Just a quick note....
I am not totally against foot washing in the worship as long as it is not considered sacrament... I am also not against considering it a part of the Lord's Supper Sacrament but not a sacrament itself.
I believe in Anointing with Oil in the Reformed Tradition from an article I read from Oceanside United Reformed Church, I forgot which pastor wrote it... James 5:13 is never in the worship service.... Notice that the sick CALL for the elders to anoint and pray over the sick... This is sick who can not make it to the church..... One's who are bedridden..... So this has no respect to the Regulative Principle.
The Kiss, I have not studied yet? So I am unsure where I stand on this.....
As per imperatives, read armourbearers comments to me in a recent thread I started on Element of Song and Imperatives.. I had a question someone asked about and I was unsure of the answer until armourbearer gave a great logical biblical answer to imperatives......
Quote:
Originally Posted by elnwood  One of my main hesitations with the regulative principle as applied by many on the board is that there is ambiguity regarding the imperatives of worship.
I am sympathetic to the OT/NT "dispensational" argument because the distinction between temple worship and the rest of life was made very clear in the OT, but the NT seems ambiguous. There is no Book of Order or formulation of what happens in the services in the NT like you have in the OT. I am sympathetic to Frame who believes the regulative principle should apply to all of life, not just public worship.
Many of the worship principles are from narratives, and it is difficult to say whether something in narrative is an imperative or just a statement of what happened. For example, just about everyone here believes that worshipers are to gather on Sunday. There is an imperative to gather, and there is a narrative that says that believers gathered on the first day of the week, but can we legitimately say that there is an imperative to gather on Sunday?
Also, it is not altogether clear in the epistles whether an imperative applies as part of the public worship or just an imperative in general. For example, is greeting one another an element of worship? (How about greeting with a kiss?) Many churches take that imperative and include greeting as a part of the service. Others do not. How do we know whether we should do this? Is there freedom on this point?
Some interpret the regulative principle to say that something either MUST be done or it MUST be disallowed, i.e. if solos are permitted, they must be sung. Is not observing the Lord's Supper in every worship service (morning and evening), then, a violation of the RPW?
What about footwashing? What about anointing the sick with oil? There are many imperatives that I don't see done in the Reformed churches, and I don't see clearly how they distinguish the imperatives of the NT. |