Worship
We gather to worship each Sunday morning at 10:30am at 2761 Valleybrook Rd in Horn Lake, MS.
WHAT TO EXPECT:
Preaching
Scripture is preached primarily verse-by-verse through different books of the Bible. This allows us to see what Scripture says in context, relating each section of Scripture with the Bible as a whole. It also avoids accidentally or purposefully skipping of portions of Scripture that are harder to apply or understand.
God gave us all of His Word, and we must wrestle with it. We must look into this mirror and deal with what we see. It is the standard that we measure everything else against, especially the elements of our worship gatherings.
We preach because...
• The Bible is God’s unchanging, absolute truth.
• The Bible is the most fundamental way that the Holy Spirit sanctifies us.
• The Bible reminds us of who God is, what He has done, and who we are because of it.
• The preaching of God’s word has proven itself to be a source of change in our hearts.
Singing
The sound of God’s people singing is one of the most defining characteristics of congregational worship throughout history. There is an indefinable quality about music that captures our intellect and emotions that helps us come to an understanding of things we couldn’t otherwise grasp.
We sing songs that are scripturally-rooted. Some of the songs we sing are old familiar hymns, some have only been around a few years, and some are songs that we have written together specifically for our congregation. The newness, oldness, style, and instrumentation is not important; what matters is the truth, beauty, and usefulness of the songs.
The songs we sing in worship deeply form us and affect the way we understand and live out the Gospel.
Prayer
God calls upon his people to pray to Him. At Vintage Church prayer takes two forms: congregational and personal.
During our worship gathering, we read aloud together from a congregational prayer. Some of these prayers are lifted directly from Scripture, and some were written long ago by saints of a different age (from books like "The Valley of Vision" and "The Book of Common Prayer").
Using these prayers reminds us that the Church is much larger, much older, and much more beautiful than we understand. We are a part of a long, great, and gracious work of God, and this is one way we seek to remind ourselves of that. We pray out loud together, unifying our hearts and voices as we cast our cares on the Lord, all the while asking for His will to be done, not ours.
We also spend time in personal prayer and examination after the Word is preached and before we take Communion. When we are shown truth from God’s Word, our response should be one of reverence and humility. We humble ourselves and confess to God our need of Him, that His will is more important than ours, and that His glory is better than our temporal good.
Communion
Jesus instituted the Lord's Supper as an element of worship on the night before He was crucified. It was derived from the Jewish Festival of Passover. In the same way that the Jewish people would feast together to rejoice and remember God’s rescue from slavery, we take communion as a remembrance of Christ’s death and God's rescuing us from the slavery of sin.
At Vintage we celebrate the Lord's Supper every week after the preaching of the Word. This is so we are constantly reminded of Christ's atonement for us, examining our lives, confessing sin, and dwelling on His holiness.
The Lord's Supper...
• Is a reminder of his once-for-all sacrifice.
• Is a physical sign of spiritual nourishment.
• Is a sign of unity among believers.
• Reminds us of Christ’s love and that all the benefits of salvation are ours.
• Is an expression of our need for Christ.
• Is a sign of the continuing of the Christian life (as baptism is a sign of its beginning).
We take communion looking forward to the marriage supper of the Lamb, when Christ and His church will be finally united.
Giving
Throughout Scripture, we see examples of believers giving tithes (which literally means “one tenth” of their income or produce), and we see offerings (contributions above or separate from the tithe).
In the New Testament, we see the church selling their possessions to give to the poor, sharing money and goods and property, and generally avoiding the love of wealth.
We give tithes and offerings as a church to remind ourselves that what we have is not our own. God is the giver of all that we have. It is a sign of our commitment to each other and to the Lord.
We give because we believe in the work we are doing together as a church and because there are people in need (both inside and outside our congregation).
Children
We encourage families to worship together so we have the opportunity to teach our children healthy worship practices at an early age. While we have nursery for babies (through age 3 during the sermon), family integrated worship is a step toward continually aligning ourselves with the scriptures as godly parents, teaching by example as children observe, practice, and are then able to do on their own.