Worship lies at the heart of the faith community. It is our time to gather and praise God and to renew our relationships as the church, the Body of Christ. In worship God calls us, speaks to us, shapes us, and sends us out with a ministry to fulfill and God’s love to share.
The typical worship experience can be understood under the following descriptions. If you are new to our church, you can review this to familiarize yourself with our worship services.
The typical worship service will be divided into four main sections: We Gather, We Listen for the Word of God, and We Respond to God’s Word, and the Sending Forth.
This segment of worship focuses on the gathering of the community for worship and praise.
This simply allows us to understand which Sunday of the Christian Year <link here to the Christian Year page> it is.
A thought for you to consider today relating to Christian life.
We shake hands and welcome our neighbors to the worship service.
We share any public information regarding events, opportunities and needs.
We invite people to come forward to the microphone at the pulpit and share any celebrations and concerns or things they are thankful for.
We invite the worshippers to prepare themselves for the worship of God.
This prayer focuses the community on the act of worship and praise. It may reflect any particular theme of that particular Sunday.
Children and youth are invited to sit at the front of the sanctuary. They are invited to drop coins into a box for our sponsor child from Columbia. We then share in a brief story, or sometimes introduce music. The children are welcome to play toy instruments during the song or hymn that ends this particular segment of worship.
Children and youth are then welcome to go to Sunday school for the remainder of worship where they will learn about the Christian faith.
This is a moment where we offer prayers to God naming where we have not fulfilled our call as Christians in our choices in life. Sometimes this prayer includes a time of silence. Sometimes it includes prayers not just for ourselves, but for our society and culture. We never ask any individual to confess publicly before the congregation. This can be done in the time of quiet, or can be included by association through the spoken prayers of the worship leader.
The words of assurance are simply that: an assurance in spoken word of God’s forgiveness and love that invites us to live more faithfully in the world.
In this segment, we turn to the Bible for a chosen reading for Sunday. We usually include a reading from the Book of Psalms, the Christian letters and a gospel passage.
We follow a three-year lectionary that other churches worldwide agree to read. This is a sign of our unity as Christians: we are literally all on the same page.
The worship leader normally introduces the scripture readings by providing a background on their context. Many people in our church find these remarkably helpful. You can find the background for a particular Sunday readings here.
We read the psalms in a responsive fashion with the worship reader reciting one verse, and the congregation responding with another. We usually sing a refrain that the congregation learns that day, between portions of the verses read. All psalms are normally found in our music resource: Voices United.
We typically use the Good News Bible (Today’s English Version) for our readings on Sunday.
The sermon will be approximately 12 to 15 minutes in length. It will be based on one of the readings for the day. You can find copies of sermons here.
This is a minute for promoting the work of the Mission and Service Fund.
We invite worshippers to give a financial donation to God as a collection plate is passed to them.
Giving <link to stewardship page> can happen in any number of ways. For instance, some people drop loose cash into the collection plates. This is perfectly acceptable, except we cannot track your giving for a tax receipt purposes.
Some people sign up for numbered envelopes <link to stewardship page> where they can deposit a cheque or cash into the envelope and place it in the collection plate.
Some people sign up for PAR <link to stewardship page> which stands for Pre-Authorized Remittance. With this method you need not bring any collection to Sunday worship. A monthly pre-authorized remittance will be taken from the bank account of your choice and deposited into the church’s bank account.
A fancy word that simply indicates that we sing the collection to the Communion Table.
A bless the gifts we have given and dedicate them to God’s use through the church.
Here we offer general prayers of the community. Sometimes these prayers are simply delivered by the worship leader. Sometimes the congregation will be invited to participate in the prayer by reciting a common mantra such as “and in your love, answer.”
Directions are generally given at the time of the prayer. If you would like to submit a prayer to be included in our weekly prayers, please click here.
We conclude our prayers with the prayer taught by Jesus. This prayer is typically written in the bulletin for convenience and for those who have never learned to recite this prayer.
On Sundays where we celebrate Holy Communion the Prayers of the People and Lord’s Prayer are included at that time.
We conclude our worship with a closing hymn.
The worship leader literally “commissions” or gives the people of the congregation the mandate of serving God and neighbor usually with a brief statement such as, “Go now to love and serve the Lord”, and the worship leader concludes this with a benediction (literally “good word” in Latin) such as “God bless you and keep you, God’s face shine upon you and be gracious to you, and God give you peace.”
The public worship service comes to a close with the singing of “Amen”, a word which simply means, “Let it be” or “Make it so.”
People are then invited to join for refreshments upstairs in the dining hall.