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Sunday Setlist - 8/31/09

I know it's said a lot, but we could never say it too much - God is good!

At Life Church this morning, we had a wonderful time in the presence of God, starting with prayer by a few members of the congregation as the worship team played, and culminating in an altar of consecration following a word from our pastor, Tom Bedford, from the book of Jude - actually, reading through the 25-verse apostolic letter.

Paul Shipman and the rest of the worship team (Rebecca, Twila, Veeve, Jon, Bethany, Drew, Andrew, and Bob) did a really great job of helping us find the presence of God in a powerful way. Here are the songs used this morning:

- "Let Everything That Has Breath" (Matt Redman, ThankYou Music, CCLI# 2430979)

- "You, You Are God" (Walker Beach, Gateway Create Publishing, CCLI# 4389918).

I love this song! We have used it several times this year, and our people really respond to it - it's a great song to release proclamation to the Lord from our hearts.

- "Great in Power" (Russell Fragar, Hillsong Publishing, CCLI# 2582339).

Paul had the band transition directly into this song without a break, but pulled everything back to drums and voices and transitioned with the chorus, which worked really well. They transitioned out of it to the next song by bringing it down slow and worshipful, which is something we do a lot. I hope we do not overuse this technique, but it's very effective for holding the thought of the upbeat, praising song, and turning it from proclamation to or about God, to deep heartfelt interaction with Him.

- "How He Loves" (John Mark McMillian, Integrity Music, CCLI# 5032549).

This song has really been popularized by Kim Walker, Jesus Culture, on CD, DVD, YouTube, everywhere, and is just a very powerful song. From the opening prayers and exhortations, the loving presence of God was evident among us, and this song just released us further to recognize and respond to Him.

Shelby, a junior in our church high school, came and exhorted us with tears to receive the love of God with a picture of a parent and a child learning to walk, with the parent always ready to aid, never leaving the child alone. As Pastor Tom opened the altars, many came to the front to receive prayer or just to be there with the Lord. It was one of those times where you come away thinking you've had an experience with God that goes beyond the principles being sung about or exhorted - He's DONE something in you, with you, for you, to you, and you're different.

Tom's message was a sobering one exhorting us (or more accurately, letting scripture exhort us) to avoid the 'secret things' that creep into our lives and cause us to live a godly public life, and an ungodly private one. God wants to judge our hearts, exposing sin now in this life, so that He can deal with it now from the Mercy Seat, rather than later from the Throne.

It's the mercy, the goodness of God, that brings us to repentance, and it was an awesome thing to hear this very serious word in the context of the deep, deep love of God that He poured out on us in worship. We don't always have an 'altar call' at the end where people are invited to come to the front, but it seemed appropriate, really needful, today. Many came up to consecrate their hearts again to the Lord, and to ask him to deal with the secret places of our lives.

If anyone from Life Church has anything to add, please do so and leave a comment. If you're from elsewhere, I hope you had a great day with the Lord and His people also, and feel free to tell us about it - either here in a comment, or at FredMcKinnon.com's Sunday Setlist blog, which this post is a part of. Take a look at what's happening in worship around the universe.

Heart Of Worship 3 - Seeking Heart

Heart Of Worship - Seeking Heart from Harold Forbis on Vimeo.

Heart Of Worship 2 - Humble Heart

Heart Of Worship - Humble Heart from Harold Forbis on Vimeo.

Sunday Setlist 8/23/2009

We had an awesome morning at Life Church today. I really appreciate our worship team's desire for the Lord, and we had a great time in prayer before we began rehearsing. Here are the songs we worked with this morning:

"Bless Your Name" (by our own Ruth Pingel). This is a great call to worship kind of song.

"Sing For Joy" (Lamont Hiebert - CCLI# 1861357 - wow, there are a lot of Sing For Joy songs registered with CCLI!). Haven't done this one in a long time, started with a capella chorus with drums.

"Hallelujah / Shout to the Earth" (Martin Reardon - Vineyard - CCLI# 3473069)

"Nothing Is As Wonderful" (Scott Underwood - Vineyard - CCLI # 2035862)

"Worthy / You Are Awesome" (Joshua Nunn - Integrity Music - CCLI# 4488486)

We had been planning to do the hymn Holy, Holy, Holy between Hallelujah and Nothing Is As Wonderful. But in rehearsal, we added Worthy/You Are Awesome on at the end, and the whole feel of where we were headed changed, so we cut Holy, Holy, Holy for the service, to be sure we'd get to Worthy at the end.

We had a couple of rough transitions, but overall we really had a good morning in worship. When we got to Worthy, it really opened up a 'breakthrough' kind of atmosphere. Our pastor, Tom Bedford, came up and exhorted us to keep pressing into the presence of God. Veeve Holtz came up and helped us by 'Veevifying' the You Are Awesome part, and we really began to call out to God.

