Q. How do parents and masters sacrilegiously defraud their families? — A. In withholding from them their due privilege of time to worship God, and of family-worship, and of proper instruction in the things of God, Jer. 10:25.

John Brown of Haddington, Questions and Answers on the Shorter Catechism, 264.

There is such a thing as being a Presbyterian without being a Christian, as it is possible to be a Christian without being a Presbyterian. Depend upon it, it is best to be both. Make the atonement of Christ the refuge of your souls; hold fast by every truth of God’s Word, small and great; lend no encouragement to opposing errors; take no pains to conceal your attachment to Presbyterian principles; and strive to do honor to the system with which you claim connection, by your love to Christ, by an upright and consistent life, and by earnest endeavors on your part to deserve the character which distinguished the saints of God in other and better days — “a peculiar people, zealous of good works.”

The Apostolic Church: Which Is It? by Thomas Witherow in Paradigms in Polity: Classic Readings in Reformed and Presbyterian Church Government, 52.

If we wish to have Presbyterianism the religion of the Church universal, we must let the world know that we cherish a warm and devoted attachment to its principles.

The Apostolic Church: Which Is It? by Thomas Witherow in Paradigms in Polity: Classic Readings in Reformed and Presbyterian Church Government, 50.

Personal attachment to a minister is a tie too weak to bind a people to the Church; for death or a removal may snap it asunder any day. The bonds of custom, kindred, and early association, though in some instances powerful enough, are not too strong to be broken, as experience often shows. It remains that we teach our congregations that our principles, forming, as they do, a portion of the Word of God, should be to all God’s people, precious as gold. We should instruct them periodically as to what Presbyterianism is. Let each minister do this as mildly as he pleases, but let it be done faithfully and firmly. Let him not be turned from his purpose by the murmurs of the disaffected parties within, or the clamors of enemies without, remembering that the patient cries most loudly when the physician probes the sore. Let him leave no man in doubt that he himself believes the principles of which he is the public representative, and that they are very dear to his heart. Let him take no steps tending to spread the popular error that our distinctive principles are trifles. While careful not to oppose other Christians who aim to advance the glory of God in their own way, he should neither aid nor encourage persons who systematically repudiate what we regard as great and important truths. And let him not fear to be called a bigot, for what is a bigot but the bad name which the world gives a man who ventures to have principles, and is firm enough to show through life a consistent attachment to them? In a word, the aim of all of us should be to make every man who is Presbyterian by name a Presbyterian by conviction.

The Apostolic Church: Which Is It? by Thomas Witherow in Paradigms in Polity: Classic Readings in Reformed and Presbyterian Church Government, 49.

Some churches are almost more dead than alive. They sing dead and pray dead and give and think dead. Others are “alive” in Christ and in their services on earth can be seen as a kind of choir rehearsal for Heaven.

Roy Blackwood, The King and His Kingdom, 21.

When we look at the Church beginning with the Kingdom, then there is a functional mission purpose that becomes very important. The Church becomes less “ours” and more “His” — not so much the place to which we come to add to our numbers and preserve ourselves, as it is the place which He brings us, equips us, sends us on to multiply into more congregations to evangelize the world.

Roy Blackwood, The King and His Kingdom, 21.

In the Psalms, past, present, and future are brought together to witness Yahweh’s presence and power to the world. The great themes of the history of Israel, creation, the kingship of Yahweh, the promise of the land, and the future promise of salvation are attested in the Psalms. All these themes are bound together by the Israelite notion of “remembrance” by which the past is made to come to life in the present and to anticipate the future (see B. S. Childs, Memory and Tradition in Israel [SBT, 1/37; 1962]).

“Worship” in The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, 1121.

The apostle Paul insisted on the need of dedication of one’s whole life, which includes both the inward motivational aspect and the outward expression of cultic devotion (Rom. 12:1f). True service must include both.

“Worship” in The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, 1118.

In the context of the OT and NT worship refers specifically to worship of the divine. Worship is seen as reverent devotion and service to God motivated by God’s saving acts in history.

“Worship” in The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, 1118.

Worship as traced in both the OT and NT originates in salvation-history . . . worship begins with God. God the creator, rescuer, and the redeemer initiates our human approach to Him. The remembered events of the Exodus, the Passover, the crucifixion, and the Resurrection evoke a response from God’s people. The response is worship.

“Worship” in The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, 1117.