If the worship of God is the most important thing in life, the corresponding question of "How does God require us to worship him?" must necessarily be asked. The historic, Reformed answer to that question has been formulated as what is known as the Regulative Principle of Worship. This principle, derived from the Reformation maxim of Sola Scriptura, is laid out and defended in the Reformed confessions of faith. The Regulative Principle in contrast to the commonplace Normative Principle, affirms that God alone has the right to determine what is acceptable in worship and how the church should conduct itself in its gathered meetings.

The National Center for Family Integrated Churches welcomes Sam Waldron with the following message entitled, The Regulative principle in confessions of faith. It would be wrong if I did not take a moment here at the outset of this session to express gratitude to Scott Brown for the opportunity to speak to you at this conference. I am pleased to think that his invitation manifests both a Christian largeness of heart and a confessional center which I find highly commendable. I'm also grateful to speak to you because of the subject which I have been assigned. Just as there is nothing more important than the worship of God, so also there is no more important question than how God requires us to worship Him.

The answer to this how question is for the Reformed tradition found in what has been called the Regulative principle of worship. Now the meaning of this somewhat intimidating theological phrase finds its historical meaning fixed in the three great culminating confessions of the Reformation, the Westminster Confession, the Savoy Declaration of Faith, and the Second London, or 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith. I'm going to use the language in this hour of the 1689 Baptist Confession, since it is my confession, but it is almost identical with that of both the Westminster and Savoy at this point. In each of these confessions, the Regulative Principle is summarized in the chapter entitled Of Religious Worship and the Sabbath Day. This chapter might also be entitled Of the Regulative Principle of Worship.

I think the entire chapter may be faithfully outlined taking this as its theme. My hope is that you will see that I am taking no undue liberties with it when I use it to outline for you the historical significance and the standard meaning of what has been called the regulative principle of worship. We're going to look at five headings with regard to this that take us through the eight paragraphs of this chapter. It's faithful definition, it's fundamental direction, it's foundational distinction, it's final dispensation, and it's fixed determination. You see them there.

First of all, consider its faithful definition. After some introductory words about worship, the definition of the Regulative Principle is carefully laid out in the last part of the opening paragraph of this chapter. It reads, but the acceptable way of worshiping the true God is instituted by himself and so limited by his own revealed will that he may not be worshiped according to the imagination and devices of men nor the suggestions of Satan under any visible representations or any other way not prescribed in the Holy Scriptures." I've described this as a faithful definition of the Regulative Principle. I've described it that way because I believe it is simply a finely worded statement of the doctrine held by the Reformed tradition as a whole descending from Calvin himself. Some argue that Calvin differed from his Puritan progeny on this subject, and it is true that with regard to some matters of application, there may have been differences.

It is not true, however, that Calvin differed from the Puritans on the principle itself. This is not the place to fully vindicate that assertion, but I do want to give you the substance of one of Calvin's clearest statements, and you'll pardon that it's going to take the next seven slides to get through this somewhat lengthy quotation. Here is Calvin's statement of the Regulative Principle in his work called The Necessity of Reforming the Church. Moreover, the rule which distinguishes between pure and vitiated worship is of universal application in order that we may not adopt any device which seems fit to ourselves but look to the injunctions of him alone is entitled to prescribe. Therefore if we would have him to approve our worship, this rule, which he everywhere enforces with the utmost strictness, must be carefully observed.

For there is a twofold reason why the Lord in Condemning and prohibiting all fictitious worship requires us to give obedience only to his own voice. First it tends greatly to establish his authority that we do not follow our own pleasure, but depend entirely on his sovereignty. And secondly, such is our folly that when we are left at liberty, all we are able to do is go astray. And then, when once we have turned aside from the right path, there is no end to our wanderings until we get buried under a multitude of superstitions. Justly, therefore, does the Lord, in order to assert full right of dominion, strictly enjoin what he wishes us to do, and at once reject all human devices which are at variance with his command.

Justly too does he, in express terms, define our limits that we may not by fabricating perverse modes of worship provoke his anger against us. I know how difficult it is to persuade the world that God disapproves of all modes of worship, not expressly sanctioned by his word. The opposite persuasion which cleaves to them being seated as it were in their very bones and marrow is that whatever they do has in itself a sufficient sanction provided it exhibits some kind of zeal for the honor of God. But since God not only regards us fruitless but also plainly abominates, whatever we undertake from zeal to his worship, if at variance with his command, What do we gain by a contrary course? The words of God are clear and distinct.

