Sabbath Morning Worship

What to Expect

Worship is a divinely enabled response to God’s self-revelation and redemptive action. When we gather, we seek to be responsive to God in a few particular ways:

First, we seek to be responsive to who God is and what God has done. We all benefit from regular reminders of why we are invited to praise and thank God. For this reason, we read scriptures that describes God’s character and sing songs that recount God’s work of love and justice. We hope it is clear whom we are worshipping and why.

Second, we seek to be responsive to God’s concerns. In Matthew 25, Jesus not only expresses compassion for people we often overlook or marginalize, he identifies with them. A worship service that is disconnected from a life of service, is disconnected from the Jesus we claim to worship. In every gathering, we include invitations not only to faith in God but to service alongside our neighbors. Every week, we have a worship segment called “Community Faith-in-Action,” where we discuss our community life activities and encourage everyone to volunteer with one of our ongoing community partnership initiatives. Additionally, we strive to ensure that how we gather—specifically, how we greet, include, and affirm one another—embodies the hospitality and loving care that we hope to exhibit in our daily lives.

Third, we seek to be responsive to God’s gracious blessing. We are sent out of our gatherings to live transformed lives; and this is only possible because of God’s transforming grace. No amount of personal conviction or determination can truly change us and enable us to change the world. We need God to do in and through us what only God can. For this reason, the final act of worship is an essential opportunity to be sent out with a divine blessing. Closing appeals and challenges have their place; but the last thing you’ll hear will be words of blessing, reminding us of our only source of true peace and hope for a better world. And you’ll be invited to participate in not only receiving but sharing that blessing when we say, “Now may the God who has been present to you be present to you as you greet one another with the words, ‘Sabbath Peace.’”