Worshiping Together: 2/3/13

It’s been a while since I’ve done a Worshiping Together recap. It’s not because I haven’t been involved with our corporate worship gatherings, because I have. I’ve had a lot of things on my plate, and just haven’t taken the time, or had the motivation, to sit down and write the posts. But I realize the value of doing this, so am going to try and be more intentional moving forward.

This past weekend, we continued with our new year series Is It In YOU? where we’ve been reviewing our three essentials of being a healthy disciple in the start of a new year. This is pretty core to our approach to ministry. These next three weeks are the second part where we are looking at how the essential elements of stewardship play into that – time, talents, and treasures. With the realization that it’s not the best 2 out of 3, but the essential of all of them.

Time was our focus. Part of being a disciple is having a clear understanding of time and what it means to prioritize availability for mission. The question isn’t so much about if we have time, but what we do with the time we have.

Here’s what we did together…

Our Service Flow:

Welcome/Announcements

Celebrate and Champion: Marriage Encounter Weekend

Meet & Greet

Colossians 1:15-20

Praise Adonai (Baloche)

Beautiful One (Hughes)

Offering

Jesus, Lord of Heaven (Wickham)

Video: In Time from The Veracity Project

Message

Response

Communion

None But Jesus (Fraser)

Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone) (Newton/Rees/Excell/Tomlin/Giglio)

Video: You’ve Got 7 Days from Nevan Hooker

Close & Commission

Observations:

• This week we started with welcome/announcements which was different for us. Usually we start with music to draw people together. While we didn’t have a problem getting started, it also was a bit into the service before we had a more “participatory” element. Probably won’t do this all the time.
• We introduced Jesus, Lord of Heaven this week. We taught it during the collection of the offering, and then invited the congregation to join in. It’s a great, yet simple, song of worship, and I think that people caught on to it well. I hope that it becomes a solid favorite of the congregation.
• We were a bit smaller in our worship team this week. One of those times when people and unavailability just converged. We ended up with keys, acoustic, bass, and drums, and a handful of singers. Despite the smaller size, we worked well together, and I think created a solid sound.
• I had a moment of embarrassment during the end of the service. Probably more personal than anything else. We had the ended set up as above. However, I thought it would be good to add in a song between None But Jesus and Amazing Grace. I started to play the intro to Revelation Song, but unfortunately no one was with me. I haven’t been working with this team very long, and didn’t communicate/lead well. They jumped in with Amazing Grace. Fortunately they were both in the same key…
• Had a bit of technical hiccup. The intent was to go right into the video at the end of Amazing Grace, which we ended by repeating the chorus after the last verse, without delay. However, we ended up with an awkward pause. One of those things that most people may not have fully realized, but where we missed the mark.

Overall, it was a great time together. Anytime we have the opportunity to celebrate communion is time well spent. Plus any opportunity to be reminded of who Christ is, the life He calls us to live (and lives through us), and to worship Him is time well spent. I hope that your time of gathering was full of spirit and truth as well.

To see what other communities did together, be sure to check out the other Sunday Setlists posted on TheWorshipCommunity.com.