Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Vocal skill required?


If you feel as if you can't or shouldn't participate in the singing on Sunday morning, or you know someone who sees themselves as a "non-musical" person, here are a few things for you to think about as you look forward to Sunday. It seems as if the commands to sing are there in Scripture (these are just a few of the many), and they apply to everyone regardless of "natural ability." So come ready to belt out the praise with us on Sunday!

Oh sing to the LORD a new song;
sing to the LORD, all the earth!
~ Psalm 96:1

Oh sing to the LORD a new song,
for he has done marvelous things!
His right hand and his holy arm
have worked salvation for him.
~ Psalm 98:1

Sing to the LORD, all the earth!
Tell of his salvation from day to day.
Declare his glory among the nations,
his marvelous works among all the peoples!
For great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised,
and he is to be held in awe above all gods.
For all the gods of the peoples are idols,
but the LORD made the heavens.
Splendor and majesty are before him;
strength and joy are in his place.
~ 1 Chronicles 16:23-27

Singing is not an option for the Christian; no one is excused. Vocal skill is not a criterion.
~ Harold Best (posted by Bob Kauflin, via Twitter)

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

"The Mercy Seat" and "The War"

If you notice in the side column on the right of this page, there's a list of "worship music I'm really enjoying right now," where I'm listing music that I've found or has been given to me, that I think is really beneficial stuff for the church. And I just want to take a second to recommend something to you from that list!

I love the movement happening right now among churches - musicians are writing their own music that is meant to be sung in their own churches. Thankfully, some of this music is making it out to the rest of us, and this is a great example. Sojourn Church in Louisville, Kentucky, has a desire to write their own music and, in the words of their worship director, "that church music can be reclaimed from the commercial world it’s in by the local church." And this EP is some of the most biblical, creative new worship music I've heard in recent years. These songwriters know music, and they know their bibles.

Each EP is about $5 on iTunes or Amazon.com, so go check it out. Search for the titles of the albums, which are "The Mercy Seat" and "The War," or search for "Sojourn" and you'll find their stuff.

Here's a trailer for the dual EP! May it whet your whistle for good worship music. You can also go here to listen to the entire album, and/or purchase it.

Preview For The Mercy Seat-The War Split EP from Sojourn Community Church on Vimeo.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Preparing for Sunday, 3-20-11

Hey guys!
We had a great rehearsal last night for this week's music. Our times of singing on Thursdays have been worshipful and energetic, which always gets me really excited for Sunday morning.

This coming Sunday is going to be a little unique for us. We've been talking about Paul's fervent prayers for the Colossian believers, that they would grow in the knowledge of God and of Christ, and that they would abound in love for one another. So we're going to devote some time to prayer during the service, where a couple of men will lead us in prayer for the people of Japan. It should be a really good opportunity for us to worship God through prayer, and humbly come before him on behalf of those affected by the disaster. Really, it's an opportunity for us to practically live out together some of what we've been studying in Colossians.

The kids' choir will also be singing our 2nd song of the morning. It's always encouraging to have them as a part of our corporate worship on Sunday.

Jordan will be preaching through Colossians 2:11-15, and our songs will be interspersed through the time of prayer. We'll also sing a song together at the end, to respond to the preaching of God's Word. Here's the song list:

1. Forever
An exultation in God's faithfulness to His people, and his sovereignty over our lives.
2. Indescribable (kids' choir)
A song about God's majesty and glory in creation, that we'll worship to by listening.
3. Glorious and Mighty
A creative re-working of Psalm 96 to music. The song speaks of God's grace, but also of His sovereignty and justice, and that he is sovereignty gracious and good! This is a really important song for us to sing together, especially given what we'll be praying about together on Sunday.
4. Blessed Assurance
This is a tune of confidence and hope, that God has saved us in and through Jesus, and that because of that we look forward with great hope to His return.
5. All I Have is Christ (closing song)
One of my favorite "modern hymns." This song is also a song of confidence, and joy in having Jesus as our highest treasure. God redeemed and saved us from His own wrath and justice, by crushing His Son for us. So we can sing "Hallelujah, all I have is Christ!" because if we are saved by faith in Christ, we do possess every good thing.

Lookin' forward to worshiping with you on Sunday, and to what God will do among his church as we meet together!

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

John Calvin's Worship Services, Part 2!

Here are the last 2 quotes by Tim Keller, about how John Calvin thought about corporate worship. I hope these make sense, and that you're encouraged by looking at the wisdom of some of the church fathers in how they went about planning corporate church gatherings. Keep in mind that by "worship," Keller and Calvin are talking about everything that goes on in a church gathering (music, but also preaching, prayer and reading of Scripture).

[F]or Calvin, the goal of gathered worship is to make God "spiritually real" to our hearts. That is where truths (that we may have known intellectually) now by the Spirit's influence become fiery, powerful, and profoundly affecting (e.g. Rom 8:15-16). They now thrill, comfort, empower (or even) disturb you in a way they did not before (Eph 1:18-22; 3:14-21). It was not enough, for Calvin, to be told about grace. You had to be amazed by grace.

And I love this next quote, about what we should be doing when we sing together in church:

Because professional musicians could turn the congregants into an audience instaed of a community, [Calvin] chose not to use choirs or soloists. Instead, [...] [Calvin's] practice was to turn the congregation into a well-trained choir under trained "singing masters" (emphasis added).

So I hope you're looking forward to reading the Scriptures together this Sunday, and praying together, and singing together as we worship together the God who has brought us to Himself by the death and resurrection of His Son.

Stay tuned for a "Preparing for Sunday" post!

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

John Calvin's Worship Services, Part 1!

