Blanchard's careful preparation for public reading of Scripture

In the two decades or so of attending church, I have rarely seen many people read Scripture with much passion, reverence and definitely such extensive preparation. Blanchard has challenged me to reconsider who we should choose to read the Holy Word aloud in service, and also the importance of the posturing of one's heart for this precious privilege.


From pages 190-191 of Worship by the Book

British evangelist and Bible teacher John Blanchard describes how he has prepared for the public reading of God's Word and the powerful results:

There are times when I have felt that the Bible was being read less preparation than the notices—and with considerably less understanding. I hesitate to use the following illustrations because of my part in it, but I do so as a reminder to my own heart of the seriousness of the issue. A year or two after my conversion I was appointed as a Lay Reader in the Church of England, to Holy Trinity Church, Guernsey. There were two other, more senior, Lay Readers on the staff, with the result that on most Sundays the responsibilities could be evenly shared out. As it happened, the Vicar almost always asked me to read the Lessons, following a Lectionary which listed the passages appointed to be read on each Sunday of the year. My wife and I lived in a small flat at the time, but I can vividly remember my Sunday morning routine. Immediately after breakfast I would go into the bedroom, lock the door, and begin to prepare for reading the Lesson that morning. After a word of prayer I would look up the Lesson in the Lectionary, and read it carefully in the Authorized Version, which we were using in the church. Then I would read it through in every other version I had in my possession, in order to get thoroughly familiar with the whole drift and sense of the passage. Next I would turn to the commentaries. I did not have many in those days, but those I had I used. I would pay particular attention to word meanings and doctrinal implications. When I had finished studying the passage in detail, I would go to the mantelpiece, which was roughly the same height as the lectern in the church, and prop up the largest copy of the Authorized Version I possessed. Having done that, I would walk very slowly up to it from the other side of the room, and begin to speak, aloud: 'Here beginneth the first verse of the tenth chapter of the gospel according to St. John' (or whatever the passage was). Then I would begin to read aloud the portion appointed. If I made so much as a single slip of the tongue, a single mispronunciation, I would stop, walk back across the room, and start again, until I had read the whole passage word perfect, perhaps two or three times. My wife would tell you that there were times when I emerged from the bedroom with that day's clean white shirt stained with perspiration drawn from the effort of preparing one Lesson to be read in the church. Does that sound like carrying things too far? Then let me add this: I was told that there were times when after the reading of the Lesson people wanted to leave the senäce there and then and go quietly home to think over the implications of what God has said to them in his Word.

Practical Advice for Service Leading and Annoucements

Mark Ashton and C. J. Davis reflect on Archbishop Thomas Cranmer's impactful contribution of the "Book of Common Prayer," and how the Anglican church today should apply the principles which sanctioned its writing.

Their helpful advise is applicable beyond their denomination (Anglian), as their heart of service unto the Lord and their fellow believers is something we all can learn from.

Ashton and Davis highlight the importance of planning for the service leader. That person would have to, as an offering unto the Lord, spend effort and time deliberating how to strike a balance between "gripping the interest and attention of the congregation, and communicating the seriousness of what is happening." The affirm the helpfulness of involving new individuals into the role, so as not to fall into having the role "restricted to some priestly caste." For them, training of new service leaders would require a balance of "encouragement and criticism."

With regard to announcements, they reiterate the importance of planning. They affirm that saints are not to be so involved within the church activities that they are unable to interact with the social world "outside," and that guilt should not be the main motivator to force congregants to attend activities/events. The authors suggest notice sheets and information desks as ways to further improve the communicating of announcements.


From Pages 95-8 of Worship by the Book

Leading the Service
The role of the service leader becomes more significant as more careful planning goes into the service itself. Well-prepared leading can make the difference between outsiders feeling welcome or not. It can help the congregation to grasp the theme of the service. But over-preparation can lead to dullness, and there is a place for spontaneity, impromptu humor, and off-the-cuff remarks as well.

The person leading the service must seek to achieve a balance between gripping the interest and attention of the congregation, and communicating the seriousness of what is happening. Some service leading is good at holding attention but communicates a sense of superficiality. It may be characterized by humor and quick wit but convey the flippancy of a TV chat show. Another style of leading is minimalist (often the refuge of the person who has spent little or no time in preparation). It may be justified on grounds of "not drawing attention to the personality of the leader," but it misses a valuable opportunity to edify the congregation. The bare announcement of a hymn or song number with no reference to the meaning of the words we are about to sing usually indicates that this is one part of the service that the service leader has not bothered to prepare. Recall David's "I will not offer to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing" (2 Sam 24:24). All too often Anglican church services have amounted to "sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving" that cost very little, certainly in terms of time spent in preparation by the person who leads them. No wonder they have been so ineffective for edification and evangelism and so monstrously dull for those who come (or prefer, perhaps wisely, not to come)!

If service leading is kept mainly in the hands of one person, it has the advantages of continuity, familiarity, and (so long as that person is suitably gifted) a uniformly high standard of leading. If the service leader is also the main Bible teacher in the church, the service leading will be another way he is able to teach doctrine to the congregation.

On the other hand, where service leading is a team ministry, the individuals involved may be able to prepare their own (smaller) part of the service in greater detail, with closer attention to its different aspects. A team ministry also publicly displays the corporate nature of the church's ministry and provides an opportunity for new individuals to be drawn into the role. Wherever possible, we should avoid giving the impression that Christian ministry is a one-man show.

