Modern Church Worship by James White

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Jun 3, 1875

Modern Church Worship.

By James White

Mrs. H. B. Stowe is a very good delineator. In a recent novel she gives the following description of worship in a modern fashionable church :—

"It was a church of eminent propriety. It was large and lofty, with long-drawn isles and excellent sleeping accommodations, where the worshipers were assisted to dream of Heaven by every appliance of sweet music, and not rudely shaken in their slumbers by any obtrusiveness on the part of the rector. In fact everything about the service of this church was thoroughly toned down by good breeding. The responses of the worshipers were given in decorous whispers that scarcely disturbed the solemn stillness, for when a congregation of the best fed and best bred people of New York on their knees declare themselves 'miserable sinners,' it is a matter of delicacy to make as little disturbance about it as possible. A well-paid choir of the finest professional singers took the whole responsibility of praising God into their own hands, so that the respectable audience were relieved from any necessary exertion in that department. As the most brilliant lights of the opera were from time to time engaged to render the more solemn parts of the service, flocks of sinners who otherwise would never have entered a church crowded to hear these 'morning stars sing together,' let us hope to their edification. The sermon of the rector, delivered in the dim perspective, had a plaintive, far-off sound, as a voice of 'one crying in the wilderness,' and crying at a very great distance. This was in part owing to the fact that the church, having been built after an old ecclesiastical model in days when English churches were used only for professional services, was entirely unadapted for any purposes of public speaking, so that a man's voice had about as good a chance of effect in it as if he spoke anywhere in the thoroughfares of New York."

It seems a pity that such scenes are to only painted in novels, which are looked upon as romances, of course, and thus the force of the truth continued in the sketch as lost upon the minds of the readers. As a specimen of Mrs. Stowe's style of sarcasm this is even copied approvingly into religious papers. But let some bold reformer point out to the congregation where this mockery of the solemn worship of God is carried on, and cry out against the abomination as it deserves, and no popular religious papers would notice him unless to rebuke him for his uncharitable ravings! Preaching, prayer, and singing, should all be aimed to the purpose of leading the congregation to worship aright; but instead of this they are too often substituted for action and activity on the part of the membership. The church itself is prayed to, sung to, and preached to, while it remains a passive spectator of the form of worship. It is a wonder that all cannot in these things find a fulfillment of Paul's prediction in 2 Tim. 3 : 1–5.

J. H. W.