By Virginia Schurman
We extend a cordial welcome to all present at our Meeting for Worship. We invite you to participate in our worship of God together. There is no outward signal to begin the meeting. It begins as we assemble together silently, to prayerfully wait upon the Lord. “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10). With the help of the Holy Spirit, who directs the worship, our minds are withdrawn from all outward and distracting things, and we are enabled to maintain a solemn, waiting attitude of spirit.
In this way, God directs the worship, and we receive guidance and direction for our lives, as we come to know God’s will. God also gives us strength to do His will, consolation, comfort, conviction of sin, forgiveness, and a reordering of our lives according to His priorities.
Someone may be led by God to stand and communicate a spiritual message, usually brief, or to kneel and pray vocally. God may call anyone to this ministry. “For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of you Father speaking through you” (Matthew 10:20). And none go beyond the measure of the spirit of God, nor quench it; for where it is quenched, it cannot try things. So if you have anything upon then to speak, in the life of God stand up, and speak it, if it be but two or three words, and sit down again; and keep in the life, that you may answer that of God in every man upon the earth. (George Fox)
The Meeting for Worship closes with the shaking of hands. This is referred to as the “rise of Meeting”.