The Use of the Word "Amen”
Singing in the Corporate Worship of the Church
Involvement in the Liturgy
Are We Experiencing All Parts of the Liturgy of the Worship Service?
Seven Ways to Choose the Best Songs for Worship
How do you choose songs for a worship service? This article suggests seven ways.
Bringing Praise to God in the Worship Service
Praying in the Consistory Room? The prayer of elders before the worship service
The Climax of the Worship Service
The Ministry of Mercy
The Ministry of Intercession
"Word and Sacraments"
Ministry of the Word
Confession and Forgiveness of Sins
The Opening of the Worship Service
Prepare to Meet Thy God
On Confession and Assurance
This article answers questions put to the author about the confession of sin and assurance of pardon in a worship service.
Splendor in the Grass: A Service Based on Psalm 103
This article offers resources to prepare a worship service based on Psalm 103.
Using the Belgic Confession in Worship: Q&As Make This Classic Confession Accessible
This article considers how the Belgic Confession can be made more accessible in a question and answer format for use in a worship service.
Lamb of God: Creating a service based on lamb passages in scripture
This article offers resources to plan and prepare a worship service focusing on the theme of the Lamb of God.
Shedding Light on the Prayer for Illumination
This article considers the function and meaning of the prayer for illumination during a worship service.
How to...Introduce Worship Songs: Some Helpful Pointers for Pastors and Other Worship Leaders
This article indicates the importance of how songs are introduced in the worship service. It reflects on how to introduce worship songs and offers some helpful pointers for pastors and other worship leaders.
The Reading of God's Law in Our Worship Service
Clothing Matters: What We Wear to Church Why What We put on May be More Important than We Think
A Brief Comparison of Charismatic and Reformed Views of Church Music
Worship: Communing with Our God
Prayer in Worship
Initial Reactions: A Visitor's View of Praise and Worship
This article provides an evaluation of a worship service where the music was according to the so-called praise and worship style.
The End of Faith? A Disturbing Development is Actually Good for Christians
Mac Worship: Do You Want Fries with That?
Remember Your Baptism
What does it mean to "remember your baptism"? This article reflects on different aspects of Christian baptism as part of the worship service.
Renewing Our Commitments
This article offers a liturgy for a worship service at the start of a new year.
Priestly Prayers – Intercessions for the Church and World
What should be included in the prayer of intercession in the worship service? This article reflects on the appropriateness of a prayer for the world during worship.
Preaching about Worship
At times it's healthy for a congregation to pause and reflect on what they do in a worship service. This article wants to facilitate a way for a congregation to reconsider what worship is.
On Offering the Offering
Until the tenth or eleventh century, the offering during the worship service was closely connected to the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. This article reflects on the self-giving character of the offerings during the worship service.
The Sunday Family Fiasco
Rehearsing for Heaven
This article sees a worship service as a rehearsal for heaven. Thus, a church needs to discover what heavenly worship is and then start applying what has been learned in worship on Sunday.
Let the Children Come to Me – An Interview with Norman Thomasma
This article reflects an interview with a pastor on the importance of children as part of the worship service.
Encouragement from the Saints
This article reflects on the value of having an element in a worship service that gives expression to the communion of the saints and celebrates the gifts of God throughout church history.
World Communion Sunday – A Service of Confession
This article reflects on the function of the prayer of confession in the worship service.
Children's Bulletins – An Aid to Worship
Many congregations make use of children's bulletins to help bridge the generation gap in worship. Making use of pictures and quizzes, such bulletins involve the children in the service and answer some of the questions children ask about worship and general church life. This article gives some suggestions on how to use such a bulletin to enhance the participation of children in the worship service.
Planning for Worship
Worshippers are generally unaware of how much work goes into preparing a good worship service. A well-planned liturgy flows so smoothly that worshippers have no reason or inclination to wonder about its design or designers. Worship itself is all that matters. This article considers three churches' planning for worship.
Prayers: Carefully Written or Spontaneous
A frequently debated question on public worship is, Which are more appropriate in the worship service—free prayers or set prayers? This article reflects on the place of spontaneous and formal prayers in worship.
Covenant of Grace: Chapter 5 – The Covenant of Grace and Public Worship
The Church’s Worship The Life of the Church Series: Sermon Three
Appearing in God's Presence: Liturgy and the Worship Service I
Meeting God with Rejoicing: Liturgy and the Worship Service II
The Collection
The Visible Word
Is there value in showing a video in a worship service in order to press home the truth of the Scriptures? This article shows that God has given the church the sacraments as the Word for our eyes.
Three Ways Good Churches Slip into Man-Centred Worship
It is easy for a worship service to be man-centred worship. One aspect where this happens a lot is through music. How? This article gives three ways in which this can happen through music content, a worship team, and musical performance.
Five Reasons to Keep the Kids In
This article stresses the importance of having the little children in the worship service.
Applause in the Worship Service
This article answers the question of whether applause in the worship service is appropriate.
The Missing Elements of Modern Worship
What are the elements that should characterize a worship service? The article explains five elements. Do they appear in your worship services?
