We are preparing to restart our Saturday worship service next month. It will probably start at a different time (most likely 5 pm) and will follow the same format that we use for our Sunday service, while utilizing some of the best of the newer songs and hymns being written along with the great hymns of the church.
Lutheran Worship is "top down." In most churches, worship is something that "we do for God," or "bottom up." In our church we recognize that worship starts with "God serving us." The introduction to "Lutheran Worship" put it like this: The rhythm of our worship is from Him to us, and then from us back to Him. God gets the first Word is worship: Our Lord speaks and we listen. Worship is not so much what we have to say to God but it has everything to do with what He says to us. So we eagerly listen as He speaks His Word of forgiveness to us...as He speaks life and peace to us in the reading of the Scriptures...as He speaks a word of invitation to come to His table and receive His body and blood for the forgiveness of sins. Then, as the introduction puts it: Saying back to Him what He has said to us, we repeat what is most true and sure.
A WELS professor and pastor puts it all in perspective: Lutheran worship recognizes that although God is our truest friend, He is not our "buddy." He is a holy God, who is to be feared. John F. Brug, quoted in "We Believe...Therefore, We Speak," page 191, Northwestern Publishing House.
Quotes in italics in second paragraph from "Lutheran Worship," Concordia Publishing House, 1982.
