Sunday Worship

 

Following is an outline of material that the we present to new members in home studies.  It provides a sense of how we live-out our corporate life of worship.

 

As members of One Body, we worship together on Sunday as we sing, pray, preach and glorify Jesus.

 

We are many members with gifts and talents, and together we are one body worshiping together on Sundays in one place.  It is our custom to gather on Sundays at 10:30am and unite our affections for Jesus as we sing, pray, fellowship, eat, play and praise. 

 

We also worship in homes on various other nights of the week, and we participate in all sorts of meetings and prayer times, but here, we’d like to explore the meaning of our Sunday worship.

 

 

Our Ordered Life as a Colony of Heaven

 

As we gather, we consciously understand ourselves to be sojourners.  We understand ourselves to be a colony of heaven, conducting ourselves according to the life we have with Christ in the invisible realm.  As Paul says,

 

Phil 3:20... “For our citizenship is in heaven“

 

       1. Our Sunday Worship

 

a. What is worship?

One must make distinctions between Corporate and Private worship

 

       To assist in this, observe a sample Order of Worship

                           We experience a Corporate Dialogue of Worship:

                           A Conversation in Heaven heard on Earth

A Conversation on Earth linked to God’s Throne

 

b. What should guide or regulate this Corporate Dialogue?

 

Warnings from scripture (severity of the subject):

              Leviticus 10:1;

              1 Chronicles 13:9-14

 

       Elements of Worship

Guidelines for deciding what is in our Worship:

       Chief guideline: How does it glorify Christ?

              Does it detract from the glory of Christ?

              Are we motivated by the glory of Christ in

                     how we have the conversation?

              Does an element feed the

                            Theologian of the Cross or

                            Theologian of Glory

              Does our practice cause someone to stumble?

 

With limited corporate time, maximize Bible over tradition and preference: We are not free to the whims even of the leaders

       Remember: you are free, even if the one

              hour corporate time is not perfected.

 

If we make an error in this, we want to err on the side of caution

 

c. Why we don’t have traditional “Altar Calls” in our worship. People are invited to receive Christ, that invitation, however, is not in the form of an altar call.  People must call on the name of the Lord, and we encourage and preach as much.  Removal of the altar call is on the basis of various considerations — the regulating principle here under discussion being one such consideration.

 

2. Baptism and Worship

 

       Baptism signifies, includes and encompasses the following:

 

Allegiance to the King (Acts 2)

 

          — not to a church or denomination

          — rebaptism of other Christians is a bad idea

 

Children of Abraham (Acts 2; Gal 3; Romans 4)

Sign of the Covenant

Relation to Circumcision

Preaching of the Gospel

Water “Ordeals” and the People of God through Scripture.

 

3. The Lord’s Supper

 

Communing with Christ (1 Corinthians 10-11)

Feasting on Christ in 1 Corinthians

A New Exodus Meal Memorial as an Exodus Word, not a mere “memory” word.

 

Discerning the Body (those who are hungry in the Body) A Covenant Meal (a meal!) in Luke’s Gospel

 

At Eastside Church of the Cross, we celebrate the Lord’s Supper in the Context of our community fellowship meals (i.e., during our corporate Sunday lunches).

Louisburg, Kansas

Sunday School, 9:30am

Sunday Worship, 10:30am

Glorifying God by Enjoying Him Forever

Eastside Church of the Cross