I don’t want to sound sacrilegious but, liturgically speaking, September is a slow month. We’re still in the weeks “after Pentecost” but there is no significant religious holiday in September. Plus the summer youth program is over. Vacations are over. School is back in session. There’s nothing to celebrate. Right? Or is there?

Lately I have been thinking a lot about worship, and especially about worship at EAMC. What is it? Why do we do it? And how do we do it?

In his book, Worship is a Verb (1992), Wheaton College professor Robert Webber writes, “Worship isn’t an entertaining showcase for a talented (choir) or a lecture on textual criticism or a pleasant weekly reunion of friends and family. Instead, true worship is a joyous celebration of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.”

In this sense, worship from the heart can transform your life literally forever! So whether you are alone in your study or together with others in the midst of the chapel your worship should express more of what God has done for you, and less of what you will do for Him. As the psalmist says, “Sing to the Lord, praise His name; proclaim His salvation day after day,” (Ps. 96:2).

So maybe there is something to get excited about in September. Each day is a “day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it,” (Ps 118:24). As we say in our policy for use of the Chapel, “our services include worship in prayer, music, scripture reading and the spoken word.” So every time we gather in the chapel whether it is for a church service, for a wedding, for a baptism, for a memorial or for communion, we gather for worship— a joyous celebration of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ who was, and is, and is to come.

Halleluiah!