Many months ago I posted several orders of worship which I drew mostly from minister’s manuals used among Christian Churches and Disciples of Christ. I included a couple from other sources because they were within reach.  My sweeping conclusion remains subject to further verification and nuance, but it seemed then that there was not among the Restoration Movement churches any defined or set order of worship:

To put a bow on the order-of-worship errand, what I see from these sources is that there is no agreed-upon or standard order of worship among the Christian Churches or Churches of Christ in the latter half of the nineteenth century, nor in the first half of the twentieth.  The placement of the Lord’s Supper varies, the accompaniment of the offering alongside or apart from the Lord’s Supper also varies.  The flow of worship, if these proposals are any indication, varies as much from place to place as it does from generation to generation.  From what little I have seen, I cannot discern a trajectory.

In my judgment, this is best explained on the basis that the Disciples did not use a common book of church order or book of worship, nor was there any agency or entity constituted or authorized to mandate its use in the congregations.  There were, however, plenty of hymnals available.  They reflected and determined the repertoire of songs sung in the assemblies; but these publishing ventures did not see it clear to publish a book of worship, except such as what I outlined in previous months in the ministers handbooks.

Such a situation appears to have led Peter Ainslie and H. C. Armstrong to issue in 1923 A Book of Christian Worship for Voluntary Use Among Disciples of Christ and Other Christians.  Ainslie was minister, and Armstrong was assistant minister at Christian Temple in Baltimore.   Seminary House Press in Baltimore published it in 1923; a second edition followed in 1924.  The Christian Temple Seminary was an experiment in theological training and urban settlement house ministry, and though it existed as an independent entity, was Ainslie’s brainchild parented by Christian Temple church.

The foreword states,

This book is for voluntary use by those who desire more orderly methods of worship in non-liturgic Churches. its chief worth lies in the fact that it does not lay claim to originality, but instead it has incorporated those methods of worship which have been found most helpful through the centuries from the beginning of spiritual worship to the present time….

…It avoids those things that are peculiarly denominational and seeks to be Scriptural and catholic. It endeavours to speak in the terms of present day experience, and to find in worship the normal way for the soul to realize its kinship with God.

It contains sample orders of worship, communion services, the administration of baptism and the installation and ordination of ministers and church officers, plus orders of special services such as marriage, “blessing little children”, the visitation of the sick, and funerals.  Orders of worship for Christmas Day, Education Day, Lenten Season, Easter Sunday, Ascension Day, Pentecost Sunday, Children’s Day, Citizenship Sunday, Labour Sunday, Rally Day, Bible Sunday, and Thanksgiving Day evince an admixture of the traditional liturgical year with the American Protestant seasonal calendar.  The book closes with some special prayers and four hymns.  It is a handsome 18mo bound in black cloth, blindstamped with Bolnisi crosses, of 195 pages.  In size and appearance it complements the minister’s handbooks I mention above.

Here is the three-page General Order of Worship: