Featured reading Philippians instead of a sermon?

Think it is a great idea!

 

Don't know if this is what you meant, but, IME, congregational reading aloud of scripture is very effective, and gratifying, in this manner. And it works wonders with scripture memory work when the same text is used for a month or so at a time. Excellent way to help teach kids how to read too. I consider it to be a superior form of worship overall.

Everyone has to read from the same version though. We used the KJV at a Bible church we attended many years ago.

 

I think it's a great idea, however.....

IMO, preaching is the primary event of corporate worship. Therefore I would tweak the idea. Week 1 have someone read chapter 1, and then the preacher preaches. Carry on in this manner until the series is complete. In fact, I think it would be a good idea to do that every week regardless of the sermon series.

I think we find an excellent example in Nehemiah 8. We have Phillip teaching the eunuch. I cannot remember an example in Scripture of someone reading from the Scripture and not providing instruction to go with it.

Read it, explain it.
Read it, explain it.

If you just read it I think it's like inviting someone to supper, they come hungry, and you cut them off after the appetizer. I'm afraid you would end up working against what it is you are trying to accomplish.

 

Oh, well. Time to keep me mouth shut. I don't want 12 strings coming after me.

 

12strings,

In all seriousness, I consider one function of the pastor's responsibility to preach the word.

Reading without teaching and exhortation is not preaching. Reading without teaching and exhortation does not call the hearer to act on what he is receiving.

 

Actually a pastor just reading the Word is not the same as teaching or exhortation. If it was then the pastor's job becomes a lot simpler, if not unnecessary.

I understand your affinity for this irregular practice. It's different, a change of pace. A biblical order of worship will include the reading of scripture before the message. We have two readings; the call to worship and a call to repentance (just before the Lord's Supper). The call to worship is always a Psalm. The second reading includes a brief word of exhortation about the passage being read. It is important that the church be taught the Word, and exhorted from the Word. Reading alone does not do this.

Ann, please forgive me if I seem picky. I understand that the Reformed view of worship is a minority position on this board. It's not going to appeal to everyone. Hopefully I'm providing another point of view to consider. That's all I can do.

 

Are you referring to the order of worship or the passage the pastor is preaching on? If it's the latter most pastors read the entire passage they're preaching on that morning at the start of their message. There's no hard and fast rule on that. There have been times when I've read the passage in segments as the sermon progressed. My earlier objection was not about when the passage for the sermon is read, but whether reading the passage without teaching and exhortation is acceptable. In light of 2 Timothy 4:1-2 it is, a best, highly irregular and, at worse, improper.

 

Even though Paul does not specifically tell Timothy that he needed to teach each time the church gathered, the circumstantial evidence is overwhelming. You cited Acts 2 as not supporting the Lord's Supper being practiced every week. You even commented on the Apostles teaching. They were doing this daily. Such was the state of the early church in Jerusalem. They gathered daily. Now the church gathers weekly. Is it too much to ask to teach the Word of God on the only day the corporate body is commanded to meet?

The NT epistles were mostly written by Apostles (Peter, John, and Paul). Apostolic letters carried with them Apostolic authority. Reading them to the early church was expected. Not every letter proved to be canonical. There were more letters written than actually made it into the Bible. But the churches that the Apostles wrote to also had elders (Acts 20:17). The elders would probably have added their comments. They have would have helped explain these letters. We cannot assume that everyone in the church is going to understand the correct meaning of a passage. Scripture needs to be explained. Again, this is the job of the pastor (and elders).

 

Rom 10:14 How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? (NASB)

This verse is central to my conviction concerning the primary place of preaching.

 

But I say, Did they not hear? Yea, verily, Their sound went out into all the earth, And their words unto the ends of the world. Ro 10:18

 

Everyone says this is the ends of the world, but their and not even Paul's ends of the world is not our ends of the world.

Until Christ comes again Praise Him who comes in the name of the Lord. I pray we teach until our ends of the world and so on and so on. I will continue until my physical death and we should teach others to do the same.

Matthew 13:
47 “Once again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was let down into the lake and caught all kinds of fish. 48 When it was full, the fishermen pulled it up on the shore. Then they sat down and collected the good fish in baskets, but threw the bad away. 49 This is how it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous 50 and throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.


51 “Have you understood all these things?” Jesus asked.

“Yes,” they replied.

52 He said to them, “Therefore every teacher of the law who has become a disciple in the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old.”

 

The Reformed conviction on worship.