Sunday Night Worship

[C. M. Sheffield]

I think there is a theological principle that says "public worship is to be preferred over private". I am not sure where it comes from or who championed it. Can someone elaborate?

Scripture teaches that the special blessing and approbation of God's presence is promised to the gathered church (Matt. 18:20; 1 Cor. 6:19; Heb. 10:24-25). As well as to the efficacy of the Word preached as a means of grace (Rom. 10:17; Gal. 3:2, 5). These promises are not and can not be made to the individual. We can be assured that private and family worship is an important part of our devotional lives. However, the ordinary means of grace which God has appointed for the sanctification of his people are corporate in nature not private.

P.S. While reading up on this topic I ran across this quote, good stuff!

Objection: I can profit as much by staying at home and reading the Scripture or some good book; it is the word of God which they preach, and it is that which I read at home. The books that are written by learned men are better than the sermons that are preached by our ministers.

Answer: What foolish pretences are these against the plain command of God and our own necessary duty! When God hath appointed you your duty, will He allow you to forsake it upon your own reason, as if you were wiser than God, and knew what will profit you better than He?

Richard Baxter
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 57​

 

[JML]

As has been said, having two worship services on the Lord's Day is neither demonstrated nor commanded in Scripture. It is required that we be involved in public worship on the Lord's Day (and I can say that I have missed only a handful of worship services in nearly 30 years as a believer), but how many services a congregation has is part of the adiaphora, those things which are indifferent, that the Scriptures have no opinion about, one way or the other.

Given this, the statement that someone above posted about how the Heidelberg Catechism states that there must be a Sunday evening worship service - even if only the minister and his family show up for it - is unscriptural, and more redolent of a cultural opinion than a biblical one.

Psalm 92
Which is titled "A Psalm or a Song for the Sabbath Day"

1 It is a good thing to give thanks unto the LORD, and to sing praises unto thy name, O most High:
2 To shew forth thy lovingkindness in the morning, and thy faithfulness every night,

Increase Mather in his sermon on the Sabbath interpreted this as a call for a morning and evening service.

Just something to consider.

 

[yeutter]

2nd service a monastic carryover?

How can the sunday evening service be "the way of the Christian life" if it wasn't instituted until the 16th century?

This line from Dr. Clark is actually incorrect factually as the second service was an inherited part of Christianity from the medieval church, back to the post-apostolic church, and further back to the days of the apostles themselves as the book of Acts evidences.

Prior to the Reformation the Western Church had multiple services. The monastic Breviary called for Matins, Vespers, Lauds, Prime, Compline, Sext, Terce, None. These were reduced to Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer by both the Lutherans and the Anglicans.
In the Eastern Church the service of Evening Prayer is said Saturday evening. Some Anglicans have adopted this custom. They like the idea of Even Prayer on Saturday because it serves as a prepatory service for Holy Communion.

 

[MarieP]

Hmmmmm.

Back in the day, Robert Haldane had 3,600 people at his Sunday evening services. A.A. Hodge turned his Sunday evening messages into Outlines in Theology. Lloyd-Jones gave such moving messages in his Sunday evening services that the year he attended proved catalytic in the life of young J.I. Packer, helping to motivate him toward ordination and vocational ministry.

Do any PBers have vital Sunday evening services in their congregations???

Yes, we have well-attended Sunday evening services. If we didn't, then I never would have met MarrowMan and ScottishLass!

Seriously, it is a great blessing! You begin the Lord's Day with the people of God and then end it with them as well. I am single, and so this is especially good for me! During the afternoons, we often go to one another's houses for lunch and fellowship. Many others spend time with their families during this time.

Another way of thinking about it is that, without the evening service, you have 1/2 the sermons you would with 2. This is of course obvious, but honestly I could not imagine my elders preaching all they feel is necessary or giving men training for the pastorate opportunity to preach (like last evening) if we didn't have a PM service.

As an aside, a church in Nashville that we planted now has SS and AM service with a time of discussion/Q&A afterward after a lunch. While we may disagree with this, we are thankful for the work God is doing there.


As long as they don't cancel their prayer meeting, then we'd have a problem