Every now and again I like to share one of our worship services from Grace Fellowship Church. I do this to provide just one example of how a church applies the principles of Scripture to its public worship. If there is something you see here that would bless your church, you have permission to pilfer freely!

This service’s cast of characters included Patrick as our service leader, Dwight as the elder who prayed the pastoral prayer and read the Scripture, Allie as the lead worshipper, and Paul as the preacher. Our band consisted of piano and violin with two female vocalists. The various elements of the service are in bold with the name of the person who led the element in parentheses. Items in quotes represent roughly what the person said to the congregation. Items not in quotes are explanatory. The entire service took approximately 90 minutes.
Pre-Service Singing
In order to integrate a little more music into our time together, we often sing an extra song five minutes before our 10:00 AM start time. This year we are singing the same song for four weeks in a row in attempt to grow more familiar with it and to learn to sing it in parts. This week and month we sang “I Surrender All.”
Call to Worship (Patrick)
Patrick began the service with a call to worship. “‘Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other. By myself I have sworn; from my mouth has gone out in righteousness a word that shall not return: “To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance.”’ This call to turn to God comes from Isaiah 45. The right day to turn to God is today. The best time to get right with God is now. Every single person will stand before God and explain their life. There are no exceptions. None whatsoever. So turn to Him now. And praise His holy Name.”
Singing (Allie)

“Come Ye Sinners”
“Grace Greater Than Our Sin”

Corporate Praise (Patrick)
“We have sung of our intention to come to Jesus and our confidence in His abounding grace. What else is true about God that should encourage anyone to approach Him today. He is gracious … what else? What makes us sure that any person can approach Him? What do we know is true about Him from the Bible that should encourage all of us to turn to Him? Just shout those out.”
For a few minutes the congregation shouted out their answers.
“The only thing that holds us back from God is our sin. Let’s use the words of that great Psalm of confession, Psalm 51, to sing our plea for forgiveness and our confidence that He will grant it.”
Singing (Allie)

Psalm 51 (set to Crimond)

Pastoral Prayer (Dwight)
Dwight led the pastoral prayer. Each week we pray for some items that are urgent but also some that are “scheduled.” This week those scheduled items included one like-minded congregation in our city, the war in Ukraine, and one of our church members who was preaching at a nearby church.
Scripture Reading (Dwight)
“Please take your Bible and turn to Judges 2. We will be reading from Judges 2:6 to Judges 3:6. You will find that on page 188 if you are using one of our church Bibles. This is what Holy Scripture says…”
Dwight read the text, then closed with, “This is the word of the Lord,” to which the congregation responded, “Thanks be to God.”
Singing (Allie)

“There is a Foe, Whose Hidden Power”

Sermon (Paul)
Paul preached the opening sermon for a new expositional series on the book of Judges. This sermon was, in my opinion, a master class in how to introduce a book. It was titled “We Need a Savior.”
Singing (Allie)

“There Is A Fountain” (acapella)

Commission (Patrick)
Patrick tied the message of the sermon into a “commission” that challenged the church to live out its truths throughout the week. This commission replaces (and carries some of the content of) what would usually be labelled “announcements” or “notices.” It forces us to tie information we want the church to know into a call to action based on the truths of the Word.
Benediction
The benediction was 2 Corinthians 13:14: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.”

Never has there been a medium so ideally suited for spreading gossip as social media. Never have Christians been so eager to hear an evil report about another Christian than they are today. And that means gossip, slander, and evil reports move further and faster than ever. This old warning seems even more relevant today than in the day it was issued. I plead with you to read it, to consider it, and to apply it.

There is only one person worse than the whisperer, and that is the man or woman who listens without protest. The trouble is you hold the sack while they fill it. The receiver of stolen goods is just as bad as the thief.
An ancient writer declares that a slanderer and a man who receives the slander ought both to be hanged—the one by the tongue and the other by the ear. And I agree with him.
When you hear something bad about your neighbors do not go all over and ask about it whether it is true, and scatter it, and spread it. You might as well go to a smallpox hospital and take a patient and carry him all through the community asking people if they really thought it a case of smallpox. That would be very bad for the patient and for all the neighbors.
Do not retail slanders and whisperings. Do not make yourself the inspector of warts, and the supervisor of carbuncles, and the commissioner for street-gutters, and the holder of stakes for a dog-fight. Can it be that you, an immortal man, that you, an immortal woman, can find no better business than to become a gutter inspector?
(Drawn from the sermons of De Witt Talmage)

Good morning. Grace and peace to you.

(Yesterday on the blog: Let’s Hear It For the Failures)
Measure Your Heart of Thanksgiving
“I don’t know what your Thanksgiving season looks like. I sincerely hope you find thankfulness a happy overflow of God’s blessings this year. I hope your home fills with joy and laughter. But there are times in every person’s life when thanksgiving is an act of trust, when the measure with which we are measured tries our hearts.”
American Church, Don’t Listen to Eric Metaxas
This review engages with Eric Metaxas’ latest book. This is quite a group of people Metaxas calls out! “Metaxas doesn’t hesitate to call out pastors he judges to be weak, timid, cowardly, or so ‘theologically fussy’ (44) that they don’t join his movement. Men like Tim Keller, Alistair Begg, John Piper, and John MacArthur are not Bonhoeffer-ish enough for Metaxas (11, 44).”
Where did Satan come from? (Video)
Guy Richard (sort of) answers in this short video. (I say “sort of” because he perhaps discusses the origins of evil a bit more than of Satan.)
The Current State of Complementarity
John Piper discusses the current state of complementarity by discussing two statements: Nashville and Danvers. “Danvers confronts women who intend to be pastors, while Nashville confronts women who intend to be men. Danvers confronts men who are unwilling to lead their wives; Nashville confronts men who can’t lead their wives because they don’t have one — they are ‘married’ to men.”
The Serious Business Of Laughing At Myself
“If I can’t embrace my own smallness, my own humiliations, and my total dependence on the God who made me, then my pride has grown out of control. That’s a serious problem. And sometimes the solution is as simple as having a good, long laugh at my own little self.” Quite right.
The Gospel Never Does Nothing
What’s the one thing the gospel never does? Nothing.
Flashback: 3 Parenting Myths We Are All Tempted To Believe
“Our job is to discharge faithfully the duties God has given to us, leaving the results in God’s hands. Our goal is not ‘successful’ parenting per se, but faithful parenting.” This is a sweet, liberating truth.

The pastor doesn’t know what interventions to provide for a distressed soul until he first listens to that soul. —Harold Senkbeil