Gathered for Worship [antikvár]

Preface Päivi Jussila As the coordinator of the Lutheran World Federation's study program on "Spiritual Life in Community" since 2000,1 would like to take this opportunity to thank all those persons and communities that contributed to this study. A team consisting of nine members visited the following local congregations and communities in Germany, Brazil, USA, India and Tanzania in 2001-2002: Germany The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria Communitat Christusbruderschaft (CCB), Selbitz Communitat Christusbruderschaft (CCB), Petersberg The Third Order of the CCB/Mr and Mrs Mohr, Selbitz Brazil The Evangelical Church of the Lutheran Confession in Brazil The Ferraz Parish (Ferraz, Formosa, Linha Cinco) The Santa Cruz Do Sui Parish The Santa Maria Parish (including ministries at the Ecumenical Center, the University and the University Hospital) USA The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Phinney Ridge Lutheran Church, Seattle The Compass Center, Seattle The Compass Cascade Women's Center, Seattle India The Gurukul Lutheran Theological College, Chennai The Saccidananda Ashram, Shantivanam, Kulithalai The Tamil Evangelical Lutheran Church The Nathamangudi Congregation The Kollumedu Congregation The Girls' Hostel, Sengaraiyur The Arcot Lutheran Church The Broadway Parish The Gossner Evangelical Lutheran Church in Chotanagpur and Assam The Ranchi Parish The Govlndpur Congregation The Pracharak Training School, Govindpur The Gossner Theological College, Ranchi Tanzania The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania Women against AIDS in Kilimanjaro, Moshi The Center of Hope, Moshi The Sinai Congregation, Kia The Bethel Congregation, Kia The Shiri Parish, Moshi The Mwika Bible School, Moshi The Lekura Parish, Moshi I am most grateful to the nine members of the study team for their contributions and commitment to the study: Adiss Arnold (India), Everton Bootz (Brazil), Susan Briehl (USA), Anna Makyao (Tanzania), Christopher Meakin (Sweden), Colette Ranarivony (Madagascar), Sr Susanne Schmitt (Germany), Richard Stetson (Canada) and Patrick Werrn (France). The fruits of this study include three essays based on the visits: "Community in Christ," "Praying the Word" and "Gathered for Worship". Creating these book- 4 lets has been a corporate process, involving several people. The primary essays were written by Susan Briehl and Sr Susanne Schmitt (Community in Christ), Christopher Meakin (Praying the Word) and Richard Stetson and Adiss Arnold (Gathered for Worship). Susan Briehl, Sr Susanne Schmitt and Päivi Jussila edited the booklets. We offer these essays for the strengthening and nourishing of Christian community among Lutherans and ecumenically. All Saints' Day 2002 Gathered for Worship You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created (Rev 4:11). Corporate worship has been vital to the life of the church since the birth of Christianity. The gathering of congregations on Sundays in the name of Jesus is universal. We come together to encounter Christ in the Word, sacraments and one another, opening ourselves to the grace of God. In worship we acknowledge what God has done for us and experience the presence of Jesus (Mt 18:20, 28:20b) who has given his life and lives again for us. In worship we are united with the risen Christ so that as we share in his death we may be raised to lead a new life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. For whoever has died is freed from sin. But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. The death he died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus (Rom 6:5-11). Many early Christians went to the extent of defying the imperial authority of Rome when they were ordered not to gather for worship. The Eucharist was life for the faithful and they preferred death to living without the Word and the sacrament. During the persecution of Diocletian, in third-century Africa, the martyrs of Abitina declared to their accusers: sine dominico (esse) non possu-mus (Without the Sunday Eucharist we cannot live). Only after the edict of toleration issued by Emperor Constantine in the fourth century were Christians throughout the Roman Empire free to worship publicly They had an 9