The order of worship flows out of the principle: worship celebrates Christ. Consequently, I follow this rule of thumb for sequence in worship: worship tells and acts out the Christ-event. In this sense, the order of worship comes from above, and not from below. Worship is patterned after God who revealed and God who became incarnate. Therefore, the twofold focus of worship is the Word (the Bible as the symbol of God speaking) and the Table (bread and wine as the symbol of God acting to save us.)
-Robert Webber, Worship Is a Verb: Celebrating God’s Mighty Deeds of Salvation, Second Edition (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1996), 45.