Music for Sunday, July 24 - Here Am I, send Me

THE go to passage for how to order a worship service is often Isaiah 6. In case it has been a while since you have read that passage, here it is for you.

Isaiah 6:1 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 

2 Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. 

3 And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.” 

4 At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke. 

5 “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.” 

6Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. 

7 With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.” 

8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I. Send me!” 

The basic outline many people take from that passage is this:

1. We see God in His greatness, glory, holiness

2. We see our sin (and ourselves as sinners) in the light of His glory

3. We are cleansed from our sin - not by anything we do, but by His work

4. God calls us to go

5. We answer with "Here am I. Send me.

Now.... just so I don't have to do all of the work for you, here is our song list for Sunday morning at Hilldale Baptist Church, Clarksville, TN at the 8:30 and 9:45 services. We won't exactly follow this order, but we cover all of the parts. But that's because the choir has to sing early on in the service. (That is because many in the choir sing both services. After they leave the choir loft some go teach Life Groups while others join the congregation and sing and worship there. Then during the 9:45 service after the choir sings those who taught stay for the service and those who stayed at the last service head out to Life Groups.)

Anyway... here are the songs we are singing Sunday.

How Great Thou Art with How Great Is Our God

Choir anthem - 

Here Am I, Send Me 

I'm going to have the words up so everyone can sing with us. You all have heard it enough that you can sing along. I want everyone to be able to respond with "Here am I. Send me." not just the choir. 

Love Lifted Me

Your Grace Is Enough

Amazing Grace, My Chains Are Gone

Then our Senior Pastor, Dr. Larry D. Robertson, will continue his sermon series on EMS - Evangelism Made Simple. I think a worship service modeled to some degree after Isaiah 6 fits in well with evangelism. Did you connect the songs with the outline in Isaiah? 

The invitation song will be "Take My Life, Lead Me Lord." The words to that are

Take my life, lead, me Lord.

Take my life, lead, me Lord.

Make my life useful to Thee.

It is my prayer that all of us will have that response after hearing God's word this Sunday.

I hope to see you all there. I'll be glad when you all stop traveling for the summer and we're all here together for worship.

A Neglected Blog's Restart

I have not consistently posted on my "Worship Blog" for a VERY long time.  
I used to blog every week. One year I blogged EVERY day for 150 days as I challenged people to read a Psalm a day with me and I posted my feeble thoughts about each day's Psalm.

I'm not sure why I stopped blogging. Probably Facebook. I felt like I was reaching a lot more people on Facebook. It's easy to post there and I don't necessarily need to have any deep thoughts on Facebook. I can just post a picture of my chickens and go with that. Like this one that explains why I named this pretty chicken Elizabeth the First. (If you haven't seen this then you probably don't know that it ends up that Elizabeth is a rooster! I just call him Izzy for short.)

And then along came Twitter (or at least I decided to give it try.) It's ended up that I mostly tweet or retweet about political things. So it's kind of annoying there. (OK. It's actually VERY annoying there when it comes to politics.)

I also tweet pictures of #Portugal so people there will discover my photographers blog http://vistadoporto.blogspot.com/ where not only will you see beautiful pictures of Portugal, 

but you'll see links that share the Gospel in Portuguese! Like this one http://pazcomdeus.net/

However, the original purpose of this blog was two-fold.

1. To share upcoming worship events with the community (and related rehearsals and info with our church musicians.)

and

2. To talk about worship with anyone interested and to help prepare the worshippers at Hilldale for our Sunday morning gatherings. 

A verse that  is extremely important when discussing "worship" in the church is 1 Corinthians 14:15.

I Corinthians 14:15 What then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will also pray with my understanding. I will sing with the spirit, and I will also sing with my understanding.

The Apostle Paul was comparing speaking in tongues with speaking prophecy in a language everyone could understand. I don't think it is out of line to expand this to say we can worship better if there is some understanding of why we are singing a particular set of songs or reading a particular verse or why we are doing one thing or another in worship. 

A few years ago (and for several years) I would post - just about every week and usually on Thursday - what we were planning on singing in worship on the upcoming Sunday. My thought was that those who read ahead would come with some understanding of why those particular songs were chosen and therefore would be singing with "understanding." Not that they would think I was clever in my choice of songs. I hope what I lead us to do is never "clever." I want us as a congregation to have a purpose in our gathering - to do more than just sing some songs and hear a sermon and then go our merry way as if nothing had happened. 

