Engage Your Heart | 9-25-22
Each week at Mercyview we enter expecting to meet with God together through the finished work of Jesus and the ministry of the Holy Spirit among us. This weekly post is designed to help those who gather with us on Sundays come into the gathering ready to engage in worship through singing, praying, and hearing in meaningful ways.
We meet at 5p @ Memorial Baptist Church, 2800 S Yale Ave. Our livestream will be available at that time on our website, www.mercyview.com.
Here is how you can engage your heart for worship:
- Read through the provided text and/or consider the topic that will be preached on that Sunday.
- Sing, listen or read through the song lyrics that we’ll be singing together and ask the Lord to deepen your understanding of Him through them. Get to know unknown songs or ask for a fresh view of old ones.
- Pray for the Lord to reveal Himself to you and the gathered church in powerful ways. Pray for those who are serving this week and for the one who is preparing and preaching God’s Word.
Our worship service is organized into four stages that we call Movements. These movements allow us to focus on specific aspects of worshiping God by giving us context and perspective.
Movement One: God is God and We are Not
Call to Worship: A time when we look at Scripture and orient our hearts toward God.
Confession of Sin: A time for us to examine our hearts under the light of God's Word and confess our sins to God.
Assurance of Pardon: A reminder that in Christ all our sins are covered, we are forgiven, and we now walk in newness of life through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Confessing Our Faith: We read a question and answer from The New City Catechism as a way to help us learn and live out what we believe.
Question: How can we glorify God?
Answer: We glorify God by enjoying him, loving him, trusting him, and by obeying his will, commands, and law.
Movement Two: We Approach God
Sung Worship:
Prayer: In response to our time of sung worship, we want to pause before moving into the ministry of the Word and approach God in prayer.
Movement Three: God Instructs Us
Ministry of the Word: Sermon Series: Reign of Grace - (watch last week's message here) // Text: Romans 11:7-24
What then? Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking. The elect obtained it, but the rest were hardened, as it is written,
“God gave them a spirit of stupor,
eyes that would not see
and ears that would not hear,
down to this very day.”And David says,
“Let their table become a snare and a trap,
a stumbling block and a retribution for them;
let their eyes be darkened so that they cannot see,
and bend their backs forever.”So I ask, did they stumble in order that they might fall? By no means! Rather, through their trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles, so as to make Israel jealous. Now if their trespass means riches for the world, and if their failure means riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their full inclusion mean!
Now I am speaking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry in order somehow to make my fellow Jews jealous, and thus save some of them. For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead? If the dough offered as firstfruits is holy, so is the whole lump, and if the root is holy, so are the branches.
But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although a wild olive shoot, were grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing root of the olive tree, do not be arrogant toward the branches. If you are, remember it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you. Then you will say, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.” That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God's kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off. And even they, if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them in again. For if you were cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, be grafted back into their own olive tree.
Movement Four: God Feeds Us
The Lord's Supper: Each week, following the teaching of God's Word, we come to the table and celebrate the finished work of Christ. We remember his death, rejoice in his resurrection, and in the taking of the elements "taste and see that the Lord is good."
Sung Worship: Promises, listen here
Spotify Playlist:
More in Mercyview's Rhythms
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Engage Your Heart | 8-27-23August 11, 2023
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Engage Your Heart | 8-6-23