Isaiah 58 is a call to worship through both personal piety and social responsibility for the vulnerable in our community. The first section of this worship service includes the songs, “He’ll Never Change,” “Ancient of Days,” “Whom Shall I Fear” (Psalm 27), and “Be Thou My Vision.”
The first half of Isaiah 59 forms the call to confession of the second section, where we confess our sins through the words of the song “Purge Me.” We hear God’s words of assurance in the second half of Isaiah 59 and respond in song using the words of “Passover Song.”
We hear God’s word to us through the words of Isaiah 60 in the third section of the service. We respond to the sermon, “A Light to the Nations,” with the song “All Creatures of Our God and King.” We also respond to God’s word in prayer, praying for God’s people gathered here at this conference, for the communities that we represent, and for the world. We are sent out through song, “Evidence” and by a spoken blessing.
This service will be led by members of East End Fellowship, a multi-ethnic, economically diverse Christian church in the east end of Richmond, Virginia, seeking God’s joy and justice for their neighborhoods out of love for Christ. Urban Doxology was brought together by a songwriting internship hosted by Arrabon and East End Fellowship. Together, they want to stand in the gap between how things are currently, the way that they could be, and will be when God’s Kingdom is fully realized through Jesus. They have been writing a soundtrack of reconciliation in the diverse and gentrifying neighborhood of Church Hill in Richmond. An urban doxology is the practice of preaching, liturgy, music, and arts that intentionally crosses barriers across racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic lines to prepare the people of God for the City of God that is to come.
