ooo,” while sort of dancing in place and out into the aisle. There was brother Lawrence, whose sudden grasp of the glory of what was being preached (by my father in this case) erupted in a shouted “hallelujah” so sudden and loud it sent shivers up and down the spine. And then there was the brother who stood up to prophesy some crazy thing, and started, typically, “Thus saith the Lord.” When his prophecy was weighed and found wanting, it was gently suggested that perhaps it was not the Lord who had spoken after all. He jumped to his feet again. “Thus saith the Lord,” he shouted, “that was too me!” Whatever else, Pentecostal services in our younger days were not dull!
But in the midst of all this there was the other reality, the much greater reality of the presence of God in our midst. At this point we got it absolutely right. We knew by instinct, by our reading of Scripture, and by our experience of the Spirit that life in Christ was a life of joy. To be sure, in contrast with the later charismatic movement, the first response to God’s presence was often weeping and repentance. God had come among us, and we were filled with awe. But repentance was followed by joy, because we knew that one of the primary reasons for our gathering together was to express our love and praise to God with bursting thanksgiving and joyful singing. We knew also that the reason for the gifts of the Spirit was to aid us in this praise, as well as to build us up as the people of God for life in the world. If not all that we did was biblical, we were biblical at the heart of things.
In this chapter we explore what Paul says about the Spirit and worship, what biblical worship means. Right up front we need to be clear about two matters, one by way of reminder.
First, as I pointed out in the overture, Paul knows nothing of the kind of either/or pattern that has developed in the later church between fruit and gifts, between ethics and Spirit-inspired worship. Indeed, according to Colossians 3:16 and Ephesians 5:19, one of the ways the community heeded the command to keep filled with the Spirit was to teach and admonish one another regarding the message of Christ through psalms, hymns, and Spirit songs. These passages suggest a much closer relationship to ethics and worship than is sometimes noted. In any case, just as with ethics, so with worship: Paul understands the Spirit to play a leading role.
Second, because of the situational nature of Paul’s letters, they contain nothing close to a systematic presentation of the worship of the early church. What we learn is in response to problems and is therefore fragmentary. Nonetheless, for Paul the gathered church was first of all a worshipping community; and the key to their worship was the presence of the Holy Spirit. Thus, in Philippians 3:3, in his strong attack against the “mutilators of the flesh” (through circumcision), Paul begins by asserting that “we are the circumcision (i.e., ‘the people of God’), who serve/worship by the Spirit of God.” Their worship is a matter of a religious rite performed in the flesh; ours is a matter of Spirit.
The Spirit is seen as responsible for worship (see esp. 1 Cor. 14:6, 24, 26); moreover, when believers are assembled in this way, Paul understood himself to be present in S/spirit (probably in the reading of the letter as his prophetic voice among them), along with the “power of the Lord Jesus” (1 Cor. 5:3–5; Col. 2:5). Thus, even though he makes no direct allusion to the presence of the Spirit at the Lord’s Table (1 Cor. 10:16–17; 11:17–34), we may assume his understanding of the bread as representing Christ’s body the church (10:16–17; 11:29), made so by the Spirit, to lead in that direction. Indeed, one would not be far wrong to see the Spirit’s presence at the Table as Paul’s way of understanding the real presence. The analogy of Israel’s having had “Spiritual food” and “Spiritual drink” in 1 Corinthians 10:3–4 at least allows as much.
In any case, the Spirit is specifically noted as responsible for all other expressions of Christian worship. What Paul says explicitly about worship is what we want to look at here.
Spirit-Led Worship
Perhaps most noteworthy from the available evidence is the free, spontaneous nature of worship in Paul’s churches, apparently orchestrated by the Spirit himself. Worship is expressed in a variety of ways and with the (potential) participation of everyone (1 Cor. 14:26). There is no hint of a worship leader, although that must not be ruled out on the basis of silence. But neither is chaos permitted. The God whom they worship is a God of peace (v. 33), whose character is to be reflected in both the manner and the content of their worship. Therefore, disorder is out. Although all may participate (vv. 23, 24, 26, 31), there are some guidelines.
Speakers of inspired utterances must be limited to two or three at a time, and they must be followed by those who interpret and discern. They must respect one another: speakers must make way for others, since the “S/spirit of the prophet is subject to the prophet” (1 Cor. 14:32). Thus spontaneity does not mean lack of order; it means “peace” and “decency and orderliness”—also the work of the Spirit.
In the somewhat puzzling correction in 1 Corinthians 11:2–16, Paul refers to both men and women as “praying and prophesying.” The inclusion of “prophesying” presupposes for that passage a setting of the church gathered for worship. Moreover, praying and prophesying are almost certainly to be understood not as delimiting terms but as representative, in this case of the two basic kinds of activities that happened in Christian worship.
Together they represent the two primary focuses of gathered worship: God and the believing community. Thus prayer (and song and tongues, according to 1 Cor. 14:2 and 15) is directed toward God; and prophesying represents the many forms of speech—especially Spirit-inspired speech—that are directed toward the people of God to edify them (1 Cor. 14:3, 16) or toward outsiders to influence them to conversion (14:24–25).
