Worship: Upward and Sideways - Blog

Be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart.

- Ephesians 5:18-19

This is how most of us think about corporate worship:

Once, maybe twice a week, we gather together in our local church. We sit in rows with a good view of the stage. Then we get an even better view of the stage by having the stage lights turned up and all the other lights turned off. At this point, we begin singing along with the worship team. The music is so loud that we can’t even hear our own voices. And to top it off, we close our eyes and lift our hands upward to best direct our worship to God.

This is the norm: our corporate worship is made for the isolated individual; our public singing is catered to the private, personal experience! 

Scripture offers us a very different view of corporate worship: it teaches us to not only direct our songs upward but also sideways. 

In his letter to the Ephesian Christians, Paul instructs the church to be filled with the Spirit by singing. But the peculiar thing about his instruction is that he seems to be envisioning ONE song going TWO directions: “addressing one another in psalms … making melody to the Lord“. 

Corporate worship here is not restricted to a vertical vision, one that focuses exclusively on God at the expense of each other. Corporate worship in the Bible includes both a vertical, God-directed dimension and a horizontal dimension directed toward each other. And these are both happening at once! 

This is not to say that we worship both God and each other. Rather, we worship God corporately by directing our songs both to Him and to the people on our right and left. We worship God corporately by singing upward and sideways. 

What does this look like? 

On a very practical level, how does this change the very set-up of the space we worship in? If it is a small enough group or a flexible atmosphere, it might be good to get rid of rows and seat everyone in a circle to see each other. In a less flexible environment, a great step to take is to keep the lights up for everybody, so that the worship team can see the faces of the congregation too! 

What about posture? There is nothing wrong with closing your eyes and raising your hands, but there is also nothing wrong with opening your eyes and seeing the people you are worshiping with! Another application is for everybody to take on the same posture together, whatever that may be. 

These are just some creative ways that we can physically reflect multi-directional corporate worship. However, to truly apply this type of corporate worship, we need to have a view beyond the service and into our daily lives. 

The concept of singing as upward and sideways brings us into accountability with each other to live out what we sing.

If we are singing together, “Take my life and let it be consecrated Lord, to Thee”, then we are instantly accountable to each other to be a people who are surrendering our lives to God in real life! If we are singing together, “Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise”, then we are instantly accountable to each other to be a people who put off greed and idolatry in real life! If we are singing together, “In Christ alone my hope is found”, then we are instantly accountable to each other to put our day-to-day hope in Jesus alone! By directing our songs sideways, we commit together to living out their content. 

Next time you come to church, remember to direct your songs not only upward to God, but sideways to the people on your right and left as well. That is corporate worship in its fullest sense. 

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