But David's act was not in the context of congregational singing in a specific church with a specific culture. Would it be within bounds to break out in dance and shouting at the next OPC service? Would fellow congregants be distracted, possibly frightened?
That depends.
1 Timothy 2:1-2, 8
[1] I exhort, therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men;
[2] for kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.
[8] I will, therefore, that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting.
Depending on the kind of service and who was present and the nature of the music, I would guess that over time at Bethlehem you might have ten to thirty percent of the people lifting their hands in worship.
“Coerced or constrained demonstrations of heart worship are self-contradictory.”
We never try to cultivate an atmosphere where it was expected — that you’re supposed to do this if you’re spiritual. Although,
Psalm 63:4 says, “I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands.” And
Psalm 141:2 says, “Let my prayer be counted as incense before you, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice!” And Paul says in
1 Timothy 2:8, “I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling.”
Now, I doubt that Paul meant, in
1 Timothy 2:8, that it’s contrary to God’s will for men to pray without lifting their hands. Rather, what I think he means is it’s contrary to God’s will that they pray without “holy hands” when they lift their hands. In other words, I don’t think it’s a mandate that every time a man prays, his hands must be in the air, but that if his hands are in the air, in his prayer, they’d better be holy hands.
Know Your Audience
Let me mention one other cultural factor and a closing word.
I was talking to a church leader outside America once who tried to explain to me that lifting the hands in worship in his city was a badge of bad theology. It was associated with certain churches that taught wrong things. He felt it would be a compromise in faithful churches if the people raised their hands. They’d be waving the flag of false teaching.
That’s the kind of thing you really need to be sensitive to when you’re an outsider and you walk into a cultural situation you don’t know anything about.
However, I suggested to him that there’s probably a better way to distinguish ourselves from false teaching than by letting the false teachers co-opt a beautiful, biblical practice as their own, while the true church goes without it. I don’t think that’s a good idea.
Natural Expressions
Perhaps one word to those who are finding the lifting of hands in worship to be artificial for themselves, rather than real. Let’s just all agree that whether we are very formal or more charismatic, we are all equally vulnerable to hypocrisy and artificiality and judgmentalism.
“Hands can be kept down for motives just as defective as they can be lifted up.”
Hymns can be sung with just as much inauthenticity as worship songs. Organs can be played with just as much hypocrisy as guitars. Hands can be kept down for motives just as defective as motives for lifting them up.
As a hand raiser, I would just say to those who don’t do it that, for me, it is both a natural expression of inner admiration for God, and an intensifier of inner exultation as it finds expression in the body.
I hope that those who don’t find it to be so have their own experiences of released admiration and inner exultation and intensification. I believe that it is possible, and I will assume that is the case when I am worshipping with you, if you’re one of those.