Several of the charismata (“gracious giftings”) discussed in chapter 14 below also belong to the context of worship together as a body. This is especially true of those gifts that involve speech directed toward the community, as Paul’s words of correction in 1 Corinthians 14 make clear. These gifts include prophecy, teaching, knowledge, and revelation (v. 6), however we finally define some of these in relationship to others.
In terms of participation, both men and women share equally in the praying and prophesying (1 Cor. 11:4–5). In the Christian assembly the cry of Moses has been fulfilled: “I wish that all the LORD’s people were prophets and that the LORD would put his Spirit on them!” (Num 11:29 NIV). This is in keeping with 1 Corinthians 14:23, where again somewhat in passing Paul says that “all may prophesy.”
The problem in 1 Corinthians 11:5–6, therefore, is not that women pray and prophesy in the assembly, but that they are doing so in appearance similar to men, which Paul considers to be an expression of shame. That women are full participants in the worship of Paul’s churches, including the more preferred expression of Spirit-inspired speech, prophecy, moves considerably beyond the norm of Paul’s Jewish background and seems to be in keeping with the rest of the New Testament evidence, as little as there is. In terms of ministry within the worshipping community, the Holy Spirit apparently inspires women and men alike, since in Christ Jesus such distinctions have no religious value in God’s new end-time kingdom (Gal. 3:28).
Since we discussed prayer in the preceding chapter and we will look at prophecy in the following one, in this chapter we note the place of singing in Paul’s churches. As with prayer, song had become the specialty of the Spirit (1 Cor. 14:14–15, 26; Col. 3:16; Eph. 5:19). Our interest here is primarily in the twin passages in Colossians and Ephesians.
Teaching with Spirit-Inspired Singing
Colossians 3:16 appears toward the conclusion of a series of exhortations (vv. 12–17) that indicate what it means for the believers in Colossae to live as those “raised with Christ” (v. 1). In order for us to catch Paul’s emphases, I present the text in a more structured form, indicating how the various parts belong to one another:
Let the word of Christ dwell in your midst richly,
by teaching
admonishing one another
in all wisdom
with psalms,
hymns [and]
Spiritual songs
by singing to God
from your hearts
with gratitude.
That this is what Paul is saying is made clear by the twin passage in Ephesians 5:18–19, where the structure is quite certain:
but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms and hymns and Spiritual songs, singing and hymning with your hearts to the Lord.
Here are passages full of intriguing information about worship in the Pauline churches.
The Opening Exhortations
We begin with some observations about the opening clauses (“let the word of Christ dwell in your midst richly” and “but be filled with the Spirit”) that are of considerable importance.
1. Everything about the contexts, and the language of both sentences in particular, indicates that Paul is here reflecting on the Christian community. These are not words for the individual believer but for believers as the people of God in relationship with one another. In Colossians that is especially clear. Beginning with 3:12, everything has the community in sight, since everything is for, or in light of, “one another.” Thus in the immediately preceding exhortation (v. 15), which sets the pattern for the present one, they are to let the peace of Christ rule in their hearts, since it is to this that they have been called together as one body.
Colossians 3:16 views these relationships within the context of the gathered people of God at worship, where they are to teach and admonish one another as one way that the word of Christ will dwell “in them” richly. This means that the prepositional phrase “in/among you,” even though it modifies the verb “indwell” and would ordinarily mean “within you,” here means “in your midst.” The indwelling “word of Christ,” therefore, in its two forms of “teaching and admonishing one another” and “singing to God,” has to do with the church at worship.
If the community context in Ephesians is less immediately certain, it is clearly in view, since the whole passage from 4:1 through chapter 6 takes up community life, how they are to “maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (4:3).
2. In the same vein, it is significant to note that the compound participles, “teaching and admonishing,” are the same two that Paul used in Colossians 1:28 to describe his own ministry. Here, then, is clear evidence that Paul did not consider ministry to be the special province of either apostles or officeholders. As in the earliest of his letters (1 Thess. 5:14), these kinds of activities in the Christian assembly are the responsibility of all.
This is in keeping with the picture that emerges in 1 Corinthians 14:26 as well. Here he admonishes in a presuppositional way that “when you come together, each one has a hymn, [etc.] . . . for the strengthening of the church.”
3. The primary concern of the exhortation in the Colossians passage is with the “word of Christ.” In Paul this expression invariably means “the message of the gospel with its central focus on Christ.” This, after all, is what the letter is all about: Christ the embodiment of God, Christ the all-sufficient one, Christ, creator and redeemer. Paul now urges that this “word of Christ,” which in part he has already articulated in 1:15–23, “dwell in their midst” in an abundant way.
In so doing, they will reflect precisely what we learned about worship from 1 Corinthians 11:4–5. Part of their activity will be directed toward one another (“teaching and admonishing one another”), and part toward God (“singing to God with your hearts”). Thus the riches of the gospel are to be present among them with great richness. The structure of the sentence as a whole indicates that songs of all kinds are to play a significant role in that richness.
