How Sunday Evening Services Can Help Continue the Reformation

There's a real debate about Sunday evening service. Some people have grown up in the Roman Catholic home where the service for Sunday morning has the same message for Sunday evening. The priest rants the same sermon like a tape recorder. Most people choose to attend either the Morning Mass, the Afternoon Mass or the Evening Mass. But such is the case when some people get saved is that they're shocked to find out that Sunday evening services are different from Sunday morning services.

The tradition of Sunday evening services can be debated. Some churches don't think Sunday evening services are important nor do they offer it. Others may end up mimicking the Roman Catholic parish in the sense that they offer the same message all over again. Yet the Reformed preachers taught a different lesson for both Sunday morning an Sunday evening. As I read through the late Charles H. Spurgeon's sermons he preached on Wednesday evenings, Sunday mornings and Sunday evenings. The late Jonathan Edwards did the same. The late John Calvin and the late Puritans of the past also had a Sunday evening service different from the morning service.

The Sunday evening service provides more room for proper exposition. If you're following Grace To You ministries with John F. MacArthur you may notice some of his sermons are divided into several parts. It's a series of lessons. An eisegesis is very easy to preach. You can take the Scripture out context and forget about taking it into context. But not with the case of expository preaching. When you've got verse by verse preaching such as MacArthur's you should expect Sunday evening to a continuation of Sunday morning. Listening to MacArthur's sermons require you to listen to part 1 before you reach the final part because it's a series of lessons.

Having two different services on a Sunday can provide easier time to understand expository preaching. Since the Christmas season is near then the upcoming topic would be the incarnation of Christ and everything around it. Several sermons may include Jesus' genealogy and the virgin birth. Just the virgin birth alone can be a difficult topic. What if the topic on Mary the earthly mother of Jesus would require several topics? One may have to discuss the virgin birth on the morning and Mary's genealogy all the way back to David through Nathan in the evening. If your topic is Joseph the foster father of Jesus you may end up having to discuss his genealogy which leads back to Solomon in two Sunday services. Having a two parter or more can give everyone enough time to digest the sermon and come back for the second serving of wonderful lessons. It would be easier to digest a difficult topic with another service to continue the previous topic.

It would be important for churches to encourage Sunday attendance as much as possible unless if people are sick. Some people may not immediately see the Sunday evening services as a delight but telling them what's coming or what they miss may start to change minds. Growing Christians may not see it important as first but when another stage of maturity comes - it means they want to hear more. I didn't like Sunday evening services at first thinking they were burdensome but the more I attended them the more I thought it's fun to have another round. It's not just Sunday schools but also worship services. Then the more the Christian grows the more they want to get involved in the Sunday evening services.

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