Church Matters: Retrieving the Great Tradition

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Appendix 42 A Baptist Preacher Discovers the Christian Year Rev. Larry D. Ellis, in Robert Webber, The Services of the Christian Year (10), Nashville: Star Song Pub. Group, 1994.

Discovery of the Christian Year This author’s Baptist church is a rare exception to the above profile. Drawing from instructive, if limited exposure to liturgical environ ments and considerable study of church history and Christian symbols, we have begun to learn the value of periodically focusing on all the major themes of our Christian faith. Our celebration of the Christmas season has expanded to encompass Advent and Epiphany as well as Christmas. And along with Easter, we now observe Lent and Pentecost. After using the Christian year as a primary basis of our worship for five years, our congregation would have it no other way. Such observance gives us a sense of the recurring celebration, anticipation, and challenge to all that our Lord has designed us to be. Advent is anticipated months before it arrives. We celebrate not only the promise of Jesus’ coming as a baby in the manger, but we also rejoice in the anticipation of his second coming. During Advent we sing primarily carols that invite or promise Jesus’ coming to be in our midst. Most Christmas carols are not sung before Christmas Eve. We then sing them for several weeks until Epiphany. As we celebrate the wise men giving gifts to our Lord, we also celebrate the many gifts that God gives to us, including spiritual gifts. In the Lenten season we rediscover the uniqueness of our Christian faith, God’s plan for our redemption, the sacrifice of God’s Son, Jesus, on the cross. This gives us the opportunity to sing many hymns about the cross and to examine prayerfully all that we are doing both in and outside the church. During Holy Week we read aloud the Scriptures con cerning Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, the Last Supper, and the Crucifixion, and sometimes we reenact these scenes in simple fashion. Reliving these events in Jesus’ ministry each year brings fresh appreciation of his great love and sacrifice for us and challenges us to enthusiastic obedience. After the culmination of Holy Week on Easter Sunday, the focus on Christ’s resurrection continues several weeks. We then turn attention to God’s great gift of the Holy Spirit displayed at Pentecost.