Walking Through Communion - Gathering

In the second of our series of articles on the service of Holy Communion, the Reverend Derek Hinge walks us through the start of the service. 

 

It’s Sunday morning, and, if we have not had too late a night on Saturday or the children have not been awake, we wake up with the resolve to join the people of God in church today.  In between busying ourselves with the essential domestic chores, we just reflect back quietly to those few moments of preparation that we took time for yesterday.  Then, off to church, arriving we hope in good time to allow ourselves a deep breath or two to remember where we are, to greet, but not chat to, the neighbours in our pew, and to roll around in our minds what we are about to do.

By all means listen to what is going on around you, and be pleased that all these people are here in this beautiful building to join you in lifting their hearts, minds, voices, and spirits to Almighty God.  Remember perhaps that you are fulfilling ‘the chief end of man (which is) to glorify God and enjoy him forever.’ (Westminster Confession )

All this is part of what our Common Worship book calls ‘The Gathering’.  Then, the service proper begins as the President welcomes us and reminds us of anything special about the service, like a visiting preacher or a special day.  Now we all join together in singing our first hymn and/or responding to the Greeting offered to us.  Immediately we sense this gathering of Christians, at all sorts of stages in our journey, into one body to do one thing, give worship to our Father.  The prayer that follows always puts us in our place (….to whom all hearts are open…..).  In it we acknowledge that the God we have come to  
worship knows us better than we know ourselves, and that there is no pulling the wool over his eyes as to the state of our lives and the quality of our relationship with God and with one another.  This prayer is not meant to be a reminder that we should not be here because we are not good enough; rather it reminds us of the nature of the God we worship and asks him to clear away the cobwebs of our lives that our worship may be a true response to his love for us.   Thus duly humbled, we seek to get right with God by an acknowledgement of our shortcomings and our need for forgiveness.

Sometimes we hear a summary of the law; then we ask for God’s mercy, and hear a seasonal invitation to confess our sins.  Silence is very important at this point as each of us takes the opportunity to bring to mind all that has marred our lives over the past few days.  Then, openly and together, we bring all this into God’s holy presence as we tell him how sorry we are that ‘we have wounded his love and marred his image in us’.  While we say that we repent of all our sins, that is we turn around and try to start afresh, we shall find that the burden of their effect on our lives will drag us back unless we hear and receive God’s wonderful forgiveness, made possible by Jesus.  So with the authority of the church duly given at ordination, the President declares that God has forgiven you (Absolution), wiped your slate clean, and you can go on from here ‘pardoned and delivered’.

 
‘The Gloria ’ that follows is our joyous response at being set free from the sins, which weigh us down.  In an act of pure worship, we say or sing of the one true God whose nature was revealed in Jesus Christ as Father, Son and Spirit.  God’s glory is his excellence and praiseworthiness displayed in his acts, especially in Jesus.  Our response is to give glory, that is to give honour, adoration and praise.

Finally, in this first part of our Service, we ‘collect’ our preparatory prayers, spoken and silent, into the words of  ‘The Collect’, which usually has a seasonal ring about it.  Note that Collects all have a characteristic pattern.  They begin with God’s name, followed by a statement about some aspect of his nature; then a petition that relates to that nature, a prayer that our lives will be different and ending with a reminder of the Trinity God in whose name all our worship takes place.   Now we are prepared, repentant, forgiven, open, ready to listen to God speaking to us.

 

Click here for the next in the series of articles - The Word