John Cotton's New England Congregational Model Of Worship

In his book The Way of the Churches of Christ in New England, John Cotton, a leading Congregational pastor of the first generation of American colonists, provided a detailed description of worship practices in New England. Although conclusive evidence is lacking, it appears that English Congregationalists used the same basic order.

Introduction This version of Cotton's description, with modernized spelling and capitalization, is taken from Bryan Spinks's Freedom or Order? (Allison Park, Pa.: Pickwick Publications, 1984), 34–36. Text: First when we come together in the church according to the Apostle's direction (1 Tim. 2:1) wemake prayers and intercessions and thanksgivings for ourselves and for all men, not in any prescribed form of prayer, or studied liturgy, but in such a manner, as the Spirit of grace and of prayer (who teaches all the people of God what and how to pray, Rom. 8:26–27) helps our infirmities, we having respect therein to the necessities of the people, the estate of the times, and the works of Christ in our hands. Commentary: Congregational worship opened with items more commonly referred to as pastoral prayer rather than beginning with an invocation or opening prayer. This is an example of the Puritan unwillingness to make even minor emendations to what they viewed as the Scriptural directives for worship. Text: After prayer, either the Pastor or Teacher, reads a chapter in the Bible, and expounds it, giving the sense, to cause the people to understand the reading, according to Nehemiah 8:8. And in sundry churches the other (whether Pastor or Teacher) who expounds not, he preaches the Word, and in the afternoon the other who preached in the morning does usually (if there be time) read and preach, and he that expounded in the morning preaches after him. Commentary: Congregationalists detested what they called "dumb reading" without comment. Based on Ephesians 4:11, the Puritans viewed the teaching eldership as divided into two offices: the "pastor" who labored in exhortation and the "teacher" who labored in doctrinal explication. This "expounding" was a brief exegetical discourse on the Scripture passage being read, either in the form of a running commentary or a summary following the reading. Text: Before sermon, and many times after, we sing a Psalm, and because the former translation of the Psalms, does in many things vary from the original, and many times paraphrases rather than translates; beside diverse other defects (which we cover in silence) we have endeavored a new translation of the Psalms into English meter, as near the original as we could express it in our English tongue, so far as for the present the Lord has been pleased to help us, and those Psalms we sing, both in our public churches, and in private. Commentary: The sermon here indicated was generally expected to occupy at least an hour and often more. Early Congregationalists sang the Psalms exclusively, as was the general Reformed practice until the English Congregationalist Isaac Watts introduced free paraphrases of the Psalms and actual hymns into Reformed worship in the mid-1700s. The new translation referred to by Cotton is the Bay Psalm Book. The first book printed in the English Colonies, it is a very literal translation of the Psalms from Hebrew into English meter. Text: The seals of the covenant (to wit, the sacrament of Baptism and the Lord's Supper) are administered, either by the Pastor or by the Teacher;.… Both the sacraments we dispense … Commentary: The Lord's Supper was normally celebrated in the morning service. The offering, any baptisms, and any "relations" (public professions of faith) would be made in the afternoon. Text: … The Lord's Supper to such as neither want knowledge nor grace to examine and judge themselves before the Lord. Such as lie under any offense publicly known, do first remove the offense, before they present themselves to the Lord's Table; according to Matthew 5:23, 24. The members of any church, if any be present, who bring letters testimonial with them to our churches, we admit them to the Lord's Table with us.… The prayers we use at the administration of the seals, are not any set forms prescribed to us, but conceived by the minister, according to the present occasion, and the nature of the duty in hand.… The Lord's Supper we administer for the time, once a month at least, and for the gesture, to the people sitting; according as Christ administered it to his disciples sitting (Matt. 26:20, 26) who also made a symbolic use of it, to teach the church their majority over their ministers in some cases, and their judicial authority, as co-assessors with him at the Last Judgment (Luke 22:27–30), which makes us to look at kneeling at the Lord's Supper, not only as an adoration devised by men, but also as a violation by man of the institution of Christ, diminishing part of the counsel of God, and of the honor and comfort of the church held forth in it. In time of the solemnization of the Supper, the minister having taken, blessed, and broken the bread, and commanded all the people to take and eat it, as the body of Christ broken for them, he takes it himself, and gives it to all that sit at table with him, and from the table it is reached by the deacons to the people sitting in the next seats about them, the minister sitting in his place at the table. Commentary: The historic Congregational "church order," the Cambridge Platform, specifies "closed" Communion in which the Lord's Table is limited to members of a particular local church and those bearing letters from other churches certifying their membership in good standing (Cambridge Platform 13:7–9, 15:2:4–5). The text here represents the effort to "fence the table," by warning unrepentant sinners not to participate. Infant baptism, not mentioned in this particular description of worship, was treated in the same manner. Since baptism was a sign of a covenant promise to raise a child in the nurture and admonition of the Lord (rather than a sacrament which itself brought children to salvation, or a mere rite of passage), it was only administered to children of church members. Since only those showing fruits of conversion were admitted to membership, the church could charitably assume that these were capable of training the child in the Christian faith. Text: After they have all partaken in the bread, he takes the cup in like manner, and gives thanks anew (blesses it), according to the example of Christ in the Evangelist, who describes the institution (Matt. 26:27; Mark 14:23; Luke 22:17). All of them in such a way as sets forth the elements, not blessed together, but either of them apart; the bread first by itself, and afterwards the wine by itself; for what reason the Lord himself best knows, and we cannot be ignorant, that a received solemn blessing, expressly performed by himself, does apparently call upon the whole assembly to look again for a supernatural and special blessing in the same element also as well as in the former; for which the Lord will be again sought to do it for us. After the celebration of the Supper, a Psalm of thanksgiving is sung, (according to Matt. 26:30) and the church dismissed with a blessing. Commentary: The double consecration of the elements should be noted. While now a common practice in some Protestant churches, it was controversial at the time. The Congregationalist did not attempt to explain the reasons for the double consecration beyond noting that it was prescribed in the Word of God.