Dale Schley, previous Moses Pastor participant and pastor of Peace Lutheran in Ruthton, MN created an Alcoholics Anonymous themed worship service.
See below for the service order with suggested hymns for worship.
WORSHIP IN ACTION ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS (AA)
CONFESSION AND FORGIVENESS:
LEADER: Are you prepared to make your confession?
People: I am.
TOGETHER: O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall declare your praise. Had you desired it, I would have offered sacrifice, but you take no delight in burnt offerings. The sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit: a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. Have mercy on me, O God, according to your loving kindness; in your great compassion blot out my offenses. Wash me through and through from my wickedness, and cleanse me from my sin.
LEADER: You have come to make confession before God. In Christ you are free to confess before me the sins of which you are aware and the sins which trouble you.
PEOPLE: I confess before God that I am guilty of many sins. PAUSE
For all this I am sorry, and I pray for forgiveness. I want to do better.
TOGETHER: Have mercy on me, O God, according to your loving kindness; in your great compassion blot out my offenses. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with your free Spirit.
LEADER: Do you believe that the word of forgiveness I speak to you comes from God himself?
PEOPLE: Yes, I believe.
LEADER: God is merciful and blesses you. By the command of our Lord Jesus Christ, I, a called servant of the Word, forgive you your sins in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.
PEOPLE: AMEN
INTRODUCTION: Today we worship God in a moving and supportive setting.
Today's worship centers around the building up and the
Genuineness of Alcoholics Anonymous.
AA PREAMBLE
BELIEVERS IN CHRIST PREAMBLE: All Believers in Christ is to be a fellowship of men and women and children who share their experience, their faith and hope with each other, so that doubt and fear disappear in order to help others come to the peace and compassion of the Creator.
The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop doubting, and to stop sinning, and to believe in the divine power of God over all things. Our primary purpose is to bring others, who are suffering, into the Light of forgiveness and freedom that lasts for eternity.
AA PROMISES
BELIEVERS PROMISES
1. We are going to know a new freedom from darkness and death, and the opportunity to live in joy and peace.
2. We will not regret the past but ask for forgiveness.
3. We will study the Word of God gaining understanding and relationship with God.
4.No matter how grievous our sins, in repentance Jesus forgives us.
5. We will be strengthened and renewed, knowing that God calls us by name.
6. We will seek to love one another as Christ first loved us. Without qualifications or prejudice.
7. We seek to live to build up our neighbors, to speak well of them, to come their defense, and choose to look on all that they do in the most positive light.
8. We will look for opportunities to share joy, not hate and disgust. We will look forward to the new opportunities of tomorrow.
9. We will fear no one, as our strength is in God who provides what we need.
10. We will be able to hear the Spirit of God leading and guiding us in our lives.
This is a voice of truth and love speaking to us.
11. We will come to know that God has always been with us, to bring us through life’s challenges, we only needed to ask.
AA HOW IT WORKS
BELIEVERS HOW IT WORKS
Never do we see a person fail who has faithfully followed God’s path. Those who fail cannot or will not give control to God. They are incapable of being honest with themselves and God. There are such unfortunates. May we seek to walk with them in fellowship to share understanding, hope and faith.
Our stories also disclose what we used to be like when we lived in the hate filled darkness of evil. Shame leaves as we accept to live in the Light of Salvation.
The steps of being totally honest, trusting in God, to do his will and not our own was not, and is not easy. We look forward to every new day, so that we may begin again to trust and believe.
We have tried and failed on our own many times, and have come to finally understand that our way does not work.
Remember that we deal with Satan, who is at the root cause of our sin-cunning, baffling, and powerful! Without God we are helpless, but God is all powerful and delivers us from the evil that has tied us in knots. God is all powerful and will deliver you. May you find him now!
AA STEPS TAKEN
1.We admitted we were powerless over alcohol- that our lives had become unmanageable.
1.B We admitted we were powerless over our sin- that our lives were unmanageable.
2.A.A Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
2.B Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves will restore our faith.
3.A.A. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him.
3.B Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we trust in Him. Mark 16: 16-Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.
4.A.A. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
4.B Acknowledged our faults and sins. From Psalm 32:5 “Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord”; and you forgave the guilt of my sin.”
5.A.A. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
5.B Made confession of our sins, as He already knew. “I confess that I have sinned against you this day. Some of my sin I know-the thoughts and words and deeds of which I am ashamed- but some is known only to you. In the name of Jesus Christ I ask forgiveness. Deliver and restore me, that I may rest in peace.”
6.A.A. We were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
6.B Psalm 31:9,10; “Be merciful to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my soul and body with grief. My life is consumed by anguish and my years by groaning; my strength fails because of my affliction, and my bones grow weak.
7.A.A. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
7.B. Into Your hands, O Lord, we commend all for whom and which we pray, trusting in Your mercy; through Your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
8.A.A. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
8.B. 1 Peter 3:9-11, “Do not repay evil with evil, or insult with insult, but with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing. For, “Whoever would love life and see good days must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from deceitful speech. He must turn from evil and do good; he must seek peace and pursue it.”
9.A.A. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
9.B. From Ephesians 4:31, “Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
10.A.A. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
10.B. From Romans 10:10, “For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.”
11.A.A. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God AS WE UNDERSTOOD HIM, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
11.B. From Psalm 6:9, “The Lord has heard my cry for mercy; the Lord accepts my prayer.”
12A.A. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
12.B. From Matthew 28:20, “And teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
AA
“Many of us exclaimed, “What an order! I can’t go through with it.” Do not be discouraged. No one among us has been able to maintain anything like perfect adherence to these principles. We are not saints. The point is, that we are willing to grow along spiritual lines. The principles we have set down are guides to progress. We claim spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection.
BELIEVERS
From 1 Corinthians 3:7,8, “So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes it grow. The man who plants and the man who waters have one purpose, and each will be rewarded according to his own labor. For we are God’s fellow workers, you are God’s field, God’s building.”
CLOSING:
A Prayer Attributed to St. Francis;
Lord, make us instruments of Your peace.
Where there is hatred, let us sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is discord, union;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy;
Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
To be understood as to understand;
To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
POSSIBLE HYMNS: GREEN HYMNAL
1.Take My Life, That I May Be p.406
2.What A Friend We Have In Jesus p.439
3. Children Of The Heavenly Father p.474
4.My Faith Looks Up to Thee p.479
5.Savior, Like A Shepherd Lead Us p.481
6. Beautiful Savior p.518
7. My Hope Is Built On Nothing Less p.294
8. Just As I Am, Without One Plea p.296