| Beginning Your Journey On The Path... celebrate one hour of worship In the Old Testament the Jews would gather together to worship on Saturday, which they called the Sabbath day. The fourth commandment said “Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days shall you labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God”. Saturday symbolized to the Jews a finished creation. But in the New Testament we see that the day of worship moves from Saturday to Sunday. And we see the reasoning behind this change is that Sunday was the day Jesus rose from the grave. The resurrection of Jesus changed everything and so the day of worship was moved in order to remember and honor this life changing event. Acts 20:7
On the first day of the week we came together 1 Corinthians 16:2
On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside
a sum of money in keeping with his income. The Christians gathered to pray, to sing, to take up an offering; they gathered to take communion and to fellowship and to hear scripture but they primary reason they gathered was to celebrate. Each Sunday we gather together to connect with our heavenly Father in a very real way. When we gather here on Sunday mornings we celebrate who our God is and what he has done. We celebrate in our praise: Psalm 95:1
Come, let us sing to the Lord! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation.
Let us come to him with thanksgiving. Let us sing psalms of praise to him. Something takes place in worship. When we sing and direct our praise to God a connection takes place. When we worship God he receives our adoration, our admiration and our thanks. Can you imagine what a thrill it would be to receive an invitation to meet the Queen of England, the President of the United States, or maybe the Pope? Not only would they want to meet you, they want to spend time with you. What an honor it would be! Every week we have the opportunity to meet with the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords! We sing to him, we pray to him, we hear from him. We take communion every week and it allow us to refocus on the price Jesus paid to set us free. Every week we listen to the word of God and we feast on the meat of scripture. Imagine sitting down to a meal of kool aid and oyster crackers. You would leave still hungry. That is why we try to make sure each message is practical and totally focused on the scripture. Here are three simple ways you can make the message more substantial: - Come Rested
I have seen people nod off during the sermon. It tickles me to see them fight it. The head starts to sway back and forth and then front to back and then they jolt (you’d think the Holy Spirit just zapped them). Some people drool on their bible or hit their head on the person in front of them. I once heard a story about a little country church where the wife nudged her husband to wake him up and he stood and had the closing prayer right in the middle of the sermon.
If you want the most out of the church experience it’s going to be tough to get it if you are constantly exhausted on Sunday morning because you stayed up too late the night before.
- Take Notes
This doesn’t work for everybody but writing down an idea or a concept or the scriptures in your sermon outline helps us to follow the sermon and to be able to take something home that we can look at later.
- Pray
Before you get out of your car pray that your worship experience would be a special time of connection. Pray for the message and the worship, pray for a receptive heart. Ask the Lord what you can bring to his house on Sunday morning.
There is a legend about a village in Southern Europe that boasted of a church called the House of Many Lamps. Built in the sixteenth century, the architect provided for no light except for a receptacle at every seat for the placing of a lamp. Each Sunday night as the people gathered, they would bring their lanterns and slip them into the bracket at their seat. When someone stayed away, his place would be dark; and if everyone stayed away the darkness became greater for the whole, for it was the presence of each person that lit up the church. Hebrews 10:25
Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing,
but let us encourage one another and all the more as you see the Day approaching. We look forward to worshipping with you on Sunday mornings!
God's peace,
Craig Grammer, Senior Minister |