4. The parallel passage in Ephesians makes explicit what we would have guessed in any case, that Paul considers all this activity to be the result of their being filled with the Spirit. Thus, however we are to understand the adjective “Spiritual” in relation to the various expressions of song, Spirit songs are at least one expression of the Spirit’s presence, whose fullness will guide and inspire all of the worship in its several expressions.
The Worship Itself
When we turn from these opening clauses to the rest of the sentences, we learn still more about Paul’s understanding of Spirit-inspired worship.
1. We need to note, first of all, that where the Spirit of God is, there is also singing. The early church was characterized by its singing; so also in every generation where there is renewal by the Spirit a new hymnody breaks forth. If most such songs do not have staying power, some of them do, and these become the treasure-trove of our ongoing teaching and admonishing of one another, as well as of our constantly turning to God the Father and God the Son and offering praise by inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
2. Nonetheless, it is doubtful whether we are finally able to draw fine lines between the three words used to describe the singing. The “psalms,” for example, may well include the Old Testament Psalter, now taken over into the worship of the Christian communities; but one would be bold indeed to limit the word only to the Psalter. This same word is used for the (apparently) more spontaneous singing of 1 Corinthians 14:26, and its corresponding verb is likewise used in 1 Corinthians 14:15 to refer to Spirit-inspired “praise to God.” Thus, even though New Testament usage is undoubtedly conditioned by the fact that the hymns of Israel were called “psalms,” there is no good reason to understand it as limited to those hymns. What is suggested by this word is a song that is in praise of God.
So also the word “hymn.” In the Greek world, this word was used exclusively of songs sung to deities or heroes, and thus would never be used, for example, of the bawdy songs of the bistro. Therefore “hymns” also refer to singing praise to/about God, or in the case of the New Testament to/about Christ as well, as the evidence from Revelation makes especially clear.
The word “songs” covers the whole range of singing, so Paul qualifies it here with reference to the Spirit. The adjective pneumatikos (“S/spiritual”) in Paul ordinarily refers to the Spirit, either directly or indirectly. Here in particular, as most recognize, the ordinary meaning prevails. We are dealing with songs that are inspired by the Spirit. This is most likely an indication of a kind of charismatic hymnody, similar to that alluded to in 1 Corinthians 14:15–16 and 26, in which Spirit-inspired, hence often spontaneous, songs were offered in the context of congregational worship.
Therefore, even though “Spiritual” could well modify all three nouns—the psalms and hymns would also be “of the Spirit”—it is more likely that it is intended to modify “songs” only, referring especially to this one kind of Spirit-inspired singing. This word, after all, is the one that the recipients of the letter would least likely associate with worship, since it covers the whole range of songs in the Greek world, whereas the other two are usually sung to a deity.
3. We probably have fragments of such psalms, hymns, and Spirit songs embedded in our New Testament documents. The book of Revelation, for example, is full of “new songs” sung to God and to the Lamb. That is almost certainly the case with Ephesians 5:14 and 1 Timothy 3:16 as well. But more significantly for this letter, the considered opinion of most New Testament scholars is that Colossians 1:15–18 also reflects such a hymn about Christ. If this is so, and there are no good reasons to doubt it, then that would also explain why Paul thinks of these various kinds of hymns and Spirit songs as a means of their “teaching and admonishing one another.” Such songs are at the same time creedal, full of theological grist, and give evidence of what the early Christians most truly believed about God and his Christ.
4. The background to such two-dimensional worship, hymns that are at once directed toward God and a means of teaching and admonishing one another, is to be found in the Old Testament Psalter. There we find dozens of examples of hymns addressed to God in the second person, which also have sections in the third person, extolling the greatness or faithfulness of God for the sake of those singing to him.
The use of hymns in the New Testament documents indicates how clearly they also function in this two-dimensional way for the early church. Most of them are about Christ, and as such are both in worship of him and for the continuing instruction of God’s people. The clear implication of 1 Corinthians 14:15–16 and 26 is that “Spirit songs” in the Pauline communities are also to be understood in this way. Singing “with the mind” (singing intelligible words by the Spirit) is understood as praise to God, and something to which the rest respond with the Amen; and the “psalm” in 14:26 is precisely for the “building up” of the others. Unfortunately, many contemporary Christians do not think of their singing in these terms, and thus miss out on one of the significant dimensions of our reason for singing.
5. Finally—and with this observation we bring the contents of this book full circle—in its own nonreflective way, Colossians 3:16 too is a trinitarian text. But in contrast to the various texts cited in chapter 4 above, where the Father initiates salvation, which the Son effects and the Spirit applies, here the order is reversed. Christ still plays the central role, hence they must let the “word of Christ” dwell lavishly in their midst. But the same Spirit who applied salvation now helps to initiate response through Spirit-inspired songs reflecting the message about Christ, and all to the praise of God.
The God who created and redeemed is worthy of all praise. The Spirit, who was present at creation and came to bring us to life in redemption, now leads us in the worship and praise of our Redeemer and Creator. In Paul, therefore, our worship is as trinitarian as our experience and our theology. It is obviously the presence of the Spirit among us as we gather in Christ’s name that makes it so.
Reflection Questions