Biblical Modes of Worship (Part 3)

Synagogue Worship

In its own complex way, the Bible presents several facets of worship.  As we behold the breadth of Scripture and the story of God and his people, we can witness five modes of worship that facilitate the meeting of God and his people. Join us for the next few posts to unpack these following five modes of biblical worship.* 

• Tabernacle / Temple Worship

• Davidic Worship 

• Synagogue Worship

• New Testament Hymns

• Heavenly Worship in the book of Revelation

Worship leaders today can embrace characteristics of worship from these biblical modes and prayerfully implement them with their leadership teams and know they're not just relying on what seems current. 

You may be wondering what a Jewish synagogue has to do with Christian worship. Quite a lot. Just as Tabernacle / Temple worship is a major antecedent to Christian worship, so also the synagogue plays a deeply formative role in how Christians order their worship of the Holy Trinity. What characterizes the biblical mode of synagogue worship for our Christian worship leader context is very simple: God's word and prayer, often sung or chanted. 

Most protestant worship services resemble this biblical mode of worship. A synagogue service generally consisted of sung psalms, reading of God's word, explanation of it, and prayers interspersed throughout. With its emphasis on the Law, Prophets, and Psalms, the synagogue service functioned as a way for the dispossessed people of Israel to remember their identity and remain vitally connected to God and one another as they experienced exile, sojourn as pilgrims, and living in an occupied land at the time of Jesus' birth. The synagogue was part of how God provided for Israel and kept them in the Law as the time would come for Christ to be born and redeem the world (Gal 3:23-26; 4:4-7). It was in the synagogue in his hometown of Nazareth that Jesus read from the scroll of the Prophet Isaiah and revealed that he indeed was the Messiah (Luke 4:16-21). One need only look to synagogues today and see the diaspora of Jews to understand the power the synagogue holds for community formation and connection. 

In the days of the second temple and of Christ's birth, the synagogue surely kept God's story in the heart and mind of the believer as the story of God creating and one day redeeming the world continually washed over them in chanted scripture and prayers for this was a time when oral tradition was at its highest. What do we mean by that?

Imagine for a moment that you live in a world where books exist, but they are few and far between. Only those with incredible wealthy own books - codices and scrolls - and even so books were not as trusted as the oral content passed down through the generations. Someone copying a scroll or book could easily make an error or worse insert something that fit their agenda. This mindset is quite the opposite of what we experience today. Information is ready for us at the touch of a screen or the uttering of "Hey Google...."

So, the content sung, read, and prayed was confidently proclaimed and just as confidently received. And this content wasn't just information, it was the narrative of God's grace in the life of God's people. Thus, praying, singing, and reading these words of life had the effect of what George Guiver calls "stream prayer."** Just as a stream carries sediment along with it and deposits bits of sediment along the way, so also the synagogue worship would be equally formative. Over time the "sediment" of truth, God's word, his "great and precious promises," would be deposited in the heart and mind of the worshiper leaving behind multiple layers of God's grace. 

Worship leaders in today's context have a high calling to ensure the lyrics sung and prayers prayed fall within this great tradition. Would today's worship set make sense to a believer 500 years ago? 1,500 years ago? Despite our different age and cultural context, God's truth revealed in Scripture is timeless. Just as the synagogue worship invited God's people into a stream of God's word sung or chanted, worship leaders today have the opportunity to carry on their office to facilitate layers of God's grace being deposited in their congregations. 

*I owe these categories to the brief study presented by Robert E. Webber in Enter His Courts with Praise: A Study of the Role of Music and the Arts in Worship (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1995). 

**George Guiver, Company of Voices: Daily Prayer and the People of God (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock, 2008).