Notes and Reflections on the Values of Worship....

Here are some notes from Beth's presentation on 11/12.

In the New Testament, it is described that people gather and worship, but there are not specific guidelines about what that might look like. However, it does say that people gathered to pray together (Acts 2:42), took meals together, devoted themselves to apostles’ teaching (Acts 11), had their goods in common, sang songs, hymns and spiritual songs (Col 3:6 and Eph 5:18), and practiced preaching and teaching, prophecy and tongues, prayer, singing, confession of faith, sacraments (baptism, the Lord’s supper, footwashing, etc.), offerings, and greeted one another with a holy kiss.

However, there is no prescribed action for “how” to worship, and is informed then as now, by cultural context. What is the overarching value of worship? It is implied that we meet together (Let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good works, not forsaking our own assembling together, as the custom of some is, but exhorting one another- Hebrews 10:24), not individually, but congregationally, preparing to worship together, with the mind to fully engage and participate (As Beth’s mom would say, “A good Sunday begins on a Saturday.”).

The act of worship within the context of Grace LB is comprised of three parts: a time of reorientation, a time of receiving/engagement, and a time of responding.

1. the time of reorientation: begins with recognizing that God is present within the moment, and we are reminding ourselves of his sovereignty, within the relationship of Creator>created. We give praise in recognition of Jesus’s sacrifice for us, as it is the essence of who we are when we gather as Christians.

2. time of receiving/engagement: we share family news, celebrating the things that God has done in our lives, which is completed with the act of public reading of the Scripture and the sermon. The act of reading is always to remind us of who God is, and we sit in the presence of the Word. The goal of the sermon is to bring us to be moved by the Spirit, speaking directly to us both as individuals, and as a congregation, and to be transformed, Christians and non-Christians alike.

3. time of responding: the Gospel tells us that God speaks to us and we in turn, respond, through prayer, the sacraments, singing, offerings, times of silence, and responsive readings. This reinforces who we are as a people and a community of God, in the context of the church within and the Church world-wide. The songs we sing must be filled with the substantive words of the Scripture and to be marked by good Theology, which then creates an intersection between intellect and emotional response, as we sing through the heart.

Through this we reorient ourselves to the Gospel, the living Word, and make ourselves disciples of Christ, reminding ourselves that this is our role in the World.

posted by Christina @ 9:03 AM