Liturgical Worship: Enactment Of Salvation History

For those who approach worship from a liturgical and sacramental point of view, Christian worship is an action which recalls the events of the history of salvation. This recollection, which is based on biblical models of worship, is not simply an intellectual remembering; it becomes an actual participation in the saving event through forms of worship empowered by the Holy Spirit and received in faith. A fundamental principle of New Testament theology is that all salvation history is recapitulated and "personalized" in Jesus. Nothing is clearer than the fact that everything in sacred history-event, object, sacred place, theophany, cult-has quite simply been assumed into the person of the Incarnate Christ. He is God's eternal Word (John 1:1, 14); his new creation (2 Cor. 5:17; Gal. 6:15; Rom. 8:19ff. ; Rev. 2122) and the new Adam (1 Cor. 15:45; Rom. 5:14); the new Pasch and its lamb (1 Cor. 5:7; John 1:29, 36; 19:36; 1 Pet. 1:19; Rev. 5ff. ); the new covenant (Matt. 26:28; Mark 14:24; …