Worship Confessional – June 15, 2008

Back on the confessional wagon. Here we go. Sunday was nice for me – it was one of those weeks where I wasn’t involved in the worship team and handed all of the leading responsibilities over to volunteers. We have very capable musicians and three other people who lead services so once every couple of months I take a Sunday and participate in the service as part of the congregation.

Doing this gives me different “eyes” on what’s happening and also allows our other musicians to really step up and take leadership of the worship ministry.

Here is the service outline from Sunday -

“Rest Area” – Philippians 4:1-8
Beautiful One – Tim Hughes – C
Ancient of Days – Gary Sadler & Jamie Harvill – C
Father’s Day Video
Announcements
Blast Worship Team
Let My Words Be Few – Matt Redman – F
It Is Well With My Soul – Horatio Spafford – C
Message – Worry: Rest Robber
It Is Well – verse/chorus
Tis So Sweet – Louisa Stead & William Kirkpatrick – G

I hate giving services ratings but if I evaluate the service based on flow and musicianship and engagement with the congregation, this week was really high on all of those counts. Being off stage is always great for reminding myself about the importance of intros and transitions, etc but it was also great to just be part of the congregation – worshipping God with my brothers and sisters and enjoying His presence.

Not that this week was without its issues. So here we go -

1. We had some good discussions about “Let My Words Be Few” and the line that closes the verses and chorus of the song – “Jesus I am so in love with you.” Nobody can argue that it is clear that we should express our love and affection for God in our worship but that wasn’t the point. The issue that came up was mainly the distinction between the phrase “I love Jesus” and “I’m in love with Jesus.” It was very clear for some people that those two statements are NOT equal and that singing about being “in love” with Jesus is probably emotionally and biblically inaccurate. It took some discussion and some pushback from the worship team but in the end we changed the lyrics, projected the changed lyrics and everyone was fine with it. I think I’m going to do a separate post just on this issue because there is lots of stuff wrapped up in this small point.
2. We brought one of the worship teams from our kids ministry, Blast, downstairs to lead worship for us on Sunday. In Blast there are teams of students who are leading their peers in worship and I think that is amazing! Normally they use video or CD and do songs that are very God-focused, high energy with lots of actions. We brought them in to our service on Sunday and had them lead three songs just like they would lead them upstairs with the kids. People loved it and it was a real thrill to see this group of kids leading our church in worship – we will definitely be doing that more often.
3. The Father’s Day video we used was a big hit. Short, funny, fast-paced, to the point, impactful – everything that a good illustration video should be. We used it as a transition out of the first worship package – the leader asked people to greet one another and as the crowd was dying down we rolled the video. I came up on stage as the video closed to wish dads a happy father’s day and then went in to announcements from there.

Great morning. God was worshipped, His word was preached, His people were encouraged. What more could you ask for??

How was your Sunday?