Sunday, August 12, 2007

a short review of worship this morning

One of the beauties of a sabbatical is the chance to visit other churches and see how they approach the whole Sunday morning worship experience thing. There are always good ideas to take home with you, and you get to be an encouragement to what they're doing in their home churches.

So this morning we planned to attend G.M.C here in Prince Albert and connect with some people who worship God in that place.

It didn't really start off in a great way, as Lauralea and I left the house this morning at 8:45 am. I was muttering something about who has church this early on a Sunday morning anyway. 9 am worship seems a bit, well, harsh to me.

I had phoned the night before. Actually I first did a websearch on the church to find out the time of the service in the morning. They had no web presence, so I was forced to use the phone. Now, there's nothing wrong with not being online with your times and location as a church, but it was interesting to me that that was the first place I looked for information. Online.

So, instead I called them and their machine held the information I was looking for. Worship service was at 9 am with Sunday School starting a little after that service.

Seemed a bit early, but if Lauralea was willing to have a go, so would I. She asked the time she should be ready to go and I guessed an 8:45 leaving time should be good enough. She groaned, and I agreed.

But this morning, after the alarm woke us at 7:30 we got up and got dressed and moaned our way out the door.

The drive was certainly nice, with very little traffic on the roads at that time. One street was closed because of roadworks, but we took the detour confident that we would arrive in time.

As we pulled up into the church parking lot at 8:57 with our bright clean morning faces on, I was at first a bit confused. There were lots parking spaces available, mainly because there were no cars in the parking lot.

"What... ?" Was my response.

I pulled up in front of the sign and parked and read it out loud.

"Sunday Worship, 11:00 am."

I started a litany of questions; "11 am? How?, Whaaat? Why?"

I called the number on the sign and re listened to the announcement and got Lauralea to listen to it too. It still said Worship at 9 am.

Sigh.

What to do, up so early on a Sunday.

I decided breakfast at A&W would be good, so off we went.

The early morning wasn't a total waste. We had a good visit and made some plans for the fall.

And so we went to worship this morning at G.M.C, and apart from committing the unforgivable sin, (Now I know what it is!!) we had a great time.

I'd give it a two thumbs up.

:)

6 comments:

  1. Ok, I must be a little slow but what is G.M.C.? And feel free to join us on a sunday for worship, we are not very far from where you live.

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  2. Did you ask anyone about the "9 a.m" message, or was that the unforgivable sin?

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  3. GMC are the initials of the church, and because I know how easily that mistake is made I don't want to completely hose them.

    There was no one there to take my enquiries, so I left a note.


    So, if I were to attend your church Joanne, which one would I attend, oh and what time would it start?


    :)

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  4. Abundant life Community Church, and it starts at 11, but if you were to show up at 9, the church wouldn't be empty as we have worship practice, and through the fall/ winter we have coffee time

    We are having a neighborhood music evening (outdoors), and barbecue on the 24th, followed by a sunday of gospel music on the 26th. You and your family are more than welcome to walk on down for either, if you feel so led.

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  5. Sounds fun.

    and I love the summer music and bbq thing. That's always been a great idea!

    thanks for the invite, we'll see what this weekend holds.

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  6. Sounds greatl, I am sure you will know a lot of people who would be there.
    Starts at 5:30, and there is nothing better than barbecued hamburgers, and good old gospel music played in the streets.

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