Many of us have little secular rituals. In my case I have a morning routine: I turn on the coffee maker, go out for the paper, eat my cereal with berries while I read the paper, shave, check my emails, read several websites including this devotional blog, and at 7:00 I go over to the workout center. There are many reasons for our rituals, and in this case this daily repetition seems to give me comfort and is an efficient way of getting certain tasks out of the way. I have to admit that there is a down side in that an interruption to this routine bothers me. Sometimes rituals are performed to make sure that something important isn’t left out; an airline pilot’s pre-flight checklist would be an example of this. Of course, this kind of ritual can’t be performed mindlessly, because a mistake could be dangerous. Other times rituals are followed for superstitious reasons; baseball players often follow a weird sequence of motions when coming to bat or refuse to change their socks when on a hitting streak. Most personal rituals are beneficial, or at least harmless, but some people have disorders such as OCD in which they take them to extreme. 
 

 In our religious services we have rituals, too. Some are formal and stylized, while others are there just because “we’ve always done it that way.” Even Baptists, whose services try not to have formal rituals, would never end a service without an altar call. Like our personal rituals, our church rituals can comfort us with familiarity and give a sense of completeness. They also help emphasize the timelessness and sacredness of our faith, and conducting them with our fellow Christians confirms our unity. On the other hand they can seduce us into passivity by making our services analogous to a college class – a place where information goes from the professor’s notes to the student’s notes without passing through the minds of either. The founders of the reformation, John Huss and Martin Luther, knew that participation in worship should be active and intentional (more recently Vatican II declared the same). That is why they insisted that services be in the language of the people; Luther also added the congregational singing of hymns. Our services today should follow this lead and try to encourage the active participation of modern worshippers using whatever worship forms are effective in conveying the Message – Christ died for our sins. What is more important, however, is that we as worshippers should not be lulled by the comfort of routine, but rather hear, listen to, and heed the Message that challenges us to increase our faith.

 To learn about the worship of the early church read Acts 2:42-47, and remember: God loves YOU unconditionally.

Jim