Biblical Worship: The Regulative Principle of Worship in History by Dr. Reg Barrow

Any real Reformation of the Church must begin with a thorough understanding (and the subsequent practice) of the regulative principle of worship. To deviate here is to open the floodgates of humanistic innovation in worship, condoning worship devised by a false hermeneutic and therefore the will of man -- Arminianism in worship in short. This is the seedbed of idolatry and a sure route to a shipwrecked church. John Knox's battle to reform Scotland and his call for purity of worship is most instructive here.

Knox states, "The matter is not of so small importance, as some suppose. The question is, whether God or man ought to be obeyed in matters of religion? In mouth, all do confess that only God is worthy of sovereignty. But after many -- by the instigation of the devil, and by the presumptuous arrogance of carnal wisdom and worldly policy -- have defaced God's holy ordinance, men fear not to follow what laws and common consent (mother of all mischief) have established and commanded. But thus continually I can do nothing but hold, and affirm all things polluted, yea, execrable and accursed, which God by his Word has not sanctified in his religion. God grant you his Holy Spirit rightly to judge." Will-worship has proved disastrous in the past, thus we must heed the warnings of history, a history also filled with testimony to the clear Biblically based hermeneutic of our Presbyterian, Puritan and Reformed forefathers -- proclaiming the sovereignty of God in worship and over every area of life!

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