Before the 1820s and 30s, Christianity in America looked more or less like it did in Protestant Europe in the centuries that followed the Reformation.

But as the country began to expand westward on the frontier, revivalism began to take over what had been standard,

theologically orthodox Protestantism.

Men like Charles G. Finney would hold tent revivals with dazzling oratory and salesmanship

to generate religious excitement and manipulate the emotions of the crowd to produce conversions.

Variations of this method eventually became the baseline for evangelical Christianity in America.

The question of how God tells us he wants us to worship him is seldom considered. From the very

beginning of Genesis, the place where man encountered the presence of God to worship was the garden.

After Adam was expelled from God's presence in the garden sanctuary, men would draw as near to God

as they could. We see Cain and Abel doing just this in Genesis 4.

From that point on, we can see that worship is about drawing near to God's special presence on earth.

He gave them a sacrificial system in nascent form in Noah,

then a detailed process of drawing near under Moses and Aaron.

Later, under David and Solomon, respectively, the sacrifice of song was added to the liturgy,

and a new permanent Garden of Eden, the temple, was constructed.

God's people would draw near to him, have their sins forgiven, be consecrated to him,

offer their ties and incense and prayers to him, share a meal with their God,

and be blessed by him and sent out. In the new covenant, the big things that have changed is that

blood sacrifice is fulfilled by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. With the coming of the

Spirit at Pentecost, his people become the living stones of a new temple, and wherever they

gather to worship is the temple, the new Garden of Eden, where the presence of the living God

dwells on earth.

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