As we gathered on this morning in culmination of a week of remembering, reflecting, and celebrating, we again took time to praise the Lord for His mightiness. After walking through the events of Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and the vigil of Easter Saturday, it was good to be able to gather and celebrate something that is worth celebrating every single week – the resurrection of Jesus Christ who defeated death, sin, and the grave.
This morning was a part of our ongoing series “Do You Believe?” as we again looking at the truth of the resurrection of Jesus through some of the encounters in John 20 and asked if people believed.
For the full service experience, click for more.We began the service with a video from Hyper Pixels Media called “3 Days Later.” We always try to start with something that captures the entirety of the story for those who were not able to participate in the Good Friday service.
We then kicked right into a bunch of songs including:
Glorious (Baloche/Brown)
Christ the Lord Is Risen Today (Wesley) – the HymnCharts Band arrangement
Our God Saves (Baloche/Brown)
During the interlude of “Out God Saves” we had people turn and greet one another and dismissed the kids for their special program. Usually we have the kids in the back for the entire service, but started with the elementary age kids in the service this week so families could be together for part of the service. We’re not sure the dismissal worked as well as it could since it was a departure from the norm. After the greeting, we called the people back together and finished the song before moving to a time of prayer.
We then did the first part of the message. It was the first part of John 20 as Mary Magdelene and then Peter and John discover the empty tomb. The idea was to film the entirety of this segment on location in a cemetery. Most of it was, but it started getting really windy and chilly that morning, so we finished the filming inside. I think it was effective in giving a bit of a different feel and look to a story often heard on Easter. I did hear that it helped to some people that are normally as engaged with the preaching portion of the service. Check it out below…
Following, we had a number of different elements, including:
A special music by a five person ensemble singing “Glorious Morning”.
A scripture reading focused on why God did what He did through Jesus at Easter.
The offering featuring an instrumental medley of “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” and “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today” called Resurrection Overture arranged by Don Chapman. This was a lot of fun to do with the band.
We then moved to the live portion of the message that furthered explored the resurrection encounters that John talks about in his gospel and what they revealed about who Jesus is. The message ended with an opportunity for people to hear and respond to the truth of the risen Jesus as Savior and Lord in their own life. It was great that people, both adults and children, responded to God that morning for the first time.
We showed another video called “Arise” from Centerline New Media as a transition into the final songs to help people again see what happens as we choose to fully believe Jesus is the Son of God.
Our final songs included:
Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone) (Newton/Rees/Excell/Tomlin/Giglio)
Jesus Saves (Cottrell/Moffitt) – this has been a new one we’ve been working on, and it went great! This is a great song because it tells the entire story of Christ’s life on earth and its significance.
We would have ended with a final announcement and dismissal at that point, but I felt it appropriate to sing one more song, so we did In Christ Alone (Townend/Getty) which was to have been our postlude song. This is always a highlight song for our congregation, and it seemed (and was) the right choice.
We then ended our morning together and sent people out hopefully encouraged and challenged in the resurrection of our Lord.
It was a good morning together. We have been having some volume issues, but it seemed to be better. There were many present who only come at this time of the year. It was also good to see many with full families present. I will confess that the preparations of Saturday were extremely stressful for me. Not necessarily because we were doing hard things or were unprepared, it was just the convergence of a whole lot of stuff that I didn’t necessarily handle well. Fortunately, both God and my team are gracious and forgiving.
Thanks for stopping by. If you were there, it would be great to hear your thoughts and comments.
To find out how other churches worshiped together on this Easter Sunday, check out Sunday Setlists at The Worship Community.