When we gather we need to truly worship God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We need to hear His voice. We need to see our sin and His incredible grace. We need to be challenged to answer His call on our life and then actually choose to follow - to live our lives as a royal priesthood.

1 Peter 2:9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His possession, so that you may proclaim the praises of the One who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.

Well.....I don't claim to be an expert theologian or the most eloquent writer, but I hope my posts will point you to Jesus, give you an idea of what's happening around Hilldale, let you see a little of my thoughts and heart and possibly give you a little bit on entertainment now and then.

So..... ALL of that to say I'm going to start blogging again. Hope to see you around here. Feedback is welcomed (but I have to approve comments. Too much SPAM is out there in blogger land.)

Links to Posts about Saints

Today, November 1, is All Saints Day. It is every year. So I searched through my blog posts for "Saints" and found several posts over the years about "saints."

I've re-posted this one several times.
Today Is Your Day

At the end of that post I mentioned the special "Saints hand signal" that I figured we all need to learn.
Here's what I found out about the special "Saints hand signal."  Saints Update

I also ran across one of my favorite posts about Family Television (I mentioned "saints" in that post.)

It is one of my favorite posts because it's actually about worship, not TV. If you only read one of these posts I hope it will be this one. Family Television

My first thought of how to end this post was to say, "Have a blessed day as one of God's saints." But instead I think I should turn it around.

Go be a blessing to someone today because you are one of God's satins.

TOGETHER - Music for November 7th

Many people use the old excuse "I can worship God wherever I am" as an explanation of why they only come to church a few times a year. "I can worship God out on the golf course when I see how beautiful all of nature is." Well, yes, you can. But do you?

But besides that, there is great value in worshipping TOGETHER.

Others have started worshipping "on line." There are many churches that live stream their services (ours included) and some have gone so far as to actually set up their church where everyone just meets on line and chats and listens to a sermon. If you can't get out of your house because you are recovering from major surgery this is a great option, but there is great value in worshiping TOGETHER.

The same can be said for those who watch services on TV. It's a great option for those who can't get out and a good supplement if you want to hear more preaching and sing some more, but (again) there is great value in worshipping TOGETHER.

Together we join our voices in a great chorus of believers as we sing to God and about God and encourage each other with our singing. Together we show the world that in Christ people from all walks of life and all ethnic backgrounds are brothers and sisters. Together we share our joys and sorrows, we pray and care for each other, we model for our children how true followers of Jesus Christ live their lives, we live out Philippians 2:4 where we consider others as more important than ourselves...

Are you seeing the picture of how TOGETHER is important and better than by yourself?

Hebrews 10:24-25 And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.

Haha! Did you notice that? There were people out golfing during worship back when Hebrews was written!

One of the things that I think is very important in the church in our worshipping TOGETHER is singing songs that different people like. It's important for the teenagers to sing songs that grandma likes because they are considering her as more important than themselves. It's important for those who have been singing great hymns for 60 years to sing new things that the younger people like because then they are encouraging them. It's part of being a family and being TOGETHER.

One of the ways I like to do this is by pairing a great hymn with a new song.

One of the best pairings of old and new songs is singing "How Great Is Our God" and "How Great Thou Art" together. First of all, they are in the same key. That's makes it easy to go from one to the other. Second, they have texts that compliment each other. One directs our singing to each other encouraging each other to sing "How great is our God" while the other turns our praise directly to Him, "How great Thou art!"

Join us Sunday morning as we worship our great God TOGETHER.

The Dangerous Act of Worship

I've just begun reading a book titled "The Dangerous Act of Worship" which was recommended by Dr. Paul Clark, Worship Specialist, Tennessee Baptist Convention. I'm sure I'll end up blogging about some of the things I'll be reading.

Here's a great paragraph from the introduction.

"Nobody went up to Moses after the thunder, lightning and loud trumpet blast at the foot of Mount Sinai and said, "How come we're using trumpets now? What happened to Miriam and that tambourine song we used to sing crossing the Red Sea? I liked that song - it was peppy. This thunder and trumpet stuff is too heavy."
       John Ortberg in the introduction to Mark Labberton's book "The Dangerous Act of Worship." IVP books (I found it on Amazