What happens in a church service?

Worship at the Tabs is fairly straightforward and informal. Our services are typical of that found in 'free' churches in that they are basically a 'hymn sandwich' - this means that inbetween singing hymns there will be prayers led by the preacher, readings from the bible and a message or sermon.

Who leads the worship?

We don't have a minister at the moment so the services are led, either by church members  or by visiting preachers from other churches.

What does the congregation have to say or do?

During the prayers we close our eyes and bow our heads, listening to the words that are being prayed by the preacher. At the end of the prayers at the beginning of the service we all say the words of the Lord's prayer together. These are:

Our father, who art in heaven
Hallowed be thy name
Thy kingdom come
Thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven
Give us this day our daily bread
and forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those who trespass against us
and lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil
for Thine is the kingdom
the power and the glory
forever and ever
Amen

At the end of any other prayers we just say 'Amen' which means 'so be it'. There are not any scripted responses from the congregation.

At the very end of the service we say 'The Grace' together as follows:

The grace of our Lord, Jesus Christ
the love of God
and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit
be with us all ever more
Amen

We turn and look at each other as we say this.

Hymns

We are usually accompanied on the piano and sometimes on the organ. We don't generally bounce up and down or wave our arms about but feel free to do this if that's how you feel! The hymns are a collection of old favourites and more modern ones.  Everyone is given a hymn book with the words in on the way in.  It doesn't matter if you don't know the tune - we often find that we are unfamiliar with one or more of the hymns and it's no big deal. We give it a go and laugh about it if it sounds terrible!

The Collection

There is a collection for the work of the church during the service and a bowl will be passed along. If you are a visitor feel free to contribute or not, it's up to you and we won't  take offence if you don't. It doesn't matter how little or how much you put in the plate - no one is looking and no one will make any assumptions about you if they do.

Communion

Communion is when we take bread and wine in rememberance of what Jesus told his disciples to do at his last supper with them. We have communion on the first sunday of the month and at other special occasions.

Unlike some churches we welcome absolutely anybody to take communion.

We stay in our seats and the preacher (either one of our church members or a visitor) will say a few words before handing plates of breads to two other church members who will pass these round to everybody. Don't take yours as soon as you get it, we all take the bread together at the same time once it's been handed out. This includes the preacher. The same thing then happens with tiny glasses of wine.

At the end of the service

After we've said the grace together the service is over. Generally people stay around for a bit of a chat and sometimes there's a cup of tea or coffee on offer as well. Sometimes people have to leave straight away and that's no problem.

Welcoming new faces

We will do our very best to make you feel welcome but sometimes we are a little bit unsure of ourselves so if we get it wrong we apologise. We will always talk to new faces in a friendly way and we never quiz people about their beliefs or their plans. But we also recognise that some people when they visit a church for the first time don't really want to talk too much so we try to get a balance.  No one is ever put any pressure though of course please don't think that this means that we don't want you to come back next week!

Some people only attend services occasionally and this too is fine. No one ever gets told off for not coming to church often enough!