Isaiah Six is the first to respond to this week's "call to posts," and it's an exhaustive review! You can read the article for the punchline, but I love his setup:
But just because something might be proposed or published by the SBC or its publishing arm, LifeWay Christian Resources, doesn't mean I fall all over myself to buy it and use it. In fact, I'm often skeptical because sometimes we just flat out get it wrong.
Any more Proverbs 27:2 folks out there?
The Spyglass shares his thoughts and a Matt Redman video about the lyrical content of worship songs.
Things Hoped For shares links to three sermons from their church about worship that is "back to the Bible."
While not the gist of his post, I couldn't resist the title. Joe blogs about his philosophy in leading a worship service .
As one of the worship leaders in my church, I feel a very heavy responsibility to provide our congregation with a service that points them toward the Lord Jesus and helps them to have a personal encounter with our Creator, primarily through the music experience.
The Bible is replete with admonitions to lift up our voices to God. Indeed, the entire book of Psalms is made up of songs meant to be sung.If we don't do what God says to do, we sin. Therefore, since God says to sing, if we aren't singing, we must conclude that we are sinning.
Hat tip to Biting the Bullets.
Chadwick Ivester is a Southern Baptist Pastor in South Carolina who has a few things to say about why your family should worship together.
Jeff talks about a passage from Harold Best's Unceasing WorshipM that he's working through a second time.
Lots of posts today from the "pew."
Mark Roberts gives a quick devotional on "extravagant worship" with the story of the alabaster jar of perfume. (Matthew 26:1-13)
New Leaven poses the posture question. One of the first commenters makes a great point back:
I think you'd be hard-pressed to find all of those forms of worship in the one time, place, or person (perhaps David? But even then, I'm not entirely sure).
Baptist Hymnal?
Worship Hymnal?
Large print edition?
Pulpit edition?
If you've called, emailed, ordered online or walked into a LifeWay store and gotten your copy, we want to hear your reaction! Good, bad or ugly.
Post a review on your personal blog (or your church's site... or whatever Internet site that you like) and we'll link to you from our blog. There may even be something in it for you... Post a link to your review in the comments section of this post so we know to look for it.
Michael McKinley gives a non-musician pastor's perspective on a guerilla-style gathering of content for worship.
Jon Las reflects on this past Sunday's service, and says that if he never heard God's call, he'd be wandering down some pointless road to nowhere... forever running, but losing the race.
Kim Jones at about.com lists her top ten personal favorite Chris Tomlin songs.
FaithByHearing posts a link to Sovereign Grace's collection of 20 worship conference messages from Bob Kauflin, Mark Altrogge, Bruce Ware, and more. I haven't listened to any of them... yet.
4whatitsworth posts an excerpt on worship from John Stott's Between Two Worlds.
Laura Lee talks about "life-changing, Jesus-centered worship" from a woman's perspective.
Jim Wilkerson, pastor of "a small PCA church," has an impassioned, and scripture-filled post about when we worship.
Why and when does your church worship? Have you thought about it as much as Jim has?
Pat Ward gives his perspective on sticking to "the theological basis and purpose of singing in the life of a church."
Maplestar uses a Yogi Berra quote about baseball to meditate on how people carry their faith.
Wesley Duncan wants your feedback on a facility that he's designing to "transform [the Araphaho UMC] fellowship hall into an intimate worship experience."
RedemptiveTobacco (hey... I don't name these blogs) posts about making our service our act of worship.
Jeremy asks "What is your worship love language?" based on Gary Chapman's work.
Probably not the first time that this question has been asked. Do you agree with his assessment?
Joel Young has a series of four posts about what he's learned now that he's leaving the worship leading ministry:
Mike Cosper reprints his sermon notes from Romans, Psalms, Isaiah and Job describing the suffering and sovereignty of God.
Ordinary Missionary talks about an epiphany during a family worship service. I love to read posts about the "collateral testimony" that happens during worship!
Simeon Nix, Bell Shoals worship leader, dies at 47. This, following the death of their senior pastor would present a challenge to any church... I know they covet your prayers.
I love it when I run across posts from people that are searching, reaching, and, to use a particularly Baptist word, "lost" when it comes to church or worship. I don't know anything about Patrick, but I imagine his story isn't uncommon. These posts serve as a reminder to me to persevere and pray.
Follow that thought with this excerpt about worship music from the perspective of a non-Christian at CaffEcclesiology.
Continuing the ongoing discussion about "what is worship," David Brush distinguishes it from "the worship service."
