Questions and Answers – 10

What’s the church like that you attend?

God has placed me in a temporary church home full of dear people whom I love, and who love me. It is a joy to arrive each Sunday morning and exchange affectionate smiles, greetings, and hugs with my brothers and sisters in Christ. It’s a small church: there have been as many as sixty in attendance, though one rainy morning we were fewer than twenty.

Because I teach in the Sunday school, I haven’t participated in too many church services. However, this seems to be the general order of things on a typical Sunday morning:

1) We begin with the “Morning Dew,” a guided Bible study on some selected theme or passage of Scripture. This time is interactive, as the leading elder invites members of the audience to read the passage(s) aloud, share any observations, and answer questions.
2) A church elder next guides us into intercessory prayer, throwing out topics for prayer that leave the audience murmuring in beautiful harmony, rising and falling in volume together. When John talks about the prayers of the saints being like incense in Revelation, I think he is referring to African Christians’ prayers. ;)
3) The singing portion of the service consists of three distinct parts: “praise” (lively tunes that have people dancing in joy before the Lord), “worship” (slower pieces that are sung reverently), and hymns (there are always two). The songs are multi-lingual and are accompanied by drums (western and African), tambourines, and a keyboard.
4) Offering is a livelier affair here than it is in the States, as a collection basket is placed up front and we dance past it row by row, dropping in our money as we pass.
5) We welcome our visitors, make announcements – there are no church bulletins! – and sing “Happy Birthday” to all who celebrated their birthdays within the past week.
6) Two hours into the service, the sermon finally starts, running about half an hour.

Stay tuned for another post, because the Sunday morning service is only one aspect of what goes on in this little church. I love and miss my church home in the States…but know that when I leave, I’ll miss this church too.