Willet Stained Glass Window

"The Ministry of Christ"

Photography by Steve Payne.

Worship at Kanawha Church

Worship is at the heart of Kanawha Church. Worship is the time we come together to celebrate the presence of God in our midst, and to be nurtured for the many tasks and challenges we are given as a community of faith. By most standards, our worship would be called traditional, as we honor the precepts of Reformed worship as exemplified in our Book of Common Worship. We are free to practice "freedom within form" so that we can expand our experiences in worship, and not become fixed or rigid by mere routine or meaningless repetitiveness.

Our normal service usually has 4 main components or sections;

We Assemble in God's Name,
    preparing our hearts and minds during preparatory music,
    and by symbolizing the light and presence of Christ as we light the candles,
    responsively saying a call to worship,
    singing a hymn of praise,
    saying a prayer of confession and receiving a declaration of pardon,
    and by passing the forgiving peace of Christ to our fellow worshipers.

We Proclaim God's Word,
    with a special children's sermon,
    hearing the lessons from scripture,
    often by singing a psalm,
    and hearing the word proclaimed through a sermon.

We Respond and Give Thanks to God,
    through our prayers and creeds,
    through our offering,
    celebrating the sacrament of the Lord's Table (at least once a month),
    and through other sacred acts of worship, as baptism and ordination.

We Go In God's Name,
    singing a dismissal hymn,
    receiving a charge and benediction from the minister,
    and then symbolically carrying the light of Christ through our lives
    as we go to interact with the greater community.

Our music, hymns and prayers are chosen according to the day and season of the church year being observed and celebrated, such as Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, & Pentecost. We occasionally include other visual art forms such as textiles and dance. We use a variety of styles of congregational music, drawn from the Presbyterian (Blue) Hymnal, and the Renew! Hymnal.
We also know that it is possible to worship God and glorify Christ in the simplest of non-structured worship "where two or three are gathered together in Christ's name"