I have been asked a lot lately, What do third day churches look like? What are the characteristics, the earmarks, the distinctives? Without trying to sound pedantic, I would like to answer these questions and share what I think Third Day Churches look like.
The most obvious distinctive, at least in form, is that their worship gatherings are God- consumed. These gatherings are conspicuously for God, and not for people. They are neither the people in the pew, nor even the people whom the church is trying to attract. For years we have called them worship services, knowing all along that they really should be called preaching services, or teaching times, or just Sunday services. After all, what percentage of the average worship service, in actuality, is given totally to the worship of God?
So to begin with, a third day church meeting is built on the belief system that the worship of God is our highest calling. Thus the uninhibited, unlimited worship of God, rather than our sermons, our agendas, our schedules, or our programs, are the high point of the worship gatherings.
This means basically learning how to entertain the presence of God by
adjusting our meetings to host the Ghost, rather than the clock. It means
giving our meetings over to new ways of worshiping, new ways of praying, and
new ways of staying in the presence of God. It means that we no longer use
the worship portion of the meeting, whether that being the first four songs
or the choir specials, as something like preliminaries or the set up or build
up for the sermon. It means that if we are going to call it a worship
service, then that is what it is; mainly worship. Many know what it is like on a personal level to be invaded by God’s glorious
presence in their daily, ordinary routines. Like Jacob, trying to catch a few
winks with a rock for a pillow, BOOM! God shows up, with His angels ascending
and descending, and we find ourselves saying, "Surely the Lord is in this
place, and I did not know it.....how awesome is this place! This is none
other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." Instantly, our
workplaces, bedrooms, living rooms and vehicles become our ‘Beth--els.’
Genesis 28:10 - 17. In this season of God’s visitation, we are also finding ourselves faced with
a renewed awareness of Emanuel...God with us, His numinous or manifest
presence in our meetings. So, what do we do when He shows up? Too often, that
depends on what we feel must happen next in the meeting, what kind of time
press we are in, or whether a longer meeting might offend the visitors, or
worse, the board of trustees. As evangelicals, we have clearly understood for generations, our access to
God’s presence...He dwells in the praises of His people. The question is,
How do we conduct ourselves in the presence of the King? Jesus taught us to pray, "On earth as it is in Heaven." So, what is going on
in Heaven? Revelation 5:10 states that He has made us all to be priests to serve Him.
While Peter says that, "you also, as living stones, are being built up a
living house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable
to God through Jesus Christ." (I Peter 2:4 - 6) What is the role of the priest? The Hebrew writer states that "every high
priest taken from among men is appointed for men in things pertaining to God,
that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins.." Hebrews 5:1.
Revelation 5:7,8, illustrates this priestly role of worship and intercession
to us, by opening a window into the very throne room of God! Remember, "...on
earth as it is in Heaven?" So what does this priestly worship look like? Quite simply, it looks like a
lot of worship mingled with a lot of prayer.
Then He came and took the scroll out of the right hand of Him who sat on the
throne. Now when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the
twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp, and golden
bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. It seems that prayer and praise are always uniquely interrelated and were
never intended to be separated. Psalm 141, verse 2, reflects this marriage of
worship and intercession when David prays, "Let my prayers be set before You
as incense, The lifting of my hands as the evening sacrifice." So what we end
up with is worshiping prayers and praying worshipers. What a concept! At the end of Psalm 72, in verse 20, it states, "The prayers of David the son
of Jesse are ended." Wait a second!...I thought these were psalms or songs,
not prayers! Jesus, in Matthew 21, Mark 11 and Luke 19, when He cleansed out
the courtyard of the temple, quotes Isaiah 56:7 and says, "For My house shall
be called a house of prayer for all nations." He uses the Greek word proseuche from which we get our English word
prose. When translated, proseuche means unrhymed poetry. This is often
put to melody, or the prayers turned into songs.
It is here that we find a deliberate, significant and effective way of
sustaining the flow of third day worship services. Moving beyond the mere singing of songs led by the professional band, we step
into to meetings where all believers begin to participate in more integrated
forms of worship. This includes spontaneous songs, prayers, intercession,
prophetic words, etc., calling onlookers to becoming participants. And
suddenly, an atmosphere is created where God is free to speak in the midst of
the meeting. Not just through a limited elite, and not only for the building
up and edifying of the church, but also, for the purpose of actually giving
direction to the meeting itself. As this kind of release comes, the whole meeting changes. Worship changes,
participation levels change, attention spans change, everything changes. The
meeting moves from the predictable Sunday routine to an orchestrated
symphony, with God as conductor, writing the songs and scoring the music as
we go along. Each meeting becomes different, unique, and alive, with the
people of God functioning as the priests of God. Worship and intercession are uniquely interrelated, and their combined effect
is greater than one by itself. When this blended recipe of worship and
intercession is released, the saints get edified and God gets glorified. We
must step into this “third day worship” by allowing our prayer meetings to
be invaded by worship and our worship services to be invaded by prayer. Yes,
there will still be times of teaching and equipping. But in more of an
open-handed fashion as God Himself orchestrates the flow of the meeting.
After all, the meetings are for Him, aren’t they?