Is It Wrong to Have A “Praise and Worship Service?”

There's nothing wrong with singing in the church building. We may sing hymns in our local assembly. The problem is that church members are often more concerned with fleshly entertainment than Bible education.

Many have no desire for learning actual Bible doctrine. In my article to which you are referring, I mentioned that people would often rather sing and dance in church than engage in proper Bible study.

Bible study will help them in the long-run because that is how Father God will work in and through them (1 Thessalonians 2:13). Studying is how we allow God to renew our minds (Romans 12:2), so we can think like Him (1 Corinthians 2:9-16). Mere singing and dancing are profitless because it is the flesh and there is often no underlying sound Bible doctrine causing us to behave as such.

For example, if you have not noticed, so-called “contemporary Christian music” tends to make people focus on the flesh (emotions) rather than on the words of the Spirit of God. What is frequently passed off as “praise and worship” is often not based on actual Bible teaching or studying. It is about what tune can be played to pacify/entertain Christians, and what beat can please the world so unbelievers are enticed to enter the church building. There should be no such compromise. A local church should not sound like the world in any fashion—and that especially applies to music!

Christian people, commonly the neo-evangelicals and Pentecostals, believe that they’ve “contacted” God because they danced or sang songs for an hour on Sunday or Wednesday. They get all emotional and the flesh causes them to lose control. They get to swaying, looking up, raising hands, spinning, constantly shouting, rolling around on the floor, jumping over pews, tapping their toes, clapping their hands, and so on. Do they realize and believe that the Spirit of life in Christ lives in them 24 hours a day… that He is not outside of us, but rather in and one within our human “spirit of man?”

Then there’s the unfeeling, unexpressive, religionist of mainline Christendom who simply sing the requisite 3 songs before the sermon, who seem to be void of the Spirit within, that is if they are a genuine believer.

But usually, the so-called “praise and worship” music of today’s “Christianity” is just loud, empty noise designed to make people move round and round. The lyrics are shallow, with little to no sound doctrinal (Biblical) content. Rather than drawing attention to and exalting God’s doctrine in song, people start watching each other as they move around in the church building. Let it be said again: “praise and worship” today is often nothing more than a distraction from what really matters.

We need to be more focused on the teachings of the Holy Bible rightly divided. The professing Church has neglected this priority and is void of any power to combat the tremendous errors in Satan’s evil world.

Think about this. If we say only a part of our time in church is “praise and worship,” what about the rest of the day? What about the rest of the week? Should we not be “worshipping” God and “praising” Him throughout the day? Throughout the week? Yes, we should. That is why it is misleading to limit “praise and worship” to an hour on Sunday morning, Sunday evening, or Wednesday evening.

In actuality, every action and every word spoken of every day of our lives should be an act of worship of God:

“And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him” (Colossians 3:17).

Contrary to modern-day “Christianity’s” claim, worshipping Father God goes far beyond singing and dancing. (You can visit nightclubs where there is plenty of “singing and dancing!” Is God being worshipped there?) Worshipping God is all about believing the doctrines of His grace, and applying those verses to life by faith. When those verses go to work in our lives, then we naturally burst into song.

During today’s “Dispensation of the Grace of God,” the Apostle Paul did talk about Christians singing. Notice Ephesians 5:19:

Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord….”

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.” Colossians 3:16

In Acts 16:25, we read: “And at midnight Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God: and the prisoners heard them.” These saints were so filled with the Holy Spirit and appreciative for the truth of His word that they sang praises to God… while imprisoned!

Please pay special attention to Colossians 3:16: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom….” Having the Word of God rightly divided—sound Bible doctrine—enables us to identify or compose truthful hymns that communicate good doctrine. Often, modern-day “Christian” songs are filled with philosophy (human wisdom), church tradition, and so on. That is not the “word of Christ.” That is the word of men (manmade religion). Colossians 2:8 says:

“Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.”

And, the Lord Jesus’ classic rebuke of Israel’s formalistic, legalistic, but empty, religious system:

“Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do” (Mark 7:7-8).

“God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth,” the Lord Jesus Christ declared in John 4:24. The word “spirit” here in “spirit and truth” is our mind — “be renewed in the spirit of your mind (Eph. 4:23). The “renewed mind” is discussed in Romans 12:1-2:

“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. 2And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”

With all the doctrine Paul laid out in the first 11 chapters of Romans, we take the truths and then let the Christian life work itself out in our lives. That would be Romans chapters 12-16. As we already saw, part of Christian (grace) living is our singing. When we learn what Father God has done for us, and what He will do with us in the future, we can be grateful and sing praises to Him. We can be thankful for His goodness, wisdom, faithfulness (go back to Ephesians 5:19 and Colossians 3:16). But here is the important point to grasp. Singing is designed to move us on the inside (reinforce God’s Word in our heart) rather than the outside (outward movements of the physical body).

Ephesians 5:19 said, in part: “…making melody in your heart to the Lord….” Colossians 3:16 said, in part: “…singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.”

Above all, Father God is looking for hearts of faith when we assemble with other Christians. He looks beyond what people are doing with their physical bodies—dancing, jumping, shouting, rolling around, spinning, clapping, and so on. He wants to see who is singing in the heart, using a mind renewed by His Word rightly divided. He wants to see a heart that has believed those divine words and implemented that doctrine in life. As with the case of prayer, Father God is listening for people in the heart repeating His Word to Him, rather than individuals mindlessly parroting words people wrote with denominational biases, philosophy, non-dispensational approach to Scripture, and so on.

We should find songs that agree with the Word of God rightly divided, or compose our own songs based on those verses, and sing them. This is a way of reinforcing Bible truth for today.

Words set to music are often a great way of learning in any discipline or field of study. By the way, Moses taught the nation Israel some doctrine by teaching them a song—the “Song of Moses” of Exodus 15:1-21—as soon as they escaped Egyptian bondage. The judge and prophetess Deborah and her general Barak sang a song after JEHOVAH God gave Israel victory over their enemies the Midianites (Judges 5:1-31). A whole Bible Book—Psalms—contains 150 songs to and about the one true God and His dealings with mankind!

- Adapted from Shawn Brasseaux -