Songs for this Sunday

Below are videos from YouTube of the songs we will be singing this coming Sunday. I am really looking forward to this Sunday, because we will be led by three awesome women: Amanda Day, Emily McCoy, and my darling wife Suzanne. The trio led the worship music for the womens' retreat for our church a few weeks ago, and the report was that they did an incredible job. I have the honor of hearing them rehearse at my house, so I have no doubt the report is true. If you go to our church, you'll probably recognize my Suzanne and Amanda, but Emily may be a new face to you. Emily is a pianist/vocalist who is studying jazz at UT, as well as teaching at our music academy.

Here are the songs, in the order we'll sing. The first song, Restoration, the girls introduced at the retreat. They will introduce it to the rest of us Sunday morning. It makes a lot of liturgical sense to follow a confession of sin (which is how we begin our worship) singing "You've taken my pain/ You've called my by a new name/ You've taken my shame/ and in its place you give me joy". The other songs are familiar.

Restoration (I promise, it won't be this long!)


Made Me Glad (With Spanish subtitles!)


Our Great God


Revelation Song




I have to say, I am probably most excited to hear Suzanne - my beloved - sing O the Deep, Deep Love.


Thanks girls for agreeing to do this! God bless you.

At the Foot of the Cross

Here's a song we are singing in the morning during communion.

more about "At the Foot of the Cross", posted with vodpod

For information about the songs we sing, there is a weekly post on the worship section of our church website.

Faith, Doubt, + Unbelief

Since my senior year in college it has become an almost annual event to have a bout with doubt. When sharing my intellectual struggles with my pastor, he has often said what Os Guinness has said (quoted here from C.J. Mahaney's blog): "Doubt is not the same as unbelief".

Guinness goes on to say:

...faith is much more than the absence of doubt, but to understand doubt is to have a key to a quiet heart and a quiet mind.

The world of Christian faith is not a fairy-tale, make-believe world, question-free and problem-proof, but a world where doubt is never far from faith's shoulder.

...if ours is an examined faith, we should be unafraid to doubt. If doubt is eventually justified, we were believing what clearly was not worth believing. But if doubt is answered, our faith has grown stronger still. It knows God more certainly and it can enjoy God more deeply.

These are comforting words from Guinness. But these are extra sweet to me:

...since the object of Christian faith is God, to believe or disbelieve is everything. Thus the market value of doubt for the Christian is extremely high. Find out how seriously a believer takes his doubts and you have the index of how seriously he takes his faith.

You can read about Os and his thoughts on doubt at C.J. Mahaney's blog.

You can hear sermons by my pastor, John Wood, from our website.

Five More In 5/4 : NPR Music

On my homepage I have RSS feeds from blogs mostly, but I also have some other stuff. One is NPR's "Discover Songs", where I found a cool post called Five More In 5/4. Check out the link. It plays songs in 5/4 that challenge your western pop musical mindset.

My favorite is "River Man" by Nick Drake. I've been hearing a lot about Drake the last year or so. I plan to begin listening more intently to him in the future. He was a talented singer/songwriter who died at 26.

the most annoying instrument ever created

If you want to really annoy your co-workers, turn up the volume on your computer and play this
xylophone.

What I am listening to today

Go HERE to listen to Kathryn Scott, or to her MySpace page: www.myspace.com/kathrynscottmusic

I plan to teach "Thank You For The Cross" to our fellowship, but all of the songs are worth listening to. Just the title to one of her songs - "Grace Has Called My Name" - is worth meditating on. Rich, biblical texts with complementary music makes "I Belong" an excellent album.

Be careful little ears what you hear

Following up on a previous post regarding what to sing and not sing in worship, I thought this quote from John Chisum relevant:

We as worship leaders are the primary gatekeepers to the heart, art, and doctrine that our congregations receive. I've heard it said that the church receives the vast majority of its doctrine through its song. The odds are that your people won't exit the building this coming Sunday humming your pastor's three points, poem, and prayer. What they will be humming is the last thing you sang together. Will it be something that leads them in their worship, facilitates more faith, and ingrains the gospel in their hearts?

Converting to Catholicism

The folks at CatholicVote.com have put together a very convicting and compelling video called "Vote Your Conscience". (The film is actually the handiwork of Grassroots Films.) Except for the ending, which is too popish for my tastes (and which I think has very little to do with voting), the video shows me how much I stand in solidarity with the Catholic conscience.


HT: First Things Journal

Songs We Don't Sing in Church

Part of my job as the Director of Music Ministries is planning worship music from week to week. The inversion of that duty is to decide what we do not sing.

As the list of songs we sing grows, so does the list of songs we don't.

I thought I'd open it up for discussion. If you attend Cedar Springs, you are welcome to weigh in about what you wish we did sing (or stopped singing). If you don't worship here, please join the conversation and share what song or songs you have a problem with.

Rule of the game: Be gracious in your speech (Col 4.6; 1 Tim 4.12)