This paper was written by a study committee of the Synod of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America. It was received by the Synod of 2004, published in the Minutes of Synod, and is to be circulated and taught in the church. We make a pdf copy of this paper available here. It is a valuable study on Psalmody in the church. We commend it warmly to you, in hopes that it will encourage you in the ways of biblical worship.
"Our main task will be to answer the question, What is the public worship of God in the Church? We begin with a review of our historic doctrinal understanding of the worship of the Church, then provide a brief summary of the theological arguments supporting the regulative principle of worship. We then develop a theology of worship framed in biblical theological terms. Building on all these, we sketch a covenantal form of worship."
This paper was adopted as a position paper of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America by the Synod of 2003.
"The Reformed understanding of the practice of biblical worship is usually summarized by the Regulative Principle of Worship."
"If we did not have the Scriptures, we would not be discussing the regulative principle of worship. Apart from the word of God, man can be a seeker, but cannot know God to worship him in truth (Acts 17:23)."
"John Owen produced a robust, Christ-centered ecclesiology in which the regulative principle supports the Christian life the way joists support a floor."
G.I. Williamson presented this paper at the Fifth International Conference of Reformed Churches, Westminster Theological Seminary, June 20-27, 2001. This paper will give you a historical, confessional, and theological overview defending the biblical doctrine of worship, which Reformed churches all held until the 19th Century. Given the confusion and conflict over worship in churches today, we invite you to consider this principled approach to the worship of God.
Arguments from the limits of church power, liberty of conscience, faith, history, etc...
"Here is the response of an elder who sang mostly Gospel songs in his youth, and who graduated to "the great hymns of the church" for most of his adult life. Then he discovered that all the Psalms could be sung from Psalters, and that they have an edifying power like no other human composition."
"People ask me, "Is your church's worship traditional or contemporary?" That's a hard question to answer in the Reformed Presbyterian Church because our worship is neither "traditional" nor "contemporary." In fact, we don't even think about worship that way."
Seventeen propositions from the Synod of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America
"If we are to going to build a theology and to teach and build up the Christian church, we have to know what our teaching is going to be based on, and what our authority is going to be based on and from where that authority is to be derived."
"Godly meditation is a choice means of enjoying the presence of the Lord. Meditation becomes a form of prayer, as the soliloquy is punctuated with remarks, with song, with shouts, with cries, groans, or questions addressed to the Lord. It is a practice which fills the consciousness with knowledge of the Lord."
"In this paper I study and analyze the relevant passages concerning women in service to the church. This includes 1Tim 3:11, 5:3-10; Romans 16:1-2. The exegesis and analysis show that women deacons are present in the New Testament. The paper also responds to a number of counter-arguments."
