What To Expect When You Visit
When you visit you will be warmly welcomed. We are a small group, usually 15-40 people in attendance, so you won’t be anonymous. But we don’t put our visitors “on display.” We’ll make sure you have a Bible, a bulletin and a Psalter (song book). The service normally begins at 11:15 a.m. and concludes about 12:30.
Before the service begins the pastor asks anyone to share news and prayer requests. He then goes over the Scripture memory verse for the week, the quote of the week, and the catechism question and answer of the week, all found in the bulletin. Then to begin the service he reads a Bible passage that is the call to worship and prays for the Lord’s blessing upon the service; especially that we worship Him in accordance with His Word, the Bible, that we bring nothing to the worship service of our own inventions, and that He would bring us the joy and comfort that comes from glorifying His Name. Often he will pray for believers around the world, especially for our brothers and sisters in the persecuted churches.
The pastor then reads and briefly explains a portion of the Old Testament — we started at Genesis and are reading through the books in order. We then sing a Psalm. We sing Psalms because they were written by the Lord for use in worship.
Then a portion of the New Testament is read; again, we go through the books in order. That is followed by a brief period of silent prayer wherein we each ask the Lord to bring those particular sins we have committed to mind and we silently confess them to Him. The pastor then publicly prays for true confession, repentance, the promise of forgiveness through Christ, and then asks His blessing upon the Word preached.
The sermon follows. It is what is known as an expository sermon; that is, the pastor reads a verse or passage of the Bible, explains it in everyday language and applies it to our lives. He normally preaches through an entire book of the Bible, verse-by-verse, although he will sometimes preach on other verses if the occasion warrants it.
After the sermon the pastor asks the Lord to grant specific prayer requests and prays for other matters, including the church as a whole and for the families and individuals of Reformation Church. We then sing another Psalm and the service closes with the benediction, which is a brief blessing from Scripture given by the pastor.
Following the service we have a time of fellowship with refreshments, and you as a visitor are encouraged to stay for that. We sometimes follow that with a lesson on some topic, and you are invited to stay for that as well.
We look forward to meeting you!
If you have any questions please contact Pastor Mencarow at 830-895-5025 or e-mail him.
