Worship

What do you believe about worship at Two Cities Church?

Worship is the act of giving ultimate value to something in our lives. Everybody gives ultimate value to something, whether wealth, power, popularity, pleasure, success, etc. So, the question isn’t really whether we will worship, but what we will worship—what we will value most in our lives. We believe God alone is worthy of our worship. When we value him most, everything else falls into its proper place, and we experience life as God intended. When we give greater value to anything else (what the Bible calls idolatry), we miss out on life in one way or another.

Worship is also deeply relational. It’s about enjoying our relationship with God and growing in it. It’s a meeting between God and his people, a kind of spiritual conversation in which God speaks to us through his Word and we respond to God through our prayers and praises. As we meet with God each week and worship him, we grow in our knowledge of him and our love for him. But worship is also about developing our relationships with one another. As we meet to worship, we are getting to know and love one another as well.

How do you worship at Two Cities Church?

Every church has a liturgy or pattern of worship that they follow in their services, whether that pattern is written down or not. Our basic pattern of worship moves from praise of God, to confession of sin and assurance of forgiveness, to thanksgiving for salvation in Christ, to prayer for the church and the world, to hearing God’s Word and meeting with God at his table, to being sent into the world for service. The service reflects some of the most basic things we believe as Christians. As we worship each week, this pattern of worship reminds us of what we believe and helps us to grow to spiritual maturity.

While we embrace more spontaneous expressions of prayer and praise in our services, we also think it’s helpful to read Scripture responsively and to confess our sins using prayers that are based on God’s Word. God’s people have been doing this sort of thing since before the time of Jesus. It helps us to be more biblical in our worship, since we are speaking the actual words of Scripture to God and to one another. It also encourages everyone, including children, to participate more actively in the service, rather than just being passive observers.

We celebrate the Lord’s Supper every Sunday for the same reason we sing, pray, or hear a sermon every Sunday. The Lord’s Supper is an essential part of Christian worship. Jesus himself gave us this important act of worship and told us to do it “in remembrance” of him. In the New Testament, we see the first Christians “breaking bread” or observing the Lord’s Supper on a regular basis when they gather together. The apostle Paul teaches that the Lord’s Supper is a way in which we share in the blessings of Jesus’ work on our behalf. As we observe it with faith, God’s Spirit works in us to strengthen us and build us up in our relationship with God, just as his Spirit works in us when the Word is read and preached. For all these reasons, we think the Lord’s Supper is a great gift of Jesus to the church which ought not to be neglected.

If you would like to see an example of our liturgy, see these samples of our worship programs:

What’s the music like at Two Cities Church?

Music is a great gift that God has given us so that we might more fully express our thoughts and our feelings to him in worship. The primary purpose of music in worship is to help us sing praises to God. We sing a blend of songs that fall into three broad categories:

Old songs with old music. We feel it’s important to sing the great hymns of the faith since they connect us with the past, and remind us that the church of Jesus Christ is much bigger than our time and place. These hymns have stood the test of time because their words are profound, and they can usually be sung by a wide variety of people.
Old songs with new music. By setting old hymns to new music, we can sing the rich biblical content of some older hymns in a musical style that is more familiar to our own time and place. This practice allows us to experience very familiar hymns in a fresh way, and to sing many previously unknown hymns that were originally set to poor music.
New songs with new music. The Spirit of God is living and active today, and he continues to equip men and women to produce worship songs for the church. There is a great need for writers and musicians to produce worship songs that express the ancient faith for each new generation.

How do you dress for worship at Two Cities Church?

Some people feel that they are being disrespectful to God, or that they are not taking worship seriously if they do not “dress up.” Others feel that they are “putting on airs,” or that they are being dishonest before God if they dress differently for a worship service. God gives us no clear commands on this subject in the Bible, except that our clothing is not to become a distraction to worship. If wearing a suit and tie helps you to feel more reverent before God, then feel free to dress in that way. If you prefer to wear jeans and a T-shirt to worship because that’s the way you normally dress, that’s fine as well.

Further questions?

If you have other questions or concerns about worship at Two Cities Church, that are not addressed by this article, please contact Pastor Brice.