Worshiping Up to Our Theology
D.G. Hart has rightly observed that in worship, “ You cannot separate form and content ” (“Recovering Mother Kirk”, 200). His point should be clear, but just in case it’s not, then allow me to rephrase it this way: You will either worship up to your theology, or you will lower your theology to your worship. One way to understand this is in regard to our liturgical language. To put it in the ancient formula, lex orandi, lex credendi est : The language of prayer is the language of faith . If the language of our worship (songs, prayers, etc) is predominately pietistic, individualistic, therapeutic, revivalistic, charismatic, and self-absorbed, then no matter what our official stated theology (whether it‘s the 39 Articles of Religion, or the Westminster Confession of Faith), our lived theology will become pietistic, individualistic, therapeutic, revivalistic, charismatic, self-absorbed, and that then develops into the gauge by which our people evaluate a church, their life experiences, a...