Sunday service

“ Citizens' Sunday is another method of securing widespread interest in this movement. Invite a clergyman to preach a sermon devoted to this matter, or, if deemed more effective, arrange for a union service in one of the churches, with addresses by several clergymen. ”

“ And more, it was often while they were gathered together, celebrating the festival of the Lord's Day, that the Lord Himself appeared among them.
LORD'S PRAYER. The prayer taught us by our blessed Lord as the model of all our devotions. (Matt. vi. 9.) But it is not only a model of prayer, but an express form to accompany all our worship. (Luke xi. 2.) Thus we find it frequently in our Prayer Book, no Service being without it. The often repetition of it, however, in our Sunday Service is caused by the fact of three separate Services being used as one whole. ”

“ To-day, we will say, is Sunday, God's holy day! To-day, of all days in the week, God has chosen to be set apart for His worship. He has given you time to be so employed. He has given you an open church to go to. He has given you health and power to go, and yet perhaps you reject all, and never go at all. Don't you see that you have taken of things of God, that you have taken His gift of health, and His gift of Sunday rest--things given that they might be spent in His service, and in worshipping Him in His church. ”

“ They look upon religion less as a Sunday garment, and more as a robe of righteousness, that transforms [208] our selfish natures into earnest, self-denying lives of obedience.
Let me give a week’s religious duties. Sunday, two of our young men preach in an adjoining town. Quite a number go out to neighboring Sunday-schools, and return about eleven o’clock, when our preaching service begins. Our pastor, a graduate of Yale College and Theological Seminary, came South at the close of the war, to build the first Congregational church in Atlanta. ”

“ It seems to us that the only way to have Sunday properly observed is for those who are influential to make some little personal sacrifices, if need be, to attend the Sunday services, and do all they can to promote the most cheerful views of religion and make the services interesting. ”

“ Hence the Prayer Book prescribes a Collect, Epistle and Gospel for every Sunday in the year, and its rubrics plainly teach us that according to the mind of the Church the principal service of every Lord's Day should be the celebration of the Holy Eucharist. Our Lord has also taught us by His example as well as by precept, that works of mercy, both spiritual and corporal, are lawful to be done on this day, and are peculiarly appropriate to it. ”

“ The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
From past ages we have received many valuable institutions, that have grown out of the transient wants or the permanent nature of man. Amongst these are two which have done a great service in promoting the civilization of mankind, which still continue amongst us. I speak now of the institution of Sunday, and that of preaching. By the one, a seventh part of the time is separated from the common pursuits of life, in order that it may be devoted to bodily relaxation, and to the culture of the spiritual powers of man ”

“ The writer does not hesitate to advise persons who are temporarily residing, as is often the case during the summer, where there is no Episcopal Church, to attend public worship, once a Sunday at least, at the representative Evangelical place of worship of the community. Reading the Church service at home by one's self is no substitute for public worship. ”

“ In order that our spiritual natures may be fed with spiritual food, we have every Christian influence in our homes, we have the Sunday-school and the Catechetical class, and the Church with its preaching service, and prayer-meetings and other services. If you desire to be good, you must study your Bibles, go to Sunday-school and to church, and seek to know all you possibly can concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, and receive Him into your hearts, and live a Christian life by His aid and the grace which God will grant you from day to day. ”

“ It is Sunday, and after the evening service it is my friend's custom to gather his children round him, and, without any formal sermon or discourse, engage their interests in subjects harmonious to associations with the sanctity of the day; often not directly bearing upon religion ”

“ For when the morning service is concluded, as though the Sabbath itself were also ended, we see no more of the mass of our congregation till we meet them on the following Sunday. A painful p. 231inquiry, then, as you will easily conceive, is often presented to our minds, as to the probable manner in which the remaining hours of your Sabbath are employed. Some few of you, I know, are kindly endeavouring to instruct the young in our Sunday-schools; some few also (oh that there were more!) make a point of instructing their own families at home ”

“ Notwithstanding all the comforts and conveniences of modern places of worship, to say nothing about the more interesting preaching and other exercises, some people consider it a hardship to be obliged to attend even one service on Sunday. How was it in "old times"? Our ancestors were obliged to conform to the prevalent custom of going to meeting whether they liked it or not. The law did not then excuse any one from attendance at public worship, except for sickness. Not to be a "meeting-goer" in those days was to range one's self with thieves and robbers and other outlaws. ”

“ Arrange chairs and "drive to church," let the audience, both real and imaginary be shown to seats, and after the opening service let one of the children in his or her own way present the lessons remembered from the sermon of last Sunday, or recast what was said by the pastor in his morning sermon. After the collection and singing, let the children "drive home" and let refreshments or some one of the Scriptural entertainments previously suggested round out the pleasure and profit of Sunday afternoon. ”

“ If the occupation of two hours or so on a Sunday morning, and another service in the afternoon, may appear somewhat excessive to our modern notions, we must bear in mind that it was in those days clearly understood and accepted as a first principle of religion that the meaning of the Sunday rest and freedom from work was, in the first place, that the Christian, who was occupied all the rest of the week mainly in temporal affairs, might have time to attend to the things of his soul. ”

“ Two or three young men go out to hold Sunday services in the country cabins, the Sunday-school is full and the older ones serve as teachers, for many children come in from surrounding fields, making a school of nearly one hundred teachers and pupils. The young people's society meeting each Sunday afternoon, and the prayer meetings on Sunday and Wednesday evenings are characterized by a quiet, earnest Christianity, that would do credit to any circle in our Northern States. ”

