There seem to be two schools of thought about brief, non-Eucharistic worship services. Unfortunately, the dominant school seems to rely almost entirely on extemporaneous prayer. It’s probably just a matter of taste, but I’m not fond of that approach.
I much preferred what we did on a children’s-choir pilgrimage to Canterbury a couple of years ago: Each day we followed an abbreviated form of the Daily Office at morning, noon, evening, and compline.
More generally, when it comes to lay worship services, I like following the basic structure of Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer — shortened considerably — with extemporaneous prayer being limited to the intercessions portion.
Following the forms of Morning / Evening Prayer gives you the feeling that you’re connected with the rest of the church, present and past, even though at the moment you happen to be away from a church building per se. I’ll never forget a Morning Prayer on a Boy Scout campout a few years ago, at the top of Enchanted Rock. A half-dozen adult leaders, all Episcopalians except for one Roman Catholic, clambered up the Rock in the pre-dawn darkness of a freezing Sunday morning. After catching our breaths, we read an abbreviated Morning Prayer service as the sun crept over the horizon, while the Scouts and the other adult leaders were still asleep in their tents. It was one of the more moving worship services in which I’ve ever participated.
Using a shortened Morning / Evening Prayer for lay worship also exposes Episcopalians to this important aspect of the church’s liturgical tradition, which we otherwise seem to be gradually losing. To me, there’s something sad when a worship leader calls out "Lord, open our lips," and gets back nothing but quizzical looks as a response. (The response, from Psalm 51:15 and the Invitatory to Morning Prayer, at page 80 of the Book of Common Prayer, is "and our mouth shall proclaim your praise.")
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