Obedience is better than sacrifice. In vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. Every addition to his word, especially in this matter, is a lie. Mere will worship is vanity. This is the decision.

And when once the judge has decided, it is no longer time to debate. I think those words of Calvin are beyond misunderstanding. The same viewpoint with regard to the regulation of worship found its way into the greatest of the continental confessions of the Reformers, the Belgic Confession. In Article 32, That confession is entitled, Of the Order and Discipline of the Church, and within it, it affirms, and therefore we reject all human inventions and all laws which man would introduce into the worship of God, thereby to bind and compel the conscience in any manner, whatever. And yet more clear and succinct is question 96 of the Heidelberg Catechism.

What does God require in the second commandment? Answer, that we in no wise represent God by images, nor worship Him in any other way than He has commanded in His Word." Much more might be said by way of showing that the 1689 Baptist Confession statement of the Regulator Principle is nothing but a faithful definition of the rule of worship adopted by the whole Reformed tradition. But this is, I think, sufficient for our present purpose. But Though this is the position of the whole Reformed tradition, it is not the position of the whole Protestant tradition. Both the Lutheran and Anglican wings of Protestantism rejected the Regulative Principle in favor of what has come to be called the normative principle of worship.

The regulative principle is only properly understood, in fact, when it is understood in contrast with the normative principle of the Lutherans and the Anglicans. What was the difference between the Reformed and the Lutherans on the continent and the Puritans and the Anglicans in Britain? Well, substantially this. Lutherans and Anglicans held that sola scriptura only applied to matters of church doctrine, but not to matters of church order and worship. Incredibly to us, who think so highly of the man and we ought to, Luther was satisfied to practice infant baptism because it was the Catholic tradition of the church and was simply not contradicted by Scripture.

Notice that language. He could not prove it from scripture. He did not derive it from what we call Sola Scriptura. And yet he practiced infant baptism, because he said it found its basis in the Catholic tradition of the church. Thankfully, I'm not attacking infant baptism here, thankfully, Calvin gave what he considered to be at least more biblical arguments and tried to root that practice in sola scriptura.

But Luther did not. He rooted it in what is called the normative principle. We can do what we want in worship as long as we don't contradict Scripture. Similarly, Anglicans make no claim to find their elaborate church order in the Scriptures, but are satisfied that it does not contradict Scripture and is consistent with the tradition found in the first five centuries of church history. The Scottish Presbyterian, James Bannerman, ably contrasts the Puritan doctrine contained in our confession, and the Anglican doctrine.

Here's what he says, in the case of the Church of England, its doctrine in regard to church power and the worship of God is that it has a right to decree everything except what is forbidden in the Word of God. In the case of our own church, its doctrine in reference to church power and the worship of God is that it has the right to decree nothing, except what expressly or by implication is enjoined by the Word of God. The Reformed view of the Regulative Principle of the Church and its worship requires us to ground our church government and worship on something more than a human tradition, a human reason, or pragmatism which does not contradict the Scriptures. It requires the clear precedent of Scripture for our church's government and worship. If this simple requirement was understood and taken seriously, it would lead to vast changes in the practice of most evangelical churches.

And it rebukes a plethora of practices and ideas taken for granted today and is a loud call to repentance and to a worship that actually has God's sanction and approval. Well, that's the faithful definition. Consider the fundamental demand or direction of that principle in the second place. Paragraph two immediately proceeds to state a certain fundamental direction or demand which this view of divine worship immediately requires. Here's what it has to say.

Religious worship is to be given to God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and to Him alone, not to angels, saints, or any other creatures, and since the fall not without a mediator, nor in the mediation of any other, but Christ alone. I don't intend to spend a lot of time in this paragraph, but it would be a mistake to say, oh, we all know that and pass over it too quickly. Because I think we have a tendency to think that only Roman Catholics have a tendency to get man in the way of the worship of God and the mediation of Christ. I think we see even today in Reformed-leaning evangelicals, cults of celebrity that remind us how easy It is for Christians to go down the path that leads to the compromise of sola dea gloria and sola scriptura. But Roman numeral three, its foundational distinction.

This is found in paragraphs three through five. Since our worship must have biblical precedent, it is not surprising that the Confession then proceeds to specify what the parts of worship are that do have biblical precedent. Notice the several uses of the word part in paragraphs 3, 5, and 6. Prayer with thanksgiving being one part of natural Worship is by God required of all men." Paragraph five. The reading of the scriptures, preaching and hearing the word of God, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing with grace in our hearts to the Lord as also the administration of baptism and the Lord's Supper are all parts of religious worship of God.

