Journey of Worship

Archive for the ‘Sunday Setlist’ Category

Sorry that I have not been as consistent in posting lately. I’ve had a lot of stuff going on and some things happening. This will be a quick recap, but I at least wanted to get this up for those of you who look forward to this.

This was the final Sunday of “The Hand-Off”, and the final Sunday of our senior pastor. We’ve spent the last three Sunday preparing for this time of transition. In the midst of all that, we’ve also been getting ready and gearing up for the fall ministry season. It’s been busy.

We began the service with welcome, announcements, and a time of greeting. We then had six children dedicated to the Lord.

One of our team members lead in the call to worship from Psalm 100:4-5, and then we sang O Worship the King (Grant/Gardiner/Tomlin), Be Unto Your Name (DeShazo/Sadler), and Praise the Father, Praise the Son (Cash/Tomlin). Leading into Be Unto Your Name, we had scripture from Psalm 24:1-6 read. Following the third song, we had a time of prayer and confession and scripture from Philippians 3 about not putting confidence in the flesh but our faith in Christ. I didn’t realize until later that all three of these songs were in 3/4 time, but our drummer did a great job giving them depth and body.

We then moved into the offering, and sang How Great Is Our God (Tomlin/Reeves/Cash) during it and invited people to stand toward the end.

We then moved into the message which was based out of Acts 20:17-38 and 1 Peter 5:1-4 and was focused on reminding to be faithful. Part was directed at the congregation and the other part was directed at the elders. Partway through the message, we took a moment to welcome new members into the church.

Following the message, we had a time of prayer for our senior pastor and his family as they transition. We had some folks sing the classic song “Find Us Faithful”, and then the senior pastor closed the service by praying one final time over the congregation.

We had a strong attendance, and I know that many people came to celebrate and connect one final time with a man who has pastored this congregation for over ten years. For many it is a bittersweet time as he leaves, but we also recognize a new season and are faithful to trust in God for what He will do.

To check out what other churches did this past Sunday, be sure to check out the Sunday Setlists posted at The Worship Community. Thanks for stopping by.

The Sunday kicked off the final series of our current senior pastor. As I’ve mentioned before, we are entering into a time of transition in the life of Cody CMA. Over these next few weeks, he’ll be wrapping up ministry here and preparing the church with some biblical counsel for the next season of life.

The metaphor of the hand-off comes from relay races where one runner has to hand a baton off to the next runner to keep the race going. It has to be done correctly so that the team is not disqualified and so they don’t loose precious time in a tight race. When done correctly, it is a thing of beauty that just happens. When done poorly, everyone’s attention is drawn to it and the price can be high.

This past Sunday, we spent time in the book of Philippians talking about gratefulness and thanksgiving. Our service focused on calling people to gratitude and thanksgiving in a number of ways. Read the rest of this entry »

Last week we did our annual Vacation Bible School for kids from Monday through Friday. The theme this year was ‘Released: God has the power to set you free’ and focused on stories from Peter’s life in the book of Acts. For the last few years, our children’s ministry has developed their own programs instead of buying something.

This year, instead of doing a closing program type thing on Friday evening (after everyone was tired and worn out from the week), we decided to focus the theme of our Sunday service on the VBS theme. We invited families to come and planned a picnic and games for afterwards. We hoped this would be a great way to engage parents and also to engage the bigger church family with VBS.

We did a lot of our normal things with some VBS specific elements. Read the rest of this entry »

This was the final week of our summer series “Blockbuster Messages”. Over the past many weeks, we’ve been looking at the various messages presented in our society primarily through movies and how those messages contrast with the truth of God. We’ve asked the question, “Is Truth impacting culture, or is culture impacting Truth?”

Our final Sunday dealt with the movie “Up” and the ideas of making the most of life while also not being afraid of beginning new adventures. This was a timely message for our church as we are entering into a season of transition with the departure of our senior pastor. It is a new season that God is leading us in, and we don’t want to be afraid or miss out on what He is going to do. Our Bible passages included Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, and Matthew 4:18-20; 14:25-36; 28:16-20. Read the rest of this entry »

This week we continued with our summer series of Blockbuster Message. We are nearing the end of this series, and it has been a great series with many positive benefits.

