Leadership In Biblical Worship

Biblical worship is both an individual and a corporate offering of praise to the Lord; it is both spontaneous and organized. It is a declaration of God's greatness and a celebration of the covenant relationship between God and his people. It is an act of obedience to the Deity who has ordained certain ways by which his sovereignty is to be acknowledged. In order for worship to be organized as a corporate expression, there must be leadership-leadership that is acknowledged by and representative of the worshiping community, leadership that is able to assemble the resources for worship and to bring to a focus the people's motivation to express their devotion to the Most High. In the Hebrew Scriptures, representatives of four major "offices," or functions, within the community served as leaders of worship. As described in the next seven entries, these roles were those of family head or elder, prophet, priest, and king. In the New Testament, Jesus Christ summed up all of these roles.…