Paragraph 6, neither prayer nor any other part of religious worship is not under the gospel tied onto or made more acceptable by any place in which it is performed. These references to the divinely appointed parts of worship bring us face to face with an important historical distinction that is vital to the Reformed understanding of the Regulative Principle. I refer to the distinction between the parts of worship and the circumstances of worship. The Regulative principle so teaches the confession and the Reformed tradition governs the parts but not the circumstances of worship. The definition of the regulative principle given us in chapter 22 Paragraph 1 of the 1689 Baptist Confession must be read in conjunction with chapter 1, paragraph 6.

And that paragraph actually has paradoxically enough two paragraphs in it. Paragraph 6a says this, The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for his own glory, man's salvation, faith, and life is either expressly set down or necessarily contained in the Holy Scripture unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelation of the spirit or traditions of men. Here, something crucial to the understanding of the Regulative Principle is stated, and it is something that is often misunderstood. Sometimes it is said that those who believe in the Regulative Principle require a direct command if something is to be a part of worship. That is simply not true.

What is required is simply the warrant or precedent of sola scriptura. In other words, what is required is that there must be either the express statement of Scripture or by good and necessary consequence, the thing must be contained in Scripture by way of implication. The warrant for a part of worship need not be a direct command, nor need it be an explicit statement. It may be a simple example, and it may be a necessary deduction from Scripture. But Paragraph 6b is where the confession comes to qualify the regulative principle.

Nevertheless, we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in His Word. And then these words are most important. And that, there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God and government of the church common to human actions and societies which should be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence according to the general rules of the word which are always to be observed. In this second part of paragraph 6 of chapter 1, we come to an important clarification, qualification or caution with regard to the regulative principle. To put it bluntly, the regulative principle does not apply to the circumstances of worship, it only applies to its part.

See that statement again. There are some circumstances concerning the worship of God and the government of the church, common human actions of societies which are to be ordered by the light of nature, not direct scriptural prescription, but by the light of nature and Christian prudence, a way of talking about sanctified common sense and the general rules of the word, which are always to be observed. Now today, this distinction between parts and circumstances has been made the pretext For sneaking all sorts of things into worship under the pretense that there are mere circumstances of worship. I have heard drama, dance, and deafening rock bands justified in this way. Such inflation of the circumstances of worship, I think, is self-evidently wrong.

The circumstances are simply the details that need to be arranged so that the appointed parts of worship may be practiced. For example, if congregational singing is a part of worship, and it is, then all sorts of circumstances need to be decided if we're going to do that. How will it be led? How will it be accompanied or pitched? How will the church know what to sing?

When will the church sing? How much will the church sing? But these circumstantial details are solely for the purpose of implementing and they are subordinate to the part of worship that we call congregational Singing. Self-evidently, these circumstances must be arranged in a way that furthers the Congregational Singing and does not tend either to undermine Congregational Singing or obscure it." Now, before we move to the next part of the confessional statement, and in connection with what I have just now been saying, I want to underline something that the confessional emphasis on the parts of worship makes clear. The confession not only makes clear that the parts of worship must be scriptural, but that they must be observed scripturally.

For instance, paragraph five said that they are to be, and this is the scripturally part, to be performed in obedience to him with understanding, faith, reverence, and godly fear. Our arrangement of the circumstances of worship by sanctified common sense must not only enable us to practice the scriptural parts of worship, but to practice them scripturally." But that brings us to paragraph 6 of the confession, what I've called the final dispensation of the Regulative Principle. Take a look at that paragraph. Neither prayer nor any other part of religious worship is now under the gospel tied unto or made more acceptable by any place in which it is performed or towards which it is directed. Reference to the temple in the Old Testament and praying toward the temple in the Old Testament.

But God is to be worshipped everywhere in spirit and in truth, as in private families daily and in secret each one by himself so more solemnly in the public assemblies which are not carelessly nor willfully to be neglected or forsaken when God by his word or providence calls there onto." The main point of this paragraph is to make the point that under the gospel, those are the keywords, worship is not tied to any particular geographical location. But Underlying this point is a broader perspective or principle that we must understand. It is that worship under the law and worship under the gospel, worship in what we call Old Testament times and worship in New Testament times are quite different. The fact that we live in the final or gospel dispensation of world history has brought about pervasive changes in God's appointment about how he should be worshiped. The regulative principle remains the same, but its specific appointments with regard to worship have changed because of the change of dispensation.