In this matter it is probably best to try to have our cake and eat it, hard though that may be to achieve! We need the example of strong, theologically astute service leading to set the standard, but we also need to make clear that this role is not restricted to some priestly caste. It is healthy to see a new face and to hear a new voice fulfilling this ministry from time to time. But it must be done as well as possible, and that will mean training people to draw the best out of them by encouragement and criticism. Good leading draws less attention to the personality of the leader and focuses more attention on the purpose of the service.

The Notices (or "Announcements" in much of the English-speaking world)
These are often one of the dullest parts of a church service. But while the weekly services are the hub of the church's structured life, there will be other meetings radiating out like spokes from that hub, and the life of a church fellowship during the rest of the week is important. Ideally the church leadership will be checking very carefully that church activities do not grow and grow so as to invade and monopolize the leisure time of the congregation members and thus remove them from all normal social intercourse with the non-Christian world. But there will be some midweek meetings of the church that need to be advertised in the notices on Sundays.

So we should not be ashamed of the notices or try to stick them away in some corner of the service where they will do least damage. But neither should we let them become the opportunity for the minister to "have a go" at the congregation, heaping guilt onto them for past and possible future sins of omission, like failing to book for the Parish Weekend. No church should run on guilt, and the notice about an important meeting (like a monthly prayer meeting) must be carefully worded.

Once again, preparation is the key. The notices must be carefully prepared. They will not be well delivered if they are drawn from scraps of paper hastily assembled in the vestry just before the service begins. Careful preparation enables us to convey important information in the most efficient and concise way. Notices have a notorious tendency to fill more and more time. They need to be pruned of all excess verbiage. Where a notice sheet can be provided, it will save valuable service time. Or attention may be directed to a notice board, where further details of an event are available for those interested. Larger churches will sooner or later discover the value of an Information Desk, where inquiries of all sorts can be dealt with individually and sensitively, and where publicity handouts and fliers can be available in quantity.

Practical advice for service planning

Mark Ashton and C. J. Davis reflect on Archbishop Thomas Cranmer's impactful contribution of the "Book of Common Prayer," and how the Anglican church today should apply the principles which sanctioned its writing.

The authors helpfully provide a framework that both reformed and pentecostal church leaders should find useful in planning for the worship service. 

The preacher and worship leader/team should not be working independently if the church is to be pointed to a unified direction - to that of Christ, God's redemptive plan and what is demanded of his adopted sons, etc. These meetings should focus on prayer rather than on administrative "arrowing" of responsibilities. Hopefully, the lead preacher is not be too afraid/proud to have his exegesis (or eisegesis) preparation examined (be it prior to or after the sermon). The preacher who takes on the stance that he is infallible and can preach no false message is treading in extremely murky waters.


From Pages 80-82 of Worship by the Book

It is helpful to have a meeting to plan and review services in order to learn from mistakes and to develop good practice. Obviously some churches do not have this opportunity, but where the person responsible for the Bible teaching and the person responsible for the music can confer and pray together, it will raise the quality of the services. If such a meeting can be weekly and can include one or two others, with draft outlines of the service prepared and circulated in advance, it will be better still. It is particularly important to assess the sermon and to consider how the rest of the service relates to it. Sermons should not be divorced from the context in which they are delivered. Every preacher benefits from hearing his sermons reviewed, and every service benefits from the preacher playing a part in its preparation.

Careful preparation need not rule out spontaneity. Open prayer, impromptu testimony, a "flow" of singing, and other forms of unscheduled congregational participation may be appropriate according to the culture of the congregation. It was to regulate rather than exclude such activity that Paul wrote 1 Corinthians 14. The planning group will want to weigh how such participation fits with the collective temperament of their congregation and how outsider-friendly it will be. The preacher will be able to suggest what will be the best congregational response to his next sermon: a time of silence, a time of open prayer, a time for repentance, discussion groups, questions to the preacher, an after meeting for those in need of an opportunity to respond to the gospel, or a time of counseling or prayer. Then the service leader need to have the freedom to change what has been planned when the time comes, within whatever prearranged guidelines are appropriate.

Together with planning, prayer is an important purpose of this meeting. If we believe that we are involved in planning something God has ordained (the gathering of Christians), for God's purposes (winning and building up disciples), and that this is his work (in which we are simply co-workers), we will make prayer a priority as we plan. It is a way of acknowledging the importance of church services and our dependence on God as the One who alone can build his church.

Every occasion when believers gather in the name of Christ is too precious an opportunity to be allowed to go by without care being taken over it. For those in isolated ministry positions with no colleagues to pray or plan with, it is a high priority to find someone who will share in this task. The best services are normally team efforts, demonstrating the corporateness of the Christian life. But a mistake we often make is to draw others in to help with the execution of the service rather than with the planning and preparation of the service. The isolated vicar will be more helped by hearing someone else's assessment of his last sermon and service than by someone leading next week's intercessions for him. It is the difference between asking someone to do something for us and to do something with us. Some ministers never manage to establish teams because they never allow anyone alongside them to become a genuine yoke-fellow, sharing both encouragement and criticism. It will be much easier to prevent services from being doctrinally off-beam or dull if we draw in others to help.