Approach to Worship
Character of Worship at Christ the Word
At the heart of true worship lies a fearful encounter with the King of Glory. True worship not only glorifies God, it ennobles and enriches the lives of men. For this reason worship can never be casual. Nowhere in life do human beings draw nearer the flame of God's eternal character than in worship, thus true worship is characterized by glory, honor and blessing, yet danger and wrath are also present when worship falls short of the standards established in God's Word.
Power demands respect. Because worship draws us near the throne of God, its rewards are great--as are its risks. Paul warns the Corinthians that some of them are sick and others have died because of inappropriate worship.
Christ the Word believes that worship must be governed by the Word of God. Our primary concern in worship is to worship God in a manner pleasing to Him in the confidence that doing so will lead those who do not know Jesus as Saviour to seek Him.
Our approach to worship seeks to avoid man-made rules while honoring areas of explicit instruction in worship in Scripture.
True worship is always an encounter with the God of eternity, thus, reverence, joy and awe must never be far from us when we enter the house of God.
What does this mean in practice?
Instruments: Scripture reveals a great variety of instruments employed to assist worshippers in the praise of God. We do not believe organs, drums, pianos, guitars, or most other instruments to be ipso facto contrary to a spirit of true worship. Instead, we believe that the appropriateness of instruments to worship is determined by their method of use. Our goal for instrumental accompaniment is to maintain performance characteristics consistent with congregational praise--in general, we seek instrumentation which will assist and promote enthusiastic and powerful congregational singing. Current worship accompaniment at Christ the Word is eclectic, including piano, organ, guitar, drums, bass, oboe, flute, mandolin, and violin.
Scripture Versions: Christ the Word encourages the use of a faithful translation of God's Word without specifying what translation that should be. We do not believe that the King James (or "Authorized") Version is necessarily more faithful or reliable than modern translations--though we occasionally sympathize with those who question the text-critical approach of most recent translations. We believe it is important that translations avoid human recharacterization of divinely inspired words, thus, we discourage the use of translations which employ "gender neutral" language or which do not faithfully translate other words in order to avoid offending modern sensibilities. A variety of versions will be found in our hands on any given Sunday morning, ranging from the New King James Version to the New International Version to the English Standard Version to the King James Version to the New American Standard Bible.
The Lord's Supper: Christ the Word practices open communion. However, we ask that visitors be under the authority of a Bible-believing church when they join with us in celebrating the Lord's Supper. We ask this for the sake of our visitors' own spiritual welfare and to guard our worship from the dangers spelled out in 1 Corinthians 11.
For a more in-depth view of our thinking about worship, see the Philosophy of Worship adopted by the Christ the Word Board of Elders.