One drastic difference is pointed to by the confession, and that is the abolition of temple worship in Jerusalem with all its accoutrements. Now this is important. The fact that the regulative principle of worship is altered in its appointments by the change of dispensation from the law to the gospel is of great importance practically in our day. One of the ways in which the many departures from Reformed worship have been repeatedly justified is by means of a, a kind of willy-nilly, wooly-headed appeal to the Old Testament. Do we want dance or religious parades or processions or big bands?

Well, there they are all in the Old Testament. What this kind of argument forgets is that the regulative principle of worship is really the regulative principle of the church and its worship. And the nature of the church has changed drastically, all Reformed Christians believe this, from the old to the new. We Reformed Baptists just believe it a little more drastically I guess. But since the nature of the church has changed drastically from the old to the new, it follows necessarily that the nature of its appointed worship has also changed drastically since the Old Testament times, and this is what the Confession is pointing to.

Now, I am not denying, of course, that some things continue from the Old Testament. The Regulative Principle is itself one of those things. The Ten Commandments as the moral core of God's law and the republication of the law written on the heart of Adam. The Ten Commandments continue and thus of course everything in them which governs worship. But with regard to the matter of the outward appointments of worship, we are dealing with one of those things that has changed drastically since the Old Testament.

Not only do you have the change of the, and the abolition of the Old Testament temple and priesthood and ceremonial sacrifices, you have the change of even the nature of God's covenant people from a physical nation to the church. Thus, arguments for New Testament worship from the appointments related to the Old Testament must only be used with the greatest caution and care. Frankly, one rarely sees that kind of caution and care in those who are making such arguments today. And if you want to know more about this, this is my brief advertisement for my session this afternoon on the use of the Old Testament in Christian worship. But we must come now to Roman numeral five, what I've entitled the fixed determination of the Regulative Principle.

And this has to do with paragraphs seven and eight. Look at them. Paragraph seven, as it is the law of nature that in general a proportion of time by God's appointment be set apart for the worship of God, so by His word in a positive, moral, and perpetual commandment binding all men and all ages, He has particularly appointed one day and seven for a Sabbath to be kept holy unto Him. Which from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ was the last day of the week, and from the resurrection of Christ was changed into the first day of the week, which is called the Lord's day. And it is to be continued to the end of the world is the Christian Sabbath, the observation of the last day of the week being abolished.

Paragraph 8. The Sabbath is then kept holy unto the Lord when men, after a due preparing of their hearts and ordering their common affairs beforehand do not only observe a holy rest all day from their own works, words and thoughts about their worldly employments and recreations but also are taken up the whole time in the public and private exercises of His worship and the duties of necessity and mercy. Now paragraph 7 and 8 self-evidently have to do with the doctrine of practice respectively of the Christian Sabbath. They teach There's a fixed and determined day of worship in the New Covenant. It's not true that there's no distinction of days in the New Covenant according to the Reformed tradition.

And that day of the week is the day upon which Jesus rose from the dead, the first day of the week. But my purpose here is not to expound the doctrine of the Christian Sabbath. My purpose is simply to point out the connection between that doctrine and the regulative principle. What is that connection? It is simply this.

If we were normative principle people and we thought we had a right to be constructing God's worship and we had a big input in how God is to be worshiped, it would make sense if the normative principle were true and God had left the construction of worship up to us, that he would also leave the day of worship up to us. We might decide that Tuesday night was better than Sunday morning. And thus the day of worship might be a matter left up to the wisdom of men. But don't you see that the whole tenor of the regulative principle goes contrary to that. The whole point of the regulative principle is that God appoints his worship.

That God constructs his worship and that Our duty is simply to obey. In that context, it makes complete sense that God appoints the day of worship. So if you believe in the regulative principle and God exercises the prerogative of dictating to us how we will be worshiped, then it makes sense that we'd also appoint the day of worship. Thus, the Christian Sabbath is an appointment of the regulative principle. The two things go together.

Now, of course, I'm not saying, and nor is the confession that God may only be corporately worshiped on the Lord's Day. The confession in paragraph 5, in fact, actually affirms the practice of appointing other days of thanksgiving and fasting. But while the appointment of the Christian Sabbath doesn't mean that we only worship on the Lord's Day, it does mean several things that I think are important for us to understand in our churches. First, It does mean that God must be worshipped on the first day of the week. Second, it does suggest that we should make full use of the Lord's Day for the purposes of corporate worship.