“ We have but to examine the average church program to be convinced of this. In a large number of churches we have three Sunday services—two of which are devoted to adults and one to children. In the average church the week-day services are largely services for adults. ”

“ After the conclusion of the church service, additional exercises or games suited to the sacredness of the day may be appropriately used to entertain [20] the children and continue their happiness. By methods of this kind, Sunday may be made not only the most profitable, but the brightest and best day of the week.
24. Some light refreshment may be introduced, as fruit, cake or candy. ”

“ The point before us is, that there was no Church throughout the world which failed, for the first three or four hundred years, to have everywhere a weekly celebration on the Sunday, and to expect the attendance of all Christians at that ordinance. ”

“ In brief, it would not hurt Society to spend its Sundays with more thought for others than Itself. For the bulk and mass of the British people—the people who are Great Britain—still adhere to the sacred and blessed institution of a “day of rest,” even if it be not a day of sermons. To thousands upon thousands of toiling men and women, Sunday is still a veritable God’s day, and we may thank God for it! ”

“ Fifty years ago hardly any one thought of absenting himself or herself from public worship. People went to church as a matter of course, partly from a sense of duty, and partly from habit; and this is still the case to some extent. The majority of thoughtful persons of all religious persuasions are agreed upon one point, and that is, it is desirable to have Sunday set apart as a day of rest and change from the ordinary cares and business of life. From a sanitary point of view this rest is no doubt of the highest importance. ”

“ The Easter services begin on Saturday evening, and at the end of the long and ceremonious services the officiating priest gives the good tidings of the day: "Christ has risen from the dead," and the attendants respond: "Blessed is the resurrection of Christ." Friends meeting with each other during the three days of Easter use the above two sentences for their salutation. The priest is sure to visit each home in his parish, holding a very brief service in each. ”

“ Then, about their Sundays, I think that church can’t do us much good if we don’t give the servants an opportunity to go, too, if they want to, or if we make it a hard day for them. Though it requires special arrangement, their Sundays should be made a day to look forward to with pleasure when each one can be sure of getting out, at some part of the day, to church, or to see her friends. The Sunday morning that the cook goes out, the lunch should be one that can be quickly cooked or her outing would be too short. ”

“ I may almost say, I am a member of all the churches, for I have occasionally attended all denominations for prayer and praise, but principally the Church of England, and my Christian friends will pardon me for saying, that every man and woman who professes the Christian religion ought to attend some place of worship twice of a Sunday, unless Christian duty calls them another way ”

“ A very large proportion of those who do not attend church services are people of culture and character, from whom church-goers have nothing to fear as regards a disturbance of their worship. Generally this class are interested in having Sunday kept as a day of quiet and rest, and their non-attendance at church is no evidence that they have any desire to secularize Sunday. ”

“ It is such a very sad sight Sunday after Sunday to see so many people, and especially young men, go out of church when the Holy Communion is going to be administered. In so many churches, even in those where the congregations are large, we see the great bulk of the congregation getting up, as soon as the sermon is over, and leaving church. You may perhaps often have been among the departing guests, you may have sung the words,-- ”

“ One relates to our duty as members of society in keeping up the influence of the Sabbath, and causing it to be respected in the community; the other, to the proper disposition of our time for our own moral improvement. As members of the community, we should go to church, and do all in our power to support the outward ordinances of religion. If a conscientious man makes up his mind that Sunday is a day for outward acts of worship and reverence, he should do his own part as an individual towards sustaining these observances. ”

“ Don't take away my human minister, whose God is no tyrant, and is better pleased to see us go smiling home from church, than bowing our heads like a bulrush, and groaning back to our dinners, till all you anti-Sabbatarians are mad to abolish Sunday,—and no wonder.
Our Catholic brethren have set us, at least one good example; their churches are not silent as the tomb on week-days. Their worshippers do not do up all their religion on Sunday. It may be only for a few moments they step in through that open church-door, on a week-day, to kneel and lay down burdens too heavy else to be borne. ”

“ But, alas, the Sunday worshipper might be quite content with that, for then, instead of offering his poor soul humbly before the dear God, he would be constantly chopping wood, counting the felled trunks, the sticks, the piles of brushwood, which on a week-day would not otherwise trouble him. Prayer would stream from the heart like a fountain of blood, if one's thoughts did not wander, but since they cannot always be controlled, we must guard the church like a fortress, so that the Sabbath may not leave it nor the work-day enter. ”

“ They are thus made to feel that they are wanted, and have a part in the Church which all too often is looked upon as a Church solely for the grownups. No part of my ministry has given me greater delight and satisfaction than the thought that I am helping to establish in the lives of many boys and girls that habit so indispensable to a steady Christian experience, namely—the habit of Sunday morning worship. ”

“ That she might have as much of the Sunday to herself as the general arrangements of the household would permit. The commandment which tells us all to ‘remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy,’ has especially said that servants are to rest on that day. No one is likely long to go on right who has no time to read the Bible—that great chart intended to guide us through life,—without time to attend the public means of grace, and without leisure to prepare for that world where the serving and the served must stand side by side, to give up their account to the great Master and Judge of all. ”

“ Some of the “church’s” ministers would no more enter a “denominational” place of worship than they would put their hand in the fire. Others will fraternize with everything and everybody, and when Sunday comes will close their eyes—sometimes they roll them upward—and pray publicly: “From heresy and schism good Lord deliver us.” ”