There are different styles of worship services in American churches today. None are divinely inspired. None are the only right way to worship God. But there are good reasons we worship the way we do at King of Grace. Occasionally on the blog I’ll explain one or another element of our worship service liturgy.

On Sunday we do something different than we do any other day of the week. On the other six days our lives revolve around making a living, fulfilling responsibilities, and enjoying God’s creation. Sunday is different. It is our entrance into the presence of Christ and the world to come. It is an entrance into a fourth dimension which allows us to see the ultimate reality of life.

Sunday worship begins when we get out of bed in the morning. We don’t put on our usual clothes. We put on our best because we are going to meet a King! We leave our earthly homes and drive to a different building, as though going up to the house of the Lord on his holy mountain (Micah 4:1–2).

At the church service we leave for an hour our mundane world and have a foretaste of heaven. The service is the gateway to the eternal. In the divine liturgy we are caught up in the saints’ and angels’ heavenly worship all around the throne of the Lamb once slain (Revelation 7:9–17). Thus Sunday, or the Lord’s Day, is often called the eighth day of the week, a day different from all others, for it is the first day of the New Creation.

The divine liturgy is commonly called “the service” because here God serves us with Word and Sacrament. It is first and foremost God’s service to us and only secondarily is it our service to God through praise and thanksgiving. Our whole lives as Christians are to be our liturgy, our service of praise to the Trinity.