Building a Worshiping Community

As a worship leader for a body of believers, it can sometimes feel like a very daunting task to be responsible to build a worshiping community within your own context.  Yet, being charged with this oversight IS what we are called to do.  I love Bob Kauflin’s thoughts on building a worshiping community.  I want to strive for this.

“A worshiping community is made up of individuals whose lives are centered around the Savior they worship together each week.  A worshiping community expects to encounter God’s presence not only on Sunday morning but every day.  A worshiping community recognizes that passionate times of singing God’s praise flow from and lead to passionate lives lived for the glory of Jesus Christ.”  (Worship Matters, pg.127)

Why Vicarious Worship?

“All our worship of the Father takes place properly within the circle of the life of Jesus Christ which he lived in our human nature in such a way that his whole life formed itself into worship, prayer and praise which he offered to the Father on our behalf” (T.F. Torrance, Theology in Reconciliation, 210-211).

The Gospel is not only about the death of Christ, but it includes the perfect life of Christ that is credited to us in the eyes of God.  So even our “response” to the Gospel is made perfect and possible only through Christ Jesus.

This made me laugh really hard!

Sometimes you just need a good laugh, ya know?

Just to fill your head with useless knowledge, here’s what the Mayo Clinic (no…has nothing to do with mayonnaise) says about laughing yourself to health:

Stresss-relief benefits from a belly laugh
Laughter’s health benefits are no joke. A good sense of humor can’t cure all ailments, but data are mounting about the positive things laughter can do.

Short-term benefits
A good laugh has great short-term effects. When you start to laugh, it doesn’t just lighten your load mentally, it actually induces physical changes in your body. Laughter can:

• Stimulate your organs. Laughter enhances your intake of oxygen-rich air, stimulates your heart, lungs and muscles, and increases the endorphins that are released by your brain.
• Activate and relieve your stress response. A rollicking laugh fires up and then cools down your stress response and increases your heart rate and blood pressure. The result? A good, relaxed feeling.
• Soothe tension and stomachaches. Laughter can also ease digestion and stimulate circulation, which helps reduce some of the physical symptoms of stress.

Long-term effects
Laughter isn’t just a quick pick-me-up, though. It’s also good for you over the long haul. Laughter may:

• Improve your immune system. Negative thoughts manifest into chemical reactions that can impact your body by bringing more stress into your system and decreasing your immunity. In contrast, positive thoughts actually release neuropeptides that help fight stress and potentially more-serious illnesses.
• Relieve pain. Laughter may ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers.
• Increase personal satisfaction. Laughter can also make difficult situations a little bit easier.

Weekend Worship 1/17 – Prayer Emphasis Week

So here we are in the new year already!  At Harvest we want to start off the year by coming boldly before the throne of God.  This Sunday we kicked off our Week of Prayer.  Our people have been praying around the clock and then corporately on Wed. night.  On Sunday, one of the elements we used in our service was an elder prayer time.  This is where the body can share requests and one of our elders will pray on the spot with them about that request.  It’s an humbling and encouraging element to our service.  It also shows that the elders are really serious about seeking God for direction in our church.  I’d be interested to know other ideas that you have used for your prayer emphasis services.   Sunday ended up being a little more traditional musically, but it’s what the Spirit laid on my heart.  Here’s Sunday:

1. Sing for Joy
2. Greeting
3. Announcements
4. Offering – Sweet Hour of Prayer (Inst. Violin and band)
5. What A Friend We Have in Jesus (w/ a new chorus I wrote)
6. Elder Prayer Time
7. Special Music: Heal Our Land (Mark sang)
8. Message: Pastor Dan
9. Closing – We Will Seek You First, Lord (Oh, Lord, to You)

Revelation Song

This past week, my wife, Juli, did an amazing job of leading the congregation to the throne of God as she ended the worship time with “Revelation Song”.  A family in our church recorded it and posted it on youtube.  It’s been awesome to see her grow as a vocalist and especially as a contagiously passionate worshipper of Christ. She would much rather have Christ exalted than her ability recognized, but I’m very grateful to have my wife serve with me on our worship team.

