Introducing Liturgy: A Concept More Familiar Than You May Think

Every Fall our church hosts the Simeon Trust Workshop. In that workshop, we study the principles of interpreting the Bible from different genres and types of text (narrative, poetry, and didactic). And somewhere in the workshop, the leaders will bring out this pyramid.

                                                      

They call it the pyramid of competence, and it can be found online with various origin stories. Applied to teaching, it goes like this:

1. There are some who don’t know what they are doing when they read the Bible. And don’t know that what they don’t know. This is where almost every Bible reader begins, and they might be called the “unconsciously incompetent.”
   
   
2. There are also those who have not arrived at a level of competence, but importantly, they know they are lacking in competence. To varying degrees, they know that they need to grow, learn, improve, and become competent. These are the “consciously incompetent.” And for all students of the Bible, this is a phase they must traverse—and often, they must traverse it multiple times. (Personally, I have often felt this way as I begin to study a new part of Scripture).
   
   
3. Then there are the ones who have worked up the pyramid to arrive at a level of “conscious competence.” They know what they are doing with Scripture and they know why. This is the optimal position on the pyramid, even though it is not the top.
   
   
4. For at the top level, which is the most rare group, is the type of person who is “unconsciously competent.” That is to say, they read Scripture clearly and arrive at the right conclusions, but they do not know why. 

To focus on this last group for a moment, this person is uniquely blessed by good instincts, but they are almost always the worst type of teacher, because they don’t know how to help those who do not intuitively understand the Bible. And this is due, in part, to the fact that this unconsciously competent individual is likely forgetful of the influences that have helped him or her understand the Bible well.

If we could peal back the layers, however, we would find that this savant was assuredly raised in church or taught Scripture in school or at home. In other words, when it comes to the revealed religion of Jesus Christ, no one stumbles into without the influence of others. And when it comes to the way we worship, the same is true. No one rightly worships God without being taught how to worship. And even for those who have proper sense of true worship, there are reasons for that intuitive understanding.

This ordering of worship is known as liturgy, and for the next few weeks, our church is going to examine the Bible to see what it says about worship and how to order our services according to God’s revealed will.

Introducing Liturgy

When it comes to the idea of liturgy, you may find yourself thinking that this is something High Church Anglicans or Roman Catholics do, but not Bible Church evangelicals. Equally, the word itself may be new or unfamiliar, even though leitourgeō is used throughout the New Testament.[1] If asked to explain what liturgy is, most who have come to faith in modern evangelical churches might not have an immediate answer. But I guarantee you, if you have been in church for any length of time, you are not incompetent either.

Over the last number of years, our church has added a host of liturgical elements to our order of service. Every Sunday, you are called to worship with Scripture, and on many Sunday’s you have confessed your faith as we have recited the Apostles or the Nicene Creed. Likewise, we have corporately confessed our sins and heard the good words of pardon. And if you are baptized member of our church, you have also partaken of the bread and the cup. So, whether you know it or not, you already have a certain competence to the liturgy.

Even more, going beyond the liturgical elements just mentioned, OBC’s Sunday worship has matured too. This has included our song selection, our single-service, and our weekly communion. All of these have changed (for the better) over the last decade.

Put all that together and you have a good foundation for understanding liturgy, even if you weren’t thinking about it. But now, it is time to think about it and to go from doing the right thing (unconscious competence) to knowing why we are doing the right thing (conscious competence). And more than that, we also need to see some aspects of worship that need improvement and change—things like the elements we use for the Lord’s Supper.

On Earth As It Is In Heaven: Delighting in the Liturgy of the Lord’s Day

For these reasons and more, we are beginning a new sermon series entitled, On Earth as it is in Heaven. This sermon title comes from the center of the Lord’s Prayer (Matt. 6:10). But more than that, it is the aim of every Sunday gathering. When we gather on the Lord’s Day, we are not simply coming to enjoy heavenly thoughts while we remain on earth. Rather, as we will see most explicitly this Sunday, we are actually ascending the hill of the Lord to meet with God who comes to meet with us. Truly, if only spiritually, gathered worship is a time where heaven touches earth and God’s saints commune with their Father in heaven.
 Still, to see that invisible reality, we need to consider what Scripture says about worship. So, for the next eight Sundays (as the Lord allows), we will focus our time on answering questions like these:

 1. Where are we when we worship?

 2. Who is present when we worship?

 3. What are we doing when we worship?

 4. When are we commanded to worship?

These questions and more will animate our time. And it is my hope and prayer that by means of this sermon series, it will not only purify our worship, but it will mature all of us in our communion with God. For in fact, how we worship is determinative for everything else about us—just read Psalm 115.

So, take time to pray for this sermon series and for your own heart to grow in understanding of what it means to come and worship God. My prayer is that we will all delight more in the liturgy of the Lord’s Day and that over the next eight Sundays, the Lord will purify our praise and glorify his Son in our midst. For this Sunday, take time to read Hebrews 12:18–29. That is where we will begin our time, as we think about where we are when come to church on Sunday.

 As the Lord allows, I look forward to seeing you on the Lord’s Day.

 For His Glory and your joy in Christ,

 Pastor David
 

   ^{[1] The word leitourgeō is often translated ‘minister,’ ‘service,’ or ‘offering.’ It can be found in Luke 1:23; Acts 13:2 Romans 13:6; 15:16, 27; 2 Corinthians 9:12; Philippians 2:17, 25, 30; Hebrews 1:14; 8:2, 6; 9:21.}