Our Worship

Worship is a very broad term. When most people think of worship, or worshiping God, they think of the portion of the church service in which we sing. Although singing is a form of worship, it does not fully convey the meaning of worship.

Worship in its simplest form is ascribing worth, value, or honor to something. As we look at our lives it is usually very easy to see what it is receiving our highest praise, and if it is anything other than God than we are committing idolatry.

We believe that God alone is worthy of worship and delights in His own glory, and so creates, seeks, saves, and commands His people to worship Him (1 Chronicles 16:29, Psalm 29:2).

Worship is a response to God’s mercy that moves us from being conformed to the world to being transformed by the Holy Spirit.

So how do we worship God? At Coram Deo you will often hear us say that “All of life is worship.”

As we see in Romans 12:1-2, worship is holistic and all-encompassing. Everything we do is an acknowledgment that he has called us out of darkness into his marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9) and that he is worthy of our praise.

But what do we mean by that? What we mean by this statement is that we don’t want to give God our Sundays, but keep the rest of the week for ourselves. We don’t want to ascribe our Sunday worship service some kind of special holiness that somehow the rest of our ordinary lives cannot attain to.

Worship is related to every area of our lives. We are called to eat, drink, speak, think and work to the glory of God (1 Corinthians 10:31). Worship cannot be narrowed down to a particular time and place as if God does not claim authority over certain aspects of our lives. There are no neutral desires or deeds; everything is an expression of worship.

We at Coram Deo desire for our entire lives to be characterized by the spiritual service of worship to God, and because of this we seek to live lives consistent with our desires. Every thought we think, word we speak, desire and deed involves the ascribing of worth, value, and glory. Each attitude, affection and activity is an expression of our allegiance, whether to our Creator or His creation. So whether singing at church on Sunday, working our 9-5 job, or playing baseball with our kids, we seek to worship God and bring him glory, for God alone is worthy of our worship.

As we pursue a life centered on the worship of God, we gather weekly with the saints for corporate worship. This is an opportunity for the saints to gather and together worship our king. It is a time to use the unique gifts that God has given each one of his children to edify the church as a whole. During this time we worship God by remembering the gospel through preaching, teaching, singing, praying and celebrating the ordinances of baptism and communion. Each presents an opportunity for the church to receive, remember, respond and rejoice in the work of our great King.

But to address the question everyone really wants to know:

What is your music like?

Our music is a mix of old and new. We sing traditional hymns, as well as contemporary music. We see the value of both and choose to incorporate both into our service.

We use acoustical instruments, as well as electric instruments. We currently use a keyboard and guitars at most corporate gatherings, but that is not so much a reflection of what we prefer, but rather a reflection of the gifts of the musicians that God has brought to Coram Deo.

We value the importance of both head and heart in our worship experience , we strive in our worship to fill our minds with Biblical thinking about God, others, ourselves, and life, while at the same time putting renewed and greater emphasis on giving expression to our heart’s affections for God during worship.

We emphasize “corporate” worship. We encourage all of the saints to sing loudly and enthusiastically about the great God we serve. We tend to lean toward a more modern style of worship, but we do realize that some styles don’t appeal to every person. In those instances we encourage all in attendance to try to lay aside personal preferences, and with an excellent spirit sing to God with all of your heart, soul, and strength.

We simply love God, and to the best of our ability seek to worship him with our lives, and we would love to live our lives with you.

Standard worship order:

  • Call to Worship (reading of a Psalm or other appropriate Scripture)
  • Song
  • Call to Confession (time for private prayer and corporate prayer of confession)
  • Song
  • Song
  • Sermon
  • The Lord’s Table
  • Song