Should We Burn Incense and Smoke the Church Today?

Insights from Revelation 8:1–5

In Revelation 8:1–5, the breaking of the seventh seal introduces silence in heaven for about half an hour. Following this, an angel stands at the altar with a golden censer, given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar before the throne. The smoke of the incense, mixed with the prayers of the saints, ascends before God from the angel's hand. Afterward, the angel fills the censer with fire from the altar and throws it to the earth, producing peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning, and an earthquake.

From this passage, we can learn several key spiritual lessons:

• The Efficacy of Prayer: The incense symbolizes the prayers of God's people. Just as sweet-smelling smoke rises upward, our prayers ascend to the heavenly throne and are valued by God.
  
  
• Heavenly Intercession: The angel offering the incense highlights how our earthly prayers are received, purified, and presented before the divine presence.
  
  
• Divine Justice and Response: The fire taken from the altar and thrown to the earth signifies that God hears the cries of His people (often connected to justice and suffering) and actively responds to set things right in the world.
  
  

Should We Burn Incense and Smoke the Church Today?

No, literal incense-burning and filling a church building with smoke are not required or taught as a Christian mandate based on this passage.

Here is why:

• Symbolism vs. Literal Practice: The scene in Revelation 8 is heavenly, apocalyptic imagery. The "incense" explicitly represents the prayers of the saints, not a physical recipe or ritual command for New Testament congregations to replicate with physical smoke.
  
  
• New Testament Worship: In the New Testament, the focus of worship shifts from physical temple rituals, altars, and burning sacrifices to worshiping "in spirit and in truth" (John 4:23). Believers themselves are now considered spiritual stones and a royal priesthood offering spiritual sacrifices (1 Peter 2:5).
  
  
• Historical and Denominational Context: While some liturgical traditions (such as Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and some Anglican churches) use physical incense during services as a rich sensory symbol of prayers rising to God, it is a traditional practice of worship atmosphere rather than a mandatory commandment for every church. Filling a church building with physical smoke carries no inherent spiritual power or New Testament requirement.
  
  

Ultimately, Revelation 8:1–5 teaches us about the power, beauty, and impact of prayer reaching the throne of God, rather than instructing us to physically smoke out our church buildings.

The vision in Revelation 8 doesn’t prescribe literal incense-burning for the church—it describes heavenly worship symbolically. The angel’s incense mingles with the prayers of God’s people before the throne, establishing a symbolic connection rather than a liturgical mandate.

Throughout Scripture, incense functions as a figure representing the prayers of the faithful[1]. This symbolic association appears consistently: the psalmist requests that prayer be “set before you like incense” (Ps 141:2), and the heavenly elders hold golden bowls of incense identified as the prayers of God’s people (Rev 5:8). The imagery conveys how prayer ascends to God with the same rising, pleasing quality as fragrant smoke.

The early church’s relationship with incense was cautious. There was no ceremonial use of incense in the first three centuries of Christian worship because of its association with emperor worship and use in pagan cults[1]. Up to Constantine the Great or later, there was no use of incense in public church worship, and for the first five centuries there was striking unanimity among the Fathers against offering incense as a sacrifice to God[2]. The New Testament contains no reference to incense in the Christian church in Acts and the Epistles—only in the Apocalypse’s symbolism—which may be rightly regarded as an argument from silence: having the substance, what need is there of the shadow?[3]

When incense eventually entered Christian practice, it carried different meanings. In the Western church it has been primarily a symbol of prayer[1], and honorific use developed, with the Seventh Ecumenical Council declaring it proper to burn incense in veneration before icons, the cross, and the Gospels, as honor shown to Christ[2].

The question ultimately hinges on whether you view Revelation’s imagery as prescriptive or descriptive. The text invites the church to understand prayer itself as the true incense—the substance rather than the shadow.

[1] Frank C. Senn, “Incense,” in The Encyclopedia of Christianity (Grand Rapids, MI; Leiden, Netherlands: Wm. B. Eerdmans; Brill, 1999–2003), 2:679.
[2] Geoffrey Wainwright, For Our Salvation: Two Approaches to the Work of Christ (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1997), 62–63.
[3] T. B. Kilpatrick, “Incarnation,” in A Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels: Aaron–Zion, ed. James Hastings (Edinburgh; New York: T&T Clark; Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1906), 1:814.