A Typical Sunday Morning...

We thought we'd walk you through a typical Sunday morning worship service at our church here in Yekaterinburg. So here's what this past Sunday was like:

10:00 - (ish.) Introductions and an opening prayer**, followed by a half hour of singing**
10:35 - "Children's" sermon (it's sometimes aimed at the children, but is often a mini-sermon of it's own) - the theme this week was stealing and how it harms the church and leads to punishment.
10: 45 - Brief greetings to guests (us included) and the sermon. The text was Mark 2 and the theme was evangelism.
11:15 - Song of response**
11:20 - Second sermon (sometimes on a totally different theme, this time more of a response to the first sermon).
11:40 - Prayers** - any member of the congregation can share a request or write it down to be shared from the front.
12:00 - Final announcements & sending.

** Congregation stands.

You might notice:
a) The service was 2 full hours long.
b) We stand for about an hour of that time.

If you'd been there on Sunday you might have noticed some other things. For example: the passion with which the congregation prays - it gets loud & fervent! - and the central role prayer plays in the worship. The worship leader prays a short prayer between each of the songs, for example and we prayed the Lord's prayer twice during the service. You might also notice, as we often do, the seeming disconnect between different parts of the service - multiple sermons on totally different themes and texts, for example. This is in large part because lay leaders on the elder board are most often included in the preaching rotation - but rarely coordinate their sermons with one another.

Here are a few pictures: