Embodying the Resurrection

Christ’s sacrificial death culminates with a focus on worship in today’s passage. In response to the Lamb’s sacrifice, the elders fall down and worship. This act helps us understand the true character of Christian worship. The Greek word for worship, here proskuneo, already indicates reverent prostration. With the addition of the verb pipto (to fall down), the two-verb structure links this verse to a common Old Testament phrase that utilizes the same combination of verbs in describing acts of prostrated worship to God (see 2 Chronicles 7:3; Job 1:20) and powerful human beings (see 2 Samuel 1:2). Revelation makes clear, however, that worship is reserved for God alone. (See especially 19:10.)

Too often in the church we focus on the style rather than the disposition of worship. We engage in “worship wars,” where we argue about the degree to which our liturgies are meant to be flexible or rigid. In many churches the meaning of worship narrows to the point that it becomes a mere synonym for “musical praise.”

Yet our current ecclesial simplifications and distractions about worship miss the disposition of worship that precedes and directs all subsequent acts of worship. The reverent worship of the worthy Lamb is meant to be the humble, submissive, spiritual, and physical posture of human beings who have come into the presence of the holy God crucified and raised for the salvation of the world. We can express our humility through prostration, bowing, and falling down. When is the last time that you fell to your knees in the worship of God? Or laid prostrate in reverent prayer to Christ?