Their church is changing facilities, and this activity oftentimes gives the leadership of a church the opportunity to pause and evaluate. Our prayers go out to them as they discover what's next in their service to the Kingdom.
This press release talks about the Uniting Church's efforts to redistribute a large church service to a smaller, rural church.
Scott Hill gives a scripturally based breakdown of what a "worship leader" does.
New Hope Methodist Church ministers to the car-bound. "No singing" says the story.
Chris gives his first impression of the 2008 Baptist Hymnal.
Actually, that's pretty good even if you're not five.
Jon has a well-formed post about worshiping God in the context of His Holiness, backed with tons of scripture.
Mark Andrew Pope talks about talking about worship, and why it's not the same as worshiping.
It is a bit like describing to someone what it is like to run. You can describe the motions, the length of the stride, how the shoes feel on your feet, how your legs feel after a half a mile. You can describe that there is running fast or slow - running up hill or down - on sand or concrete - running on a track, through your neighborhood or on a beach. But, unless someone actually runs some distance in each of these situations, it is really difficult to really get the feel for each method/means of running.
This newspaper article from Rev. Creede Hinshaw recounts his attending two very different worship services on his vacation. Note: Donnie and Marie are involved.
We've passed a milestone with the Worship Project. If you've been looking at our websites or reading our brochures, you know that we drew a line in the sand on a certain date: 08.08.08. Our goal was to have the pew edition hymnal ready by that day. Well, we beat that day by a bit.
Here in Nashville last Friday, we celebrated and dedicated the Worship Project at the Schermerhorn Symphony Center with one of our PraiSing '08 events. Keith and Kristyn Getty were there along with Buryl Red, Travis Cottrell, Camp Kirkland and the Nashville Praise Symphony, and the Tennessee Baptist Men's Chorale.
This, of course, begs the question... what's next? We heard all about 08.08.08, now where's the rest?
The good news is: soon. Here are some dates to look for:
An exhaustive post from Chris A takes an exegetical view of worship.
"Incarnate" comments on some excerpts from Marva Dawn's book .
"If television is causing people to be dissatisfied with the worship of our churches, should we change worship to be more like television - or should the splendor of our worship cause people to ask better questions about television" (pg. 73)?
Dan from Oceanside United Reformed Church is concerned about the "spectator element" in many worship services.
This most often takes place during special music (soloists and choirs), but some churches include drama, interpretive dance, handbells, finger painting, puppet shows, hop-scotch, etc.
I think I go to a non-hop-scotching church, myself... but good points to be considered nonetheless!
April gets the opportunity to go from church to church because her husband is a full-time freelance musician.
I hear the churches that have it all together, production, lights, media, music but no heart. No passion.I hear churches that are singing the songs they sing every 3rd Sunday of the month because Mary Joe likes it because it reminds her of her dog Spot that died when she was 4 years old.
I hear churches that sing to God with all of their heart because the worship leader listens to God who leads him to lead the church in passionate, God led worship.
Where does your church fall?
If you've ever been to a LifeWay Worship Leadership Conference at Ridgecrest or Glorieta, you know that we try to cover all the bases: choir, praise team, worship, children, students, tech, and more. One of the responses that we hear from time to time is "this was great, but I want to go more in-depth."
Our friends at Yamaha, who have been long time supporters of "music week," have connected with Shure and Martin Professsional to create a new conference called the Worship Arts Technology Summit or "WATS" for short. This national event is the "next level" of training for two groups of leaders in your church. As you would expect, there are going to be in-depth sessions for technical people: sound, light and media. However, they're also offering something you might not expect: the same kind of things for guitarists, vocalists, and even musicians who'd like to arrange for praise band.
When I sat down with Mike Overlin, Yamaha's worship resources manager, he shared with me his heart about this conference. Even though they'll be using Shure, Yamaha and Martin products at the conference, this isn't a hard sell event. You're not going to feel like you're at a timeshare presentation. Even if you use products from other manufacturers at your church, you're going to learn a lot. What this conference is focused on is training and equipping the worship community. To me, that's one of the things that LifeWay is called to do to, and we don't have our own tech conference, so that's why I wanted to make our blog readers aware of the it.
The event is being held at the Maranatha Conference Center in Muskegon, Michigan, September 14-18... not a bad place to go in the middle of the summer, and will be at two more locations in 2009. More details at worshipartstechnologysummit.com.
Several of Dan Wilt's students have great posts on worship. RanchGirl reflects on being a living sacrifice.
King and Kong talks about the flow of worship, referencing the work of the late Robert Webber.