And Third, it does teach that the main purpose of the appointment of the Christian Sabbath is not for physical rest, although that's true, but for the purposes of the corporate worship of the living God. Well, that's the confession of faith. God has asked me in this hour not to teach you the Bible, but to teach you the confession of faith. But I in many respects, of course, In teaching you the confession of faith, all along I've been teaching you the Bible, haven't I? The allusions to the Bible, the summaries of the Bible are in almost every word of this chapter.

And so, having looked at the faithful definition, fundamental direction, foundational distinction, final dispensation, and fixed determination of the regulative principle, it seems to me that there are several important practical perspectives that in closing this study underscores. First, it shows that the regulative principle has to do at least primarily with the corporate worship of the church. This is suggested by all sorts of things that we have seen in the confession. We just saw that it appoints a day of worship. But why is a day of worship necessary?

Primarily because men need to worship God corporately and not just individually or in families. We saw that in the gospel dispensation, worship is not tied to a certain geographical location, but this is an observation that has primarily to do with corporate worship. The discussion of the parts of worship focuses on the corporate worship of the church. The reading of the scriptures, preaching, hearing the word of God, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing with grace in our hearts to the Lord, as also the administration of baptism and the Lord's Supper, are all parts of religious worship of God. These things are all the corporate worship of the church.

And the distinction between parts and circumstances of worship focuses on the need for sanctified common sense. With regard to what? Well the confession answers, circumstances concerning the worship of God and government of the church. Why am I saying all of that? Well I think it is helpful and even crucial to understand that the regulative principle of worship is more broadly speaking, and I think more accurately called the regulative principle of the church, because the regulative principle governs not just the church's worship, but its doctrine and its government and its functions.

All of these things come under the auspices of the regulative principle of the church. But the second thing I want to say by way of conclusion is this. The regulative principle of the church and its worship calls us in so many ways that we've seen in this hour to renewed and practical recognition of the idea of the sacred and the holy in human life. The Reformed tradition, as it's summarized in this chapter of the Confession, believes that a certain part of life is especially holy and especially sacred. And I think that's something that the Bible teaches that we need desperately to recover in our day and in our churches.

I do not deny, in fact I suppose that I believe, that there is a wrong dichotomy between the sacred and the secular in some people's minds. Perhaps there is need still today to say that in some sense all of life is holy and that all of life is worship and that every day is holy. But I am convinced that there is also a need, and I think it is a greater need, to say that such assertions as these are only half the truth. And that with regard to this specific matter, a half-truth, uttered as the whole truth, is a whole untruth. So let me insist, insist here and now, on some things that the confessional doctrine of the Regulative Principle teaches us and which are too often passed over in our day.

According to the explicit testimony of Scripture, Christianity is a religion. James 1. The church is especially holy in a way that other human institutions, even divine institutions, are not. The Lord's day is holy in a sense that other days are not. And in fact, all of life is not worship in anything like the same way as the church's solemn assemblies.

Believe me, I think Christians like us and churches like ours in our day desperately need to regain these perspectives, desperately need to understand that the church is holy and the day, the Lord's day is holy, in a way that the rest of human life is not. I think there is something great and desperately needed being lost in our day with this flattening of all of human life with sayings like, all of life is worship and every day is holy and Christianity is not a religion. I think there's something very important being lost in those kind of statements, those kind of half-truths. We need to understand what the regulative principle teaches us, what the Reformed tradition demands of us, and that is that though all of life is holy, the church is especially holy, the Lord's day is especially holy, worship it in the church is especially holy. And if we forget that, we have forgotten something vital to the Christian religion.

Let's pray. Father, we thank you for the teaching of these great gifts that you have given to the church. We thank you for the pastor-teachers that through 20 centuries of the life of the church you've been giving to us. And we ask, Lord, that we might profit from their teaching as it's summarized in the confession of faith, and that you might bless our studies in the sower, cause that your truth might sink down to the ears of your people, cause that your spirit might blow away anything that was not according to the truth of your word, and bless us in our study. We have come to acknowledge that a man can receive nothing except to be given him from above.

We ask all this in Jesus' name, amen. For more messages, articles, and videos on the subject of conforming the church and the family to the word of God and for more information about the National Center for Family Integrated Churches where you