The Whole Christian Life Every Sunday
A well-planned worship service is one whose elements have been carefully planned to fulfill God’s purposes for the gatherings of his church. Such a worship service displays the whole of the Christian life. This article explains how.
Leading in Public Prayer
This article touches on the purpose of prayer in the worship service.
Practical Guidelines for Ministry to Children in the Church
The Reading and Preaching of Scripture in the Worship Service
The Ten Commandments and the Apostolic Creed in the Worship Service
Where Has All the Worship Gone?
Psalms Only – Tradition Or Scripture
Where Have All the Children Gone?
The Inheritance and Worship
Vital Members
This article addresses one of the main weaknesses of the seeker-sensitive approach to the church's worship service, which is the lack of participation of the rest of the congregation members in ministry.
Training Children to Worship
Word and Sacrament in Worship
What is the role of preaching and the sacraments in the worship service? Through these means, God assures believers of the promises of Scripture. The author also discusses the practice of the altar call - does this practice also confirm the gospel?
Raising Hands in Worship and Praise?
Can you raise your hands during worship service? This article shows that the raising of hands in ancient times was to show attention to, submission to, and dependence upon some deity or authority figure. If it is used in this way during the worship service it is acceptable. Any other usage should be discouraged.
The Elder's Handshake
Child and Worship
The Place of the Law in the Worship Service
"Piety within Proper Bounds": John Calvin on Christian Worship
What should the worship service be like? This article looks at John Calvin's principles on worship, which state that worship must be God-focused, biblically based, and spiritually simple.
Between Old and New
The Privilege of Worship
O Come Let Us Worship (8b): The People of God Humbled and Healed - The Element of Prayer
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author looks at the importance of prayer in corporate worship. This prayer is guided by an understanding of God as the covenant God. Within the covenant God reveals Himself as a personal God, a promise-keeping God, and a holy and merciful God. This character of God shapes the response of God's people in prayer. The author of this article discusses what the character, content, and goal of such prayer should be.
O Come Let Us Worship (8a) - The People of God Humbled and Healed
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author looks at the importance of prayer in corporate worship. This prayer is guided by an understanding of God as the covenant God. Within the covenant God reveals Himself as a personal God, a promise-keeping God, and a holy and merciful God. This character of God shapes the response of God's people in prayer. The author of this article discusses what the character, content, and goal of such prayer should be.
O Come Let Us Worship (7b): And God Spake all These Words
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author looks at the place of the Ten Commandments in the worship service, discussing the character and goal of the law.
O Come Let Us Worship (7a): And God Spake all These Words
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author looks at the place of the Ten Commandments in the worship service, discussing the character and goal of the law.
O Come Let Us Worship (6): Praising the Lord in the Congregation
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author looks at corporate singing during worship. Corporate singing has a characteristic of dialogue, and comes as a response to God's word.
O Come Let Us Worship (5): Praising the Lord in the Congregation
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author looks at the significance of singing in worship, discussing the goal, necessity and nature of corporate singing.
O Come Let Us Worship (4): Hear Ye Him! The Reading and Preaching of Scripture in Worship
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author looks at the significance of public reading of scripture and preaching during the worship service. The focus of the article is the impact God's word must have on the life of the believer and the attitude a Christian must exhibit when listening to God's word.
O Come Let Us Worship (3): Hear Ye Him! The Reading and Preaching of Scripture in Worship
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author looks at the significance of public reading of scripture and preaching during the worship service and the place they have in the liturgy of the church.
O Come Let Us Worship (2): Called into His Presence – The Opening Service
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author discusses the call to worship, the salutation, the votum, and the benediction and their place in the worship service.
O Come Let Us Worship (1): Called into His Presence – The Opening Service
This series of articles is about the elements of the worship service. Here the author discusses the call to worship, the salutation, the votum, and the benediction, and their place in the worship service.
The Dialogical Principle of Worship (2)
At the heart of reformed worship is the covenant. The covenant implies a relationship in which God declares Himself to be the God of His people and that His people are His own. Because of this covenant, God speaks to His people and His people respond. This is what forms the dialogue nature of worship service which is made possible by God through Christ. Cementing this conviction, the author shows how this dialogue principle is applied through the liturgy.
The Dialogical Principle of Worship (1)
This article builds upon a previous article entitled The Covenantal Assembly. At the heart of reformed worship is the covenant. The covenant implies a relationship in which God declares Himself to be the God of His people and that His people are His own. Because of this covenant, God speaks to His people and His people respond. This is what forms the dialogue nature of worship service which is made possible by God through Christ.
The Covenantal Assembly (2)
What should motivate God's people to come together in public worship? Looking at Psalm 95:1-7, the author shows that a true understanding of God as Creator and Redeemer is what causes the covenant child to come and worship God. This understanding and desire is the work of the Holy Spirit, and causes the worship service to be God-centered, with the word of God taking the center stage.
Evangelistic Worship
New Testament Church Practice
In the New Testament worship service there was no distinction between laity and clergy; rather, there was a priesthood of all believers. However, this does not mean that everyone had the right to preach or teach - this God entrusted to the elders. We should take this into account when reflecting on our worship today.