1.  Nothing But the Blood
2.  Greeting
3.  Offering
4.  Announcements

5.  Jesus Messiah
7.  Grace Unmeasured (Sov. Grace Music)
7.  Jesus You Are Worthy

Scripture Reading: Revelation 4:8b, 11; 5:9-14 (ESV)
7.    Special Music: Revelation Song (Juli)
8.    Message: P. Dan
9.    Closing Song: The Stand

The Prayer of the Satisfied Soul

My new favorite book is Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health by Donald S. Whitney.  The first chapter is entitled “Do You Thirst For God?”.  I love the fact that he starts the book with this chapter, because too often we begin diagnosing our spiritual health by the “spiritual things” we are doing or not doing (reading my Bible, praying, church involvement/attendence, etc.).  NO NO NO!  We must begin by pursuing God because he is a worthy pursuit and satisfying to the soul.  It is of God himself that Paul says in Phil. 3:10, “that I may know Him…”.  The Apostle Paul knew God a lot better that I do, but He wanted to know Him even more!  It satisfies our soul to be satisfied in God himself and crave more!  THEN…. the desire for His Word will grow stronger, the need for communicating in our relationship with Him will grow deeper, and the love  of serving Him will be sweeter.  You see, we often desire the results of pursuing God rather than pursuing God Himself!  Wow.  Good stuff.  Worship leaders, you must read this book!

Check out this prayer from A. W. Tozer.  It is the prayer of the satisfied soul:

O God, I have tasted Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more.  I am painfully conscious of my need for further grace.  I am ashamed of my lack of desire.  O God, the Triune God, I want to want Thee; I long to be filled with longing; I thirst to be made thirsty still. (Whitney, p. 23)

Weekend Worship Review 2/22

I introduced another song that I wrote.  As a songwriter, it is exciting to see people catch on to a song and hear them sing it to the Lord.  People seemed to pick it up quickly, which is how I intended the song to be.  When I write a worship song where the goal is congregational participation, it is important to keep in mind the “accessibility” of the song.  On other songs that I have written which I intend to sing myself, the phrasing and melody will be more suited to my own voice.  Also, I might be more personal on the subject of the song or it’s meaning, but for worship I don’t want people spending lots of time trying to figure out what they saying to the Lord because I wrote the song about how God provided for a specific situation in my life.  Although people can relate to provision, the song is about me.  I’m trying to give a group of believers a voice to express worship to God.  I also don’t want people trying to hit notes that when they try to sing they thinking, “man, my vocal cords are gonna break if I have to sing that on the second verse!”.  I’m also not going to write in a long instrumental break between verses because I thought it was a SWEET chord progression, while everyone is thinking, “how much longer ’till I’m supposed to sing again…I just want to sing to the Lord!”.  Anyway, these are some of the ramblings of a songwriter trying to do his best at helping the church express worship to God in song.  I’ll try to post an acoustic version of the song.  Here’s the set this past week:

1. Sing to the King
2. Greeting
3. Announcements/Offering
4. Update on St. Vincent Church planting (Pastor Al Blake)
5. Yours (We introduced a new song to the church that I wrote)
6. Scripture reading: 1 John 2:15-17 (esv)
7. Be Thou My Vision (I wrote a simple flute line for the verses, worked good!)
8. How Great Is Our God
9. Message: Pastor Dan (series: Worldliness)
10. Turn Your Eyes upon Jesus (no band, just Joe on acoustic)

Grace and Truth Radio

My pastor and I are kicking off a new radio ministry in the detroit area beginning on March 2nd on WRDT AM 560.  We are calling it Grace and Truth Radio Ministry.  Pastor Dan’s messages will be the content of the broadcast.  I wrote the music for intro and exit to the program.  It was a lot of fun.  For those of you not in the detroit area you can listen to it live online here.  It will be on at 9:30am & replayed at 1:30pm.  For the Month of March it will also be on their FM station, WMUZ 103.5, at 9:30pm.  We’re excited.  So tell your friends about Grace and Truth Radio!

"Peace Has Come" has come.

Blogging had to take a back seat on my priority list for a while.  Christmas concert is over…phew!  I have enjoyed singing some the Christmas songs in our church theses past few weeks.  I stressed to the band that we don’t do Christmas songs because of the nostalgia or sentimentality of the songs.  We sing them because they are songs that proclaim truth about Christ…incarnation, worship, exhaltation, ascription, divinity, lordship, etc…

Also, I have released a 6 song CD of Christmas songs and songs that I have written.  It’s called “Peace Has Come”, which is also the title track.  I wrote Peace Has Come for our Christmas concert.

Weekend Worship 11/2

Your Grace Is Enough
Our God Saves
Offering & Announcements
Grace Unmeasured (Patty leads)
You Have Been So Good To Me

Scripture Reading: Psalm 145:1-8

How Great Thou Art (Paul Baloche Version)
Message: Pastor Al

I really like Paul Baloche’s version of “How Great Thou Art”.  The words of that song are so rich!  They need a stronger feel that his version brings.  If you haven’t picked up his CD “Our God Saves”, you need to.

Al preached Genesis 42.  He really brought it this week!  I’m thankful for the faithful preaching of the Word.