Worship or Evangelism / Mission

There is no competition between the concept of the church as a worshiping community and the church as a people on mission? The worship of God can only take place in and through the lives of regenerate people who worship in spirit and in truth. In order for there to be assembled, a body of believers who can truly exalt the Lord, they must be called out of darkness and into His marvelous light.

The call to worship that resounds throughout history is an evangelistic call. It is a summons to recognize that God is Sovereign over all things and that He is worthy of our worship. But that message also recognizes and publishes the truth that fallen man can bring no offering that God can accept except as he or she has been cleansed by the loving, gracious, and merciful redemptive act of God Himself in Jesus Christ.

God's love compels the worshiper to propagate the message of grace. God's passion for the lost to come into a loving and worshiping whole-life relationship with Him is the driving force of the mission of Christ and of the early church. He will not be contained in temples made with hands, but has chosen to make sanctuaries of the human heart and declare that reasonable worship extends beyond recitations and prostration to the presentation of our bodies as living sacrifices.

Then, when we come to sing, kneel, bow, shout, and lift our hands, it is a continuation of whole-life worship, which include discipleship, evangelism, and ministry to hurting humanity. When the benediction is pronounced, there is no cessation of worship - only continuance at an even deeper level because we have been equipped, inspired, and sent forth.

Evangelism is a way of saying:

"Come, let us worship the Lord, for He alone is worthy. Come before Him all you people of His making, whose souls are restless until they rest in Him. He has loved you with an everlasting love and calls you into relationship with Him. Hear the truth and receive the Spirit. Come freely and without reservation for the table has been set. Jesus Himself, God's Son, is your host. He has blotted out all your sins by His own sacrificial death. Come, all you who are poor and feeble, who have no offering to bring to the altar; the price has been paid, the offering made. Bring only your sins and your selves. Come and receive mercy and grace. Come with thanksgiving. Come with tears. Come with laughter. Come, consecrate your lives to His praise and glory. Come; find reconciliation with God and with one another. Come, come, come.”

And so, the worshiping community invites to the world, constantly, fervently, and passionately to the assembly of praise for God's own sake and for the sake of them whom He loves so profoundly. The Son of Man came, not to be honored, but to seek and to save that which was lost.

And so, He is worthy of all honor. Having emptied Himself for the mission, He has a Name that is above every name. All will bow; all will declare His Lordship - but God has expressed a decided preference that all come by grace rather than by ultimate coercion. He would far rather invite than demand. He will employ every persuasive means that might somehow touch the hearts of men and women. He will move upon His servants to become all things to all men so that by all means, some might be save.