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Public worship is to be preferred before private. So it is by the Lord, so it should be by His people. So it was under the law, so it must be under the Gospel.

1. The Lord is more glorified by public worship than private. God is then glorified by us when we acknowledge that He is glorious. And He is most glorified when this acknowledgment is most public.

2. There is more of the Lord's presence in public worship than in private. He is present with His people in the use of public ordinances in a more especial manner, more effectually, constantly, intimately.

3. Here are the clearest manifestations of God. Here He manifests Himself more than in private. Why was Judah called a valley of vision, but because the Lord manifested Himself to that people in public ordinances?

4. There is more spiritual advantage to be got in the use of public ordinances than in private. Whatever spiritual benefit is to be found in private duties, that, and much more, may be expected from public ordinances when duly improved. There is more spiritual light and life, more strength and growth, more comfort and soul refreshment.

5. Public worship is more edifying than private. In private you provide for your own good, but in public you do good both to yourselves and others. And that is a received rule, that good is best which is most diffusive, most communicative. Example has the force of a motive; we may stir up others by our example (Zechariah 8:20, 21).

6. Public ordinances are a better security against apostasy than private, and therefore to be preferred: an argument worthy our observation in these backsliding times.

7. Here the Lord works His greatest works; greater works than ordinarily He works by private means.

8. Public worship is the nearest resemblance of heaven. In heaven, so Ear as the Scripture describes it to us, there is nothing done in private, nothing in secret, all the worship of that glorious company is public (Hebrews 12:22, 23). They make one glorious congregation, and so jointly together sing the praises of Him that sits on the throne, and the praises of the Lamb, and continue employed in this public worship to eternity.

9. The examples of the most renowned servants of God, who have preferred public worship before private, is a sufficient argument.

10. Public worship is the most available for the procuring of the greatest mercies, and preventing and removing the greatest judgments.

11. The precious blood of Christ is most interested in public worship, and that must needs be most valuable which has most interest in that which is of infinite value. The blood of Christ has most influence upon public worship, more than on private: for the private duties of God's worship, private prayers, meditation, and such like, had been required of, and performed by, Adam and his posterity, if he had continued in the state of innocency; they had been due by the light of nature, if Christ had never died, if life and immortality had never been brought to light by the Gospel. But the public preaching of the Gospel, and the administration of the federal seals, have a necessary dependence upon the death of Christ. As they are the representations, so they are the purchase of that precious blood; as Christ is hereby set forth as crucified before our eyes, so are they the purchase of Christ crucified, so are they the gifts of Christ triumphant.

12. The promises of God are more to public worship than to private (Exodus 20:24; Isaiah 4:5; Isaiah 55:2, 3; Psalm 36:8, 9).

(D. Clarkson.)

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KJV: The LORD loveth the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob.

WEB: Yahweh loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob.