Dear Family at CCC,

     This Sunday we will come to the close of our brief sermon series on worship as Divine invitation and celebrate God’s goodness together by partaking of the Lord’s Table. We will also hear this Sunday from Hebrews 4:1-16, which will remind us of the deep and eternal implications worship holds for us who live and labor in the now and not yet of Christ’s Kingdom.  Worship as blessed necessity becomes ever more apparent the more we realize that it is through the ordinary means of grace that God has appointed for worship that He enables us to rest in His mercy and grace as we wait in hope for the eternal rest to come in Christ.  

The bread and cup of the Lord’s Table will help us better to see and celebrate this truth as it points us to Jesus Himself, the One who offers Himself to us as our righteousness, peace, and rest.  In his little book, The Riddle of Life, J.H. Bavinck captures this point beautifully:

“We by ourselves cannot open the gate that leads to the peace that passes understanding.  Only when our soul finds Christ is it possible for hope to emerge.  He is the Redeemer, He is our peace.  In Him we find the answer to that thirst for righteousness.  Only when we learn to meet him in that way will we know Him and sense that He is the One.” 

As you prepare to partake of the Table this Sunday, pray that the Spirit would help you through these ordinary means to meet with Jesus.  Ask that He would use worship not only to nourish your faith in Jesus and to help you rest in Him, but to increase the faith of those around you so that they too may rest in Christ.  May our worship together strengthen us with joy and patience as we wait with eager expectation the eternal Sabbath rest prepared for us in Christ Jesus. 

In Christ,
Robby