As Christians growing in faith in Christ, we engage in various spiritual disciplines. Those habits we cultivate to become more like Jesus become spiritual disciplines. They are ways of offering our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. Spiritual disciplines help us grow in our faith and provide opportunities to be transformed by renewing our minds. Living this kind of life is our “true and proper worship” (Romans 12:1-2).
Corporate worship is the gathering of the body of Christ to give glory to God, to be identified as his people, and be conformed to him by celebrating the grand story of redemption as revealed to us in his Word (2 Corinthians 3:18). Through corporate worship, God speaks to his people and his people respond in love for his gift of eternal life. Believers gathering to respond to God’s grace cultivate a relationship with him and each other—building the body of Christ to accomplish his commission to reconcile all people to himself (2 Corinthians 5:18-19). Corporate worship is a spiritual discipline. It is a significant way of learning who we are as God’s people and becoming more like Jesus as we partner with God and each other in his mission. God does not need our help in accomplishing his mission. Still, in his perfect love, he invites us into a covenant partnership with him and each other to experience the true meaning of love—receiving and offering love to God and to each other (Mark 12:29-31).
The early Church also practiced worship as a spiritual discipline. They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, fellowship, breaking bread, and prayer (Acts 2:42). They gathered to praise God in the temple and their homes (Acts 2:46-47). They also worshiped God by serving one another (Galatians 5:13) and giving generously (2 Corinthians 9:7). Through these actions, the early church became the body of Christ so powerfully that Paul, a persecutor of men and women of the early Church, was asked by Jesus in a vision, “Why do you persecute me?”
Through corporate worship, the early Church was indeed the body of Christ. If spiritual disciplines are intended to make the individual believer more like Jesus, there is no better way to encourage that development than through corporate worship where the body of Christ forms for the purpose of reconciling all things to God.
by Jeff Faux, Director of Sacred Arts
