Four Questions
by S. Kirton
31 March 2001
At the end of each worship service each person should ask him/herself
In this one worship service...
what was God trying to tell me?
and then,
through my actions what was I saying back to God?
The first questions speaks of the attentiveness of our spiritual ears, eyes and heart and the second speaks of what each person believes is the level of his/her own actual participation.
The leadership of the congregation should add two more questions to the first two above.
what did God desire I share with His beloved children?
and, then,
by my actions what did I impart to them?
The third question speaks of our leading by our words (share, tell) and the fourth speaks of our actual teaching (impart, show, tell by our actions) by our participation in the congregational worship service.
It is easy to recognize our participation in the worship service when we have provided something outright expected: preaching, leading in song, prayer, or Scripture reading, or in the decorations we provide. But often we, for the lack of a better word, forget that we are participating in the service even when we did not one thing up front or noticable by others. But, since God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is the intended audience of our worship we should, again, lacking better words, evaluate our part in the dialog with Him; our taking in from His giving and, then, our teaching by everything that we do and say, and do not do and do not say.
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“You do participate in the
worship service even
if you are only actively listening
because God is the intended audience... an audience of one.”
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