Tom shared a sobering challenge from Eph. 3 and 4 to live our lives rooted and grounded in the word and the ways of God. 

This post is a part of the Fred McKinnon Sunday Setlist blog at http://www.fredmckinnon.com/myblog/2009/08/23/sunday-setlists-57/. Feel free to leave a comment.

See you next week!

Heart of Worship - Part 1

Worship Life from Harold Forbis on Vimeo.

Sunday Setlist 081609

This is the first in what will hopefully be an every week series of posts regarding the songs we used this Sunday at Life Church in Kirksville, MO, and how everything went. We're participating in the "Sunday Setlists" blog carnival at FredMcKinnon.com, http://www.fredmckinnon.com/myblog/2009/08/16/sunday-setlists-56/

This Sunday, we were winding up a Kingdom Kids Bash weekend. There was a Friday evening worship service kid-style, Saturday afternoon bbq for the kids and workers, then a couple of us 'older folks' (sorry Veeve) joined the mostly high school or just past musicians and singers to lead worship for Sunday morning's service. Here's the songs we did:

Tell the World (J Douglas, J Houston, M Sampson - Hillsongs - CCLI#4451310)

One Way (J Houston, J Douglas - Hillsongs - CCLI#4222082)

You're the Answer (J Bell, D Wakerley, B Wakerley - Hillsongs/Integrity - CCLI#4962658)

To Carry the Glory (Harold Forbis - OneVoiceWorship.org - CCLI#2742832)

We started "Tell the World" with a drumbeat, and open chords on the chorus, then went into the Hillsongs Kids version - all holding F#m for a 4-bar intro, through the verse and through the pre-chorus. Starting that way seemed to us to be a good way to soften up the one minor chord being held for so long. It made a good 'preview' for the song as well, since this is one the kids do, but we probably haven't used in our adult service before.

It went well, kids and adults responded to it. Went right into "One Way", which our folks know, and brought a fun, really joyful feel to the meeting. "You're the Answer" brought a very worshipful, almost serious sense of the presence of God - so much so that we went into free worship at the end (looping the C#m, B, A), and didn't want to stop. Honestly, we were in a moment where God was there, and we weren't really sure what to do, so we continued to seek Him and worship Him from that place.

At some point, we moved on to "To Carry the Glory", a song I wrote a few years ago that quotes Gal. 2:20, and II Cor. 4:6. The point of it is that we are here as vessels to bring the glory of God to the earth. I'm not sure we placed this song well in the service - it fit the theme of the morning, on Legacy, but we may have missed the flow coming out of "You're the Answer". Anyway, my wife said it was anointed, so I will take her word and move on to next week!

Great words were shared about Legacy, and investment of God in our children, both in our church school and in our homes, for the sake of the Kingdom of God being left as a perpetual legacy of our time of the earth.

See you next week!

 

Your Gift & Your Life

I recently had the privilege of helping provide the music for the wedding of two young friends of mine, Jon and Bethany. They are a wonderful couple, both very gifted in music, both devoted to God and to serving His people, particularly in the area of leading worship. Their journey through friendship, courtship, and engagement was a joy to observe, as they have lived pure lives, and put God first in the choices and decisions they've made.

At the rehearsal, we worshipped and our pastor invited the presence of God. His presence began to fill the room, and the bride and groom were undone as the Lord began to minister to them. It was a beautiful, powerful moment.

A thought struck me as we were there together in the glory of God. As gifted and talented as Jon and Bethany are, the Lord was not there manifesting His presence because of their gifts and talents - they weren't playing, singing, or doing anything 'gifted' at the moment - He was present, glorifying Himself and making Himself known because the lives Jon and Bethany live are pleasing to Him. They have determined to seek God as their reward, and in that moment, He was rewarding them among their friends and family by being found. 

Here's the phrase that came to my mind -

Your gift will make room for you, but it's your life that will bring the glory of God.

Your gift and talent will cause people to notice you, and they'll make way for you, just like at the gift table at a wedding. If people are crowded around the table, when they see you coming with a gift for the bride and groom, they'll make room for you. But when the bride and groom are opening gifts, although they appreciate the stuff they get, what really blesses them is receiving those things from people they know and love.

People will make way for us to serve them when they see we are gifted, but what they really need - and what they are really hoping for - is the glory of God (God Himself to show up). That will happen, not if we can play the guiltar or sing well (although, hey, it helps!), but if the lives we live honor God.  Develop the gifts God's given you in every way you can, but use them as a tool to express what's in you, don't depend on them. Develop a worship life, and depend on God. When you draw near to Him - in your own time of worship, or when you're leading others - He will draw near to you.