TOGETHER IN HIS PRESENCE WITH OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS
Dear Friends,
You can be a good Muslim and never attend a mosque. You can also be a good Buddist or Hindu and never attend a temple. Many people believe they can be a good Chirstian and not be an active member in a local church, nor regularly attend the worship services of their church. Such people are sadly mistaken. On one hand the Christian faith is deeply personal. Each person has to come to a saving faith in Jesus. Each person is called to follow Jesus and become more Christ-like. But the Christian faith is also deeply communal. The local church is the Triune God’s idea. The New Testament is filled with "one another" language. Jesus said, "I will build my church" (Matthew 16:18). There are different lists of church officers. Spiritual gifts are given to each Christian, and these gifts are to be used in the church community. In the book of Acts, once people come to faith in a city, the Apostles appointed elders and formed churches. The majority of books in the New Testament are written to local churches, and/or to all the churches in a city/region. By the way, both the local church and all of the churches in a region can be referred to as “the church.” The interplay of the personal and communal in living a Christan life is not only taught in the Bible, it is also part of the "architecture" of the Bible. Once a person comes to saving faith in Jesus Christ they are to become part of a local church community, and part of being part of the community is to gather in "public worship", i.e. a service of worship with the church members (and presumably, others).
It is easy to forget this during COVID-19. Church of the Messiah is continuing to learn how to be "three congregations and one church" with 8am, 10am, and online congregations. These new challenges catch us by surprise, but nothing catches the Triune God by surprise. Over the next few weeks I am going to write a series of blogs reminding us of why we gather to worship and, hopefully, reminding us of how to pray for the local church gathered in worship. If you think about it, this is an especially good time to remember why we gather because we need to pray into this more and more with the peculiar challenges posed by COVID-19. It would be great if we remember to pray for all three groups of our church - and to be united in praying for the same biblically wise things.
In these series of blogs I am going to be guided by the "Call to Worship" written in 1549 and incorporated into the Book of Common Prayer in its services of Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer. This short beautiful composition is one of the fruits of the English Reformation. It is not idiosyncratic or denominational. With the rediscovery of the biblical Gospel came a rediscovery of the Bible in light of the Gospel, and so people and churches were reformed according to the biblical Gospel and the Bible, in light of the Gospel. Thomas Cranmer, the author of this "Call to Worship" was merely trying to simply and memorably sum up biblical teaching as to why Christians gather to worship as part of a local church. By the way, each week I will include the full 167 word text as found, unchanged, in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer.
Back in 1549 (and in 1662) it was recognized that you could use a word like “brethren” in certain contexts and people knew that both men and women were being addressed. Now I need to point it out. The "Call to Worship'' begins very simply, "Dearly beloved brethren". Now we would say, "Dearly beloved brothers and sisters''. This gets the biblical tone and context exactly right. There may be disharmony in the congregation. There may be people who are hard to love. You might be hard to love. But such disharmony and lack of love is not something to be celebrated or tolerated - it is something to be grieved. We should be praying and longing that the Lord will work so that we can speak of each other as "Dearly beloved brothers and sisters". This is not a call to fake smiles while war is in our hearts. It is a call to put the war in our hearts to death and have the Lord replace our fake smiles with real smiles of welcome. This simple opening reminds us that we are born again as the children of God by adoption and grace - pure, unmerited grace. People in the church might have different politics or be of different nationalities and race. But we are united by Christ. We have a new primary identity as the adopted children of our Father in Heaven. We come together around our Saviour, each of us equally and fully brother or sister in Christ.
So, whether you are part of the church on-line or in-person, please pray that we grow in love, affection, and respect for each other. Pray that we grow into understanding ourselves as brothers and sisters with one Saviour, one Father, and one Holy Spirit who indwells each of us. Pray that "Dearly beloved brothers and sisters" will be a lived reality at 8am, 10am, and online, three congregations, one church.
George+
Here is the “Call to Worship”
“Dearly beloved brethren, the Scripture moveth us in sundry places to acknowledge and confess our manifold sins and wickedness; and that we should not dissemble nor cloak them before the face of almighty God our heavenly Father; but confess them with an humble, lowly, penitent and obedient heart; to the end that we may obtain forgiveness of the same by his infinite goodness and mercy. And although we ought at all times humbly to acknowledge our sins before God; yet ought we most chiefly so to do, when we assemble and meet together to render thanks for the great benefits that we have received at his hands, to set forth his most worthy praise, to hear his most holy word, and to ask those things which are requisite and necessary, as well for the body as the soul. Wherefore I pray and beseech you, as many as are here present, to accompany me with a pure heart, and humble voice, unto the throne of the heavenly grace, saying ....”