Discussion questions by Joanna Felts
Wonderful Words of Life by Christine Longhurst
1. Why do you think it is that churches have gotten away from Scripture reading in Sunday worship? What differences in culture, the printed word and the way we assimilate information from the first 2 to 3 centuries A.D. until 2010 affect this?
2. How does the author’s statement, “significantly more time is taken for announcements than for Scripture reading” make you feel?
3. Is it the expectation for Scripture reading in our services that “God is again speaking to the gathered community”?
4. Why is it important to consider using multiple texts throughout the service instead of simply reading the sermon text alone?
5. Why is it important to use the tools we have in our culture and society to visually portray the chosen Scripture readings?
6. How can we help our congregations listen attentively and with anticipation? How can we help them understand that Scripture readers are “the vehicles through which God’s Word comes to life again…”?
Show and Shape by Cory Seibel
1. Would a visitor to your worship service know that the worship taking place is about God and not about the people in your community of faith? Why or why not?
2. How does corporate worship allow us to express ourselves before each other and before God? Does knowing that God sees our true inward condition spur you to authenticate your worship or convict you about your worship?
3. Why is it so easy to take our eyes off the instruction given about worship in Micah 6:6-8? What can we do in our worship services to continually draw our focus back to Micah’s exhortation?
4. Why is it important that God’s story rather than our own shape our worship each week?
5. If God is a missionary God, then we need to be a missional people. What are some specific strategies or components that we need to incorporate into our worship that will show this about God and about us as His people and His worshipers?
Coming to God, Just the Way I Am by Brian Doerksen
1. Doerksen states, “But I had served long enough in the church to know how to effectively gather up people in the presence of God through intimate worship, and so I just got on with it, believing that eventually my feelings and the restoration of my heart would follow.”
- a. Do you think God is pleased when we “just get on with it, believing that the feelings and restoration will follow”? Why or why not?
- b. Should we encourage someone who is struggling in their walk with Christ to do this? Why or why not?
- c. How does this statement agree or disagree with Micah 6:6-8? Does it follow that when we “just get on with it” that we will return to a right relationship or right focus on God? What are the dangers and pitfalls of not moving on? What are the dangers and pitfalls of moving on while we are in this particular state?
2. Doerksen states, “Worship is reality.”
- a. What does that statement mean?
- b. How does this song particularly state that reality in a way that makes us want to grasp it and revel in it?
- c. Read Philippians 2:6-11. What connotation does this statement have upon every created human being, according to this passage in Philippians?
3. How does “Come, now is the time to worship” specifically speak to worship as a way of life; worship that is lived out in our daily lives?
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