Our Exec meeting this week began with a time of prayer for our church. Often the opening prayer of a meeting is brief so that we can then dive into the agenda, but this week, it was good to spend longer listening, giving thanks, and asking for God's help and direction. There followed a conversation on our collective longing to be a more prayerful people. It's not a peripheral issue - the journey of prayer is in many ways at the very heart of the journey of discipleship. For my part, I came away challenged to be more intentional during Sunday services to invite our people to participate (in a non-threatening way) in the work of prayer, so that we don't just end up spectating while the preacher prays on our behalf!
A second conversation during the meeting also related to Sunday worship. We talked about the pre-Covid practice of passing around a collection bag on Sundays. There was something wonderful about how this obliged us to participate and engage with our neighbours. The use of a collection bag was however phased out during the time when we were all social distancing - remember that? One of the reasons why we haven't re-introduced it, is because the passing of that bag creates huge social pressure to put something in! I know of people who give generously online, who nevertheless would also put cash in the bag because it was too hard to just pass it on to the next person :) That's not helpful because our giving is worship and it pleases God when we give cheerfully and with grateful hearts (2 Cor 9:6-7), not with a sense of obligation. Also, we are trying to move towards electronic giving, which makes good sense from a security and administrative cost perspective. We noted in our meeting that during the month of September, we saw a significant decline in our planned giving, resulting in a shortfall for the month of R25,000. If you consider WMC your home church, but are not yet a part of our planned giving programme, please think about signing up (forms are at the welcome counter).
We may think of liturgy as written prayers, but more correctly, liturgy means "the work of the people", which suggests that we are all actively involved. We are invited - all of us - to participate in the work of the people - worshipping God in our praying and our giving. May God bless you as you join us in worship this week!
A second conversation during the meeting also related to Sunday worship. We talked about the pre-Covid practice of passing around a collection bag on Sundays. There was something wonderful about how this obliged us to participate and engage with our neighbours. The use of a collection bag was however phased out during the time when we were all social distancing - remember that? One of the reasons why we haven't re-introduced it, is because the passing of that bag creates huge social pressure to put something in! I know of people who give generously online, who nevertheless would also put cash in the bag because it was too hard to just pass it on to the next person :) That's not helpful because our giving is worship and it pleases God when we give cheerfully and with grateful hearts (2 Cor 9:6-7), not with a sense of obligation. Also, we are trying to move towards electronic giving, which makes good sense from a security and administrative cost perspective. We noted in our meeting that during the month of September, we saw a significant decline in our planned giving, resulting in a shortfall for the month of R25,000. If you consider WMC your home church, but are not yet a part of our planned giving programme, please think about signing up (forms are at the welcome counter).
We may think of liturgy as written prayers, but more correctly, liturgy means "the work of the people", which suggests that we are all actively involved. We are invited - all of us - to participate in the work of the people - worshipping God in our praying and our giving. May God bless you as you join us in worship this week!