Worship Confessional – Sunday, June 13, 2010

We had a great morning at OBC (where I’m on staff as the worship director) this past Sunday. How can you go wrong with stories of how people’s lives have been changed by Christ, seeing them baptized, celebrating together in worship and then spending significant time in God’s word? I continue to be thankful for what God is doing in our midst when we gather – we are in this fresh, new, exciting season where people seem to be very willing to engage in worship and show their excitement and joy for the Lord while we are singing.

Here’s what our services looked like this week as part of our Romans series -

• Everlasting Light – Drew Brown, Bob Cottrill, Luke Holst & Keith Sparrow (as part of WorshipRises) – F
• Your Grace Is Enough – Matt Maher – F
• Welcome/Announcements
• Testimonies & Baptisms
• How Can I Keep From Singing – Chris Tomlin – G
• Glorious – Paul Baloche – C
• Everlasting Light – F
• Message – Romans 6:15-23
• There Is A Redeemer – Keith Green – E

I’ve got a second post coming today talking about “Everlasting Light” but the reason that it’s in our setlist twice is that the first time we did it pre-service just so people could hear the song as they were walking in.

A few things from this past Sunday -

1. Like I said before, hearing stories of how Jesus has changed the lives of kids, students and adults to the point where they are ready to go public with their faith never gets old. Being part of a church that values and celebrates baptisms is a real privilege and I am so thankful that God continues to be at work in the lives of individuals in our church. The big encouragement for me on Sunday was that each of the stories spoke of how other people in our church had been influential in the faith journeys of those being baptized – a good reminder that God is at work in the lives of individuals but also in the community life of our church. It’s important to be reminded of that.

2. The middle set of those three songs (How Can I Keep -> Glorious -> Everlasting Light) was very, very solid. We were helped out by using click tracks for the first two songs from PraiseCharts. If you aren’t using the resources that PraiseCharts is producing you should check them out. Great stuff! (I’m a little biased – we’ll have some news on that in the next couple of weeks.)
3. While there was great joy with the testimonies and celebrations there was also a bit of heaviness of Sunday for me, just because of a situation that is happening with someone who is part of our worship team. Our pastor, Earl Marshall, spoke to the severity of continually dreaming of what life might be like “on the other side of the fence” even when we know that making those decisions would only be coming from satisfying our desire for sin. He encouraged those in our church to confess to secret sin, to behavioural patterns inconsistent with live out the gospel.. but above all that he encouraged us to remain focused on Christ, to remember the gospel and to live lives out of the grace and mercy God has shown us in Christ.

All in all, we celebrated, we worshiped God, we opened His word, we gathered together to turn our eyes away from “the hills” in our lives and to focus instead on Christ (Ps 121). You can read more recaps like this over at TheWorshipCommunity.com.