So here we go - a great picture of what's important when planning corporate worship gatherings. For any of us showing up as the body of Christ on a Sunday morning, whether we're singing up in front or not, this can still be helpful as we think through what should be happening when we meet together as Christians. These quotes are by Tim Keller in his essay, "Reformed Worship in the Global City," found in Worship by the Book. The essay talks about some key ways the great Reformer, John Calvin, planned his church meetings in Geneva, Switzerland.

Keller tells us,
[O]ur current "worship wars" are due in great part to our unwillingness to consult the Bible, culture, and tradition together. I think Calvin did this much more effectively than did any of the other Reformers.

Postmodern people (that's us, today) are much more ignorant of basic Christian truth than their forebears and need a place to come to learn it, yet they are also more distrustful of "hype" and sentimentality than older generations. Calvin's worship tradition avoids the emotional manipulation that so frightens secular people about charismatic services, even though they desire the transcendence that contemporary praise worship appears to offer.

So what did Calvin do that was helpful?

Calvin considered the Bible to be the supreme authority and source for God-honoring worship.

[Calvin] did not claim the ability to create a pure biblical corporate worship "from scratch." Rather, he first consulted ancient tradition [...] Calvin's reliance on church tradition has been well documented.

Calvin would not choose high culture over intelligibility to the common person. The preaching and the singing were to be done so that they were accessible even to the unlearned. [...] The [order of service] was "entirely directed toward edification" (Calvin).

This is very important for us to see - Calvin kept the edification and encouragement of the entire gathered body of Christ in mind when he planned the music, the order of service, the sermon, or anything else.

When Calvin faced the question of how to arrange the "concrete circumstances" of worship (such as whether we should pray standing or kneeling, in unison or individually, etc.) he wrote that we must be wholly directed by the concern of edification.

I/we need to keep this in mind when I think of what songs we're going to sing each Sunday. What does our church, and what do we as Christians need to sing this week, based on the culture we live in, the threats against the Gospel we're facing, and on our individual needs?

Hope you enjoyed this post. It's becoming a miniseries, so stay tuned for part 2!

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Preparing for Sunday, 3-6-11

I'm really excited to be blogging again about Sunday morning. I feel like this helps me a ton, as I think through our song list, etc. Hopefully it's helpful to you too!

Pastor John is still on his sabbatical through the end of March, so Jordan will be preaching all the Sundays through then. This Sunday the sermon text will be Colossians 2:1-5, about Paul longing for the believers at Colossae, that they would be encouraged and united in love, that they would "reach all the riches of understanding" of God in Christ. Jordan has a special knack for explaining passages like this, that deal with the life of believers in a church. Should be a really good morning!

In Colossians we find theology about Christ's deity and majesty as God in human form, but also about his death and resurrection to triumph over sin and ransom his people from the grave. So our songs will probably continue to hit these aspects of our Savior as we study this book. Our song list will go as follows.

1. God of Wonders
2. Indescribable
3. Glorious
4. Jesus Paid it All

And I just want to include a note on the song Glorious, which we introduced in church about a month ago. This song was originally written by Chris Tomlin, but a pastor friend of ours over at Grace Community Church rewrote the lyrics to the verses, in order to express more specific biblical truth. As someone told me in relation to the re-written lyrics, they're "another testament to why we need pastors and theologians writing good lyrics." I love this version, and I love that someone I know wrote the verses to serve the church. The lyrics to the song are below.

No earthly mind would dare invent
A substitute from heaven sent
The Lamb
To pay for sin and take the guilt
Through innocent, divine blood spilt
The Lamb, Lamb of God

Glorious over us
You shall reign, glorious!

No greater thought can be conceived
Than what You did to purchase me
O Lord
From sin, despair and Satan's spell
From righteous wrath, eternal hell
O Lord, O Lord

Majesty and power are Yours alone, forever!


Wednesday, March 2, 2011

John Calvin's Worship Services - A Preface

The following is just a preface to my forthcoming post on John Calvin, and how he planned his worship services. I intend to keep posting on the blog, with reflections on quotes by other pastors, theologians and church fathers (like Calvin), for a couple of reasons. I hope they're helpful to you.

Reason #1: I've talked to a good number of Christians and even "worship leaders" who have really vague ideas about what exactly their role is in church, and what role the music is actually supposed to play in the life of a church body. Why in the world do we sing together as a church on Sunday (or any other time)? And by the way, I throw myself in on this one. I've often been poorly-thought-through about church. But by the grace of God, no more!

I've said it before, but I believe the Scriptures say some very specific things about having music in church, and about singing together as Christians. Unfortunately, somehow our modern culture has produced a generation of church music leaders who (in my opinion) are influenced by the Christian "pop worship" scene, and plan music because it's what we're supposed to have in church. They try to incorporate all the "popular" worship songs to keep things relevant in their church, and they fail to really think and process through what Scripture commands concerning church music; and, if Scripture does command gathered Christians to sing, how should that be done?

As those leading our church we need to know why we do what we do, so we can help our congregation know. Otherwise, what's the point?

Reason #2: I've been helped a ton by studying what Scripture says on this, of course. But, I've also been helped immensely by reading what some other godly pastors and music leaders think about the subject. Some of these writers are from today, but many that I've tried to read from are from church history: men like Spurgeon, Luther, Calvin, Edwards, even C.S. Lewis, and others.

The reason some voices from the past can help us so much, is that we can never figure life out in a vacuum. These men tried to figure out how to do church according to the Word of God years before us, and so we would be foolish not to learn from them. They were sinful like us and didn't do everything right, as history will attest to; but, there are vast amounts of wisdom to be gained from those who've gone before. We would do well to learn from these men, and let their wisdom affect how we think through what we do in the church today.

All that to say, there will henceforth be a post with a couple quotes about how John Calvin went about structuring his church's worship services! And, ironically, that post will probably be shorter than this one.