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An Offertory Sentence
“Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his Name;
Bring offerings and come into his courts.”
Psalm 96:8
I am sure that we have all heard a priest say these words at the end of announcements in transition to the collection of the offering and setting of the Table. Besides these words being very beautiful, this is one of many examples of Scripture being used in our worship directly, yet often unnoticed. Sometimes in praying the Daily Office or in sermon preparation, I come across verses of Scripture that make me pause, smile and say to myself, “Oh, we use this verse in worship.”
Interestingly, of all the given offertory sentence options listed in the Book of Common Prayer on pages 343-344, only one is not a quotation of Scripture. The single non-scripture option is “Let us with gladness present the offerings and oblations of our life and labor to the Lord.” (Book of Common Prayer, p. 344) While the other eight options listed in the Book of Common Prayer are Scripture, the rubrics do allow for “some other appropriate sentence of Scripture, may be used.” (Book of Common Prayer, p. 343) Clearly, the expectation is that Scripture is to be used at this point in the liturgy.
You might be asking what does this journey into a liturgical rabbit hole have to do with our Daily Word emails? My point in sharing about the offertory sentence is that we are knowingly or unknowingly being bathed in Scripture every time we worship together and in more areas than just the spoken Scripture from the lectern and Gospel book.
My hope is that next time you are in worship, you take a few moments and look through your worship booklet and try to identify some new Scripture passage that is being quoted that you see for the first time. This might lead you to ask how you have not noticed this before in the months, years or decades that you have been worshipping in the Episcopal tradition. My larger hope is that after reflecting on these words, we are led to try and see where God has been at work and is at work in our lives that we are just now noticing. What an awesome God we serve that is doing more than we can ask or imagine.
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