The Chapel - Rediscovering God Changes Everything.

Greetings,

This is a very good question! Worship can be physically expressed in many ways, from sitting quietly in contemplative reverence to dancing. Biblically, we find a wide range of such expressions.

Perhaps one of the more exuberant expressions is reported in 2 Samuel 6:12-23. Here we find King David removing his royal robes and dancing and leaping in worship before the Lord. In addition, he offers an abundance of sacrifices in honor of God as the Ark of God is brought to Jerusalem. David responds to his wife’s disapproval by claiming that he “will make merry before the Lord.” Hence, physical worship of this magnitude is an expression of joy and happiness consistent with David’s temperament. Psalm 47:1 exhorts, “Clap your hands, all peoples! Shout to God with loud songs of joy!” Psalm 134 encourages us to “come bless the Lord, all you servants of the Lord…. Lift up your hands to the holy place and bless the Lord!” So it appears that God is blessed when we include physical gestures in worship, as long as these are authentic expressions that come from our heart. The Apostle Paul desires “that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger and quarreling” (1 Tim. 2:8). So it appears that raising hands is an appropriate gesture in prayer as well. So such gestures as dancing, clapping, and lifting one’s hands are all approved by Scripture.

Then again, we find this simple and beautiful exhortation in Psalm 95:6, “Oh come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker.” And God declares through the prophet Isaiah, “To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance” (Is. 45:23). Hence, kneeling and even prostrating ourselves before God in otherwise verbally expressionless reverence honors God as well (For an example of prostration, see 2 Samuel 12:16).

These are only a few of the different ways that prayer and worship are physically expressed in the Bible. How one worships may be a matter of temperament or propriety given the setting. It may be a matter of the Spirit’s leading and obedience on the part of the worshiper in a particular situation. It may be founded on a worshiper’s particular tradition, be it, as in your case, more traditional as you indicate, charismatic, or even liturgical as in Lutheran or Anglican churches. However, we also need to be open to ways in which the Spirit may be challenging us to expand our worship repertoire in order to maximize our experience of his presence in worship.

Blessings,

Arnie Gentile

http://www.mychristianapologetics.com/