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Commentary on "Trust Not in Deceptive Words": The Prophets and Worship
Day 4: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 - No More Vain Oblations
Overview
Now the reader is introduced into the same theme—humanity's worship of Him—but from a different perspective: God's. Referring to the first chapter of the book of Isaiah, God is described as disgusted by people's worship, their sacrifices, their new moons, their burning of incense, even their Sabbath-keeping. Nothing pertaining to liturgy escapes God's displeasure. The apparent contradiction between the fact that these are practices instituted by God, having God's full approval, and the current rejection of them by the same God is seemingly resolved by appealing to God's requirements to live a moral, just, righteous life—before coming to worship. To support this notion, the author appeals to the famous 58th chapter of Isaiah where God defines fasting in an unusual way—as doing good and making justice. In the author's conclusion, God values living moral lives as being superior to worshiping God according to His own prescriptions. He also rightly perceives that people are hypocritical when they go through the motions or worship while neglecting the way in which they relate to their neighbor.
Observations
In contrast, Isaiah doesn't argue, either in chapter 1 or 58, either for a redefinition of worship or for balancing the priority scale by raising moral life to the importance given to worship. The real problem was that people's liturgical practices were affected negatively by their sins, and their worship mixed their solemn assemblies with iniquity (Is. 1:13). Their hands raised in prayer were full of blood (Is. 1:15). Their worship was corrupted by sinful practices; in God's eyes their burning of incense was an abomination (v. 13).
Worship and righteous living are not complementary aspects of spiritual life; they are intermingled. They cannot be separated nor evaluated separately.
There is no legitimacy on insisting that a particular day of worship gives a certain group the status of "favorite church" while the same group manifests moral failures in other areas. Those sinful areas make their worship on what they believe is the right day as sinful as worshiping on the other days in the week—or on Sunday in particular. Their alleged advantage over other churches—having the "correct Sabbath"—is no advantage at all.
There is simply no room for boasting in the New Covenant, and any attempt to force this covenant into the shape of the Old Covenant limitations is illegitimate. "And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins" (Mark 2:22).
Copyright 2011 BibleStudiesForAdventists.com. All rights reserved. Revised August 21, 2011. This website is published by Life Assurance Ministries, Glendale, Arizona, USA, the publisher of Proclamation! Magazine. Contact email: BibleStudiesForAdventists@gmail.com.
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