Our senior pastor was back after a time of being away, and we focused on the reality of evil in the world today. Our movie example was the recent Sherlock Holmes moves as we tackled the message that evil is just an illusion. The Bible paints a very different picture – that evil is very much real and something to be aware of. But we also took time to remember that our victory as Christians is found fully in Christ who has already won the victory.

Click through to find out how we celebrated and remembered together. Read the rest of this entry »

We’re continuing in our “Blockbuster Messages” series. After the craziness of the previous weekend (July 3/4 – July 4th is a BIG deal in our community and everything going on presented some challenges), it was good to be back to a more relatively normal Sunday schedule.

This past week, our senior pastor began his annual vacation/study leave weeks that he takes each July. That means that I got to speak this past week, and our youth pastor will do so next week.

We didn’t focus on the message from a particular movie this week, but instead took some time to teach about how we live as Christ-followers without being impacted by the messages of the world. We wanted to help people understand how to process and filter the messages on their own since there won’t always be someone standing up to explain how the message of a movie/show either conflicts or lines up with Scripture. It was a good midpoint to take in the series. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s been a while since I last recapped one of our services. Sorry about that. I’ve had stuff going on, and haven’t given much attention to the blog. We’ve continued to work through our summer series, Blockbuster Messages.

This past week we focused on the end of the world. Movies like 2012 paint a picture of destruction, fear and hopelessness. Yet, while the Bible also paints some vivid pictures of the end of the world, it even more so draws our attention to remember that the end of the world is coming, that we don’t know when, and that if we are in Christ Jesus, there is no reason to fear. If we live with a biblical worldview, then we will be ready and not caught off guard.

The messages we are receiving though the media are constant and often in contrast with biblical truth. We must be aware and constantly evaluating according to the Bible. Read the rest of this entry »

With the beginning of the summer season, we began a new message series called “Blockbuster Messages.” In our society today, we are drawn to movies, and there are plenty to choose from. Each of these movies tell a story and present a message. Some of these messages are good and some of them are bad.

What is the standard we use to determine the appropriateness of the messages we see? We need to have one because otherwise we will be swayed in our worldview and perspective with each new message delivered. As believers in Christ, we have a standard in the form of God’s Word.

What are the messages that we are allowing to shape us? How do we respond and engage in the discussion? Are we allowing the Truth we know to be true to impact our culture, or are will letting culture impact Truth? Read the rest of this entry »

This week was another week of the “Improving Our Serve” series. Our focus this week was what it meant to serve like Jesus. That concept is tossed around a lot, but not always fully understand. Our primary focus was Philippians 2:5-11. We also had some other special elements this week.

Our series mascot, Skip, made a live appearance this week. Instead of a video, Skip was interviewed live about what he had learned so far about serving. It was great to have him as part of the service, and to have him help us bring serving around to the spiritual side of things. Don’t worry, there was some characteristic Skip elements, too.

This was also the Sunday where we take some time to focus on graduates and youth. They were involved more in various aspects of the service. Click through to find out more… Read the rest of this entry »

This week we continued in our series “Improving Our Serve.” We took a look at what it means to have fruitful service that is empowered by Christ and not out of our own self. Our basis was a number of lessons that can be learned from the Christ’s teaching about the vine and branches in John 15:1-8.

Our time of worship through music drew our attention to the sufficiency of what Christ has already done and that in Him and Him alone is everything we need for life and godliness. We don’t serve to earn or maintain our salvation, for that is found in Christ alone. When we have a right perspective, our life and service flows out of Christ and we find joy and song in the complete work of Christ in us for the Father’s glory.

As with other weeks in this month, we had some special elements, but everything seemed to work together as we worshiped this past Sunday. Read the rest of this entry »