What You Can Expect
Come as you are and expect a warm Regina welcome. We are a community of people from all different walks of life who share one main thing in common, our only comfort in life and in death is that we belong to our faithful Saviour Jesus Christ. Our worship is formative and centered around Christ in all the Scriptures.
How We Worship
The Bible tells us that we are to "offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe. For our God is a consuming fire" (Hebrews 12:28-29). As we enter God's presence every Sunday at Redeemer, we try to come with this in mind. We are reminded that we are coming into the presence of a Holy God (Isaiah 6:1-7), the Creator and Judge of all (Psalm 96:4-13). For this reason, we worship according to God's command in Scripture.
Worship is also a covenant dialogue between God and His covenant people, initiated by God.
We also come in joy and gratitude (Psalm 100). Through faith in Christ, we have a once for all sacrifice for our sins, because of His death on the cross. And He is our Great High Priest, who ever lives to make intercession for us at the Father's right hand. In light of this we come in confident faith, sure hope and to stir one another up to love and good works (Hebrews 10:19-25).
Christ-centered preaching
At one occasion Jesus rebuked the Pharisees for
misunderstanding the Bible. "You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you
have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me. Yet you refuse to come to me that
you may have life" (John 5:39-40).
Another time, after his resurrection, he instructed two disciples on the road to Emmaus who
misunderstood the Scriptures. He taught them that ultimately the Bible is all about the Christ.
“O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not
necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” And beginning
with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things
concerning himself. (Luke 24:25-27)
So the focus of preaching at Redeemer is on proclaiming Christ from all the Scriptures. We preach the Gospel (or Good News) of Christ and him crucified and risen from the dead from both the Old and New Testaments (1 Corinthians 1:22-24; 2:1-2; 15:1-5). We preach the Good News that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, on the basis of the work of Jesus Christ alone (Ephesians 2:8-9). The Holy Spirit uses the Gospel to create faith in our hearts (Romans 10:17) and He continues to use it to transform us more into the image of Christ (2 Corinthians 3:18). When Christ is proclaimed week in and week out Christians find both the pattern and the power to live the Christian life for God's glory and the good of one's neighbour. As the Apostle Paul said to the Colossians, "Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ" (Colossians 1:28).
Children worship with us
We love to have and hear your children worship with you and they are most welcome in the service. Since Scripture teaches that the church is a community of those in covenant with God – believing parents and their children – children join us in the corporate service as they did in the days of Israel (Psalm 78:4; Joel 2:16) and in the days of the Apostles, being addressed in corporate worship when the New Testament letters were read (Ephesians 6:1; Colossians 3:20). As fellow members in the church (Romans 12:4–5) we accept their presence and “joyful noise” in the service (Psalm 100:1). Even more, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is present in worship by His Spirit, welcomes children in His presence (Matthew 19:13-15; Mark 10:13-16; Luke 18:15-17). We see this as a Biblical approach to worship and it has been our experience that children benefit and grow from worshipping God with their family.
We reserve the back rows on both sides of the aisle for parents with small children. We also have two pews in the foyer and a nursery downstairs where you may listen to the service with your children if they are having an especially noisy and squirmy day.
There is also a changing table in one of the bathrooms downstairs and a mom and baby room available for when feeding your infants.
We sing Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs
"...be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Ephesians 5:18-20)
We love to sing carefully chosen, biblically faithful, simple, and traditional Psalms and Hymns to our Triune God from the Trinity Psalter Hymnal. We do this for specific reasons. The book of Psalms was the songbook of the Old Testament saints. They were sung for over a thousand years in anticipation of the coming of Christ. And, according to scholars, Jesus and his disciples likely sang Psalm 118 at the end of the first Lord's Supper (Matthew 26:30). Now we as Christians sing them following the example of the apostle Paul in Acts (Acts 16:25). We also sing hymns, both ancient and recent, that are in accord with the teaching of Scripture. This not only gives us a sense of unity with the church of all ages, as we sing what God’s people have sung for hundreds and thousands of years, but also gives us the ability to express ourselves through all the joys and sorrows of the Christian life.
