As we deal with the new normal presented by the coronavirus, I've decided to post worship services I led in the past. Although this is in no way a substitute for gathering with our brothers and sisters to praise the Lord, I hope it helps those of us who feel Sunday is incomplete without some kind of worship. I'm also posting separately the sermons preached during these services. Below is the service I led at Cove Presbyterian Church on March 12, 2017. It was the first service in a series entitled, "Why: Answering Some of Life's Hard Questions." We used the Book of Job to grapple with the following questions:- Why do bad things happen to good people?
- Why don't people understand me?
- Why don't I understand what's going on?
- Why is God allowing this to happen?
- Why doesn’t he make things clear?
As with all our services, worship is intended to be a free expression of our love for God and the joy we feel when we accept that love. Of course, there are many ways for us to express that love and joy.
We started the service with the announcements. As the Bible entered (marking the beginning of our worship), we sang "This is the Day that the Lord Has Made."
Instrumental and vocal music are important to our worship. Songs give us the chance to praise God and to help focus our attention on the theme of the service. During the service, we have the opportunity to sing songs that reflect different musical styles. Since God has called into his church as individuals with a variety of tastes, this offers us the chance to display our sensitivity for our fellow worshipers and to grow in our knowledge of how we might praise God. Our first song was “Here I Am to Worship.”
Our prayers represent our communication with God. Of course, as Paul wrote, the Holy Spirit “...intercedes for us with groans too deep for words”; therefore, God already knows our needs. Still it’s important that we put them into words, as well as the regret we feel for our sins and our thanks for all God has done for us.
During the Our Congregational Prayer, we confessed our sins and hear the assurance that we're forgiven. We also lifted our concerns and needs to God. We closed this prayer with The Lord’s Prayer. After we collected the offering, we praised and thanked God for his presence in our church and within our lives. During the offering, the choir sang “Take These Wings.”
God’s word is at the core of the worship service. It’s often reflected in the songs we sing and the prayers we pray. But it’s most clearly present when we focus a passage from the Bible and apply it to our daily living in the sermon. During this service, we looked at these passages from Job:
Job 3:1-10
Finally, Job cursed the day of his birth by saying to God:
Blot out the day of my birth
and the night when my parents
created a son.
Forget about that day,
cover it with darkness,
and send thick, gloomy shadows
to fill it with dread.
Erase that night from the calendar
and conceal it with darkness.
Don’t let children be created
or joyful shouts be heard
ever again in that night.
Let those with magic powers
place a curse on that day.
Darken its morning stars
and remove all hope of light,
because it let me be born
into a world of trouble.
Job 4:1-11
Eliphaz from Teman[c] said:
Please be patient and listen
to what I have to say.
Remember how your words
have guided and encouraged
many in need.
But now you feel discouraged
when struck by trouble.
You respect God and live right,
so don’t lose hope!
No truly innocent person
has ever died young.
In my experience, only those
who plant seeds of evil
harvest trouble,
and then they are swept away
by the angry breath of God.
They may roar and growl
like powerful lions.
But when God breaks their teeth,
they starve,
and their children
are scattered.
The title of the sermon and the question we’ll consider is this: “Why don’t people understand me?”
The service ended with the song, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.”
Below is the podcast of the service.
I want to thank the following persons who were involved in the service:
- Choir Director: Ray Seifert
- Organist: Janice Torrance
- Bell Choir Director: Sue Willson
- Video Technician: Peggy Baldt
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