Don’t Call Me a Worship Leader. Seriously.
“We Evangelicals have come to view the word ‘worship’ as referring to something like God-focused music. And music is inherently emotional. So it follows that our understanding of ‘worship’ could then be reduced to the personal expression of a God-centered, emotional experience.” - CLeaders
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I appreciate how the writer comes out against defining music as "THE" service part of worship, then tending to make that service (Hebrew avad, Greek latreuo, etc.) a very emotional and non-intellectual substitute for other portions of a liturgy like teaching/preaching, prayer, reading of Scripture, and the like. And that is an extension, I think, of using one word "worship" to denote both "prostration" and "service". We use one word for both, and eventually, we end up limiting the senses of both words into one application of one of them.
It is my soapbox, I confess (guilty as charged), but I think it would be healthy if we started referring to key parts of a standard "worship" service by their own names, and perhaps we would grasp how important they are.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
It’s one of the many cases where the literal meaning of a word is not the functional meaning, though it still retains that connotation.
The most common word for ‘worship’ in the NT is προσκυνέω, proskuneo
The second most common is λατρεύω, latreuo
They are both usually translated simply “worship” because they both usually mean “worship.”
53.56 προσκυνέωa: to express by attitude and possibly by position one’s allegiance to and regard for deity—‘to prostrate oneself in worship, to bow down and worship, to worship.’ εἴδομεν γὰρ αὐτοῦ τὸν ἀστέρα ἐν τῇ ἀνατολῇ καὶ ἤλθομεν προσκυνῆσαι αὐτῷ ‘for we saw his star in the east and we came to worship him’ Mt 2:2.
Louw, Johannes P., and Eugene Albert Nida. Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament: based on semantic domains 1996: 539. Print.
προσκυνέω proskyneō worship (vb.), do homage
Balz, Horst Robert, and Gerhard Schneider. Exegetical dictionary of the New Testament 1990–: 173. Print.
53.14 λατρεύω; λατρεία, ας f: to perform religious rites as a part of worship—‘to perform religious rites, to worship, to venerate, worship.’
λατρεύω: μετὰ ταῦτα ἐξελεύσονται καὶ λατρεύσουσίν μοι ἐν τῷ τόπῳ τούτῳ ‘afterward they will come out (of that country) and will worship me in this place’ Ac 7:7.Louw, Johannes P., and Eugene Albert Nida. Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament: based on semantic domains 1996: 532. Print.
3302 λατρεύω (latreuō): vb.; ≡ DBLHebr 6268; Str 3000; TDNT 4.58—LN 53.14 worship, minister or serve (in religious duties), (Mt 4:10; Lk 2:37; Ac 24:14; 26:7; Ro 1:9, 25; Php 3:3; 2Ti 1:3; Heb 8:5; 9:9; Rev 22:3)
Swanson, James. Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Greek (New Testament) 1997: n. pag. Print.
λατρεύω latreuō serve (God), worship (vb.)
Balz, Horst Robert, and Gerhard Schneider. Exegetical dictionary of the New Testament 1990–: 344. Print.
We do lose something in the translation, for sure. The problem is that proskuneo means more than just bowing and latreuo means more than just serving. So using either of those English words would overly limit the meaning.
But I don’t disagree that we’d benefit from pondering these nuances more.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
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