When you look at our order of worship, it is broken into 3 important categories which describe an effective approach to worship. The first thing we do is we take some time to enter into worship. All of us come into the worship space with things on our mind: a conversation from Sunday School; a person who is hurting that we want to help; a personal situation that is troubling us; work; family.
The purpose of this time of entering into worship is to let the Spirit of God remind us that God’s presence can speak words of hope and grace into those situations. The goal is that by the end of our time of entering into worship, we have made peace with our thoughts and concerns, and are ready to hear God’s word for us.
Hearing the word is the time when the songs we sing, the children’s focus, the choral anthem, and the sermon, all help us to paint a picture of what God is saying to us in the Scripture, which is the centerpiece of worship.
After we have heard the word, hopefully with a fresh and ready spirit, it is our time to respond to that word. We do that by offering up our tithes, our commitments and our time and talents to the service of God. While the offering plate is being passed around, the music of the offertory gives us a moment to reflect and ponder what kind of commitments and response God is leading us to. Then as we sing the song of invitation, we have the opportunity to share those commitments and decisions that we have made with the family of God.
While I often describe decisions that relate to joining the church or making a decision to follow Jesus, other decisions can be shared, and shared with people who love us: decisions to change a lifestyle or habit; decisions to mend broken relationships; or decisions to begin a new journey. And while these three sections of Entering, Hearing, and Responding, give us a healthy understanding of what worship should be about, they are salted and peppered with other elements.
There is fellowship with brothers and sisters in Christ; there is compassion for people we see in worship; there is history and memory of our church’s past; and there is newness and creativity as we look to the future. And arching over all of this is the Spirit of God, who moves us and opens us, who whispers words of assurance and grace, and who challenges us to be the people God created us to be.
I hope that as you worship this morning, you do not skip over these sections, but that you tune your spirit to their purpose and function.
May God bless you today and always!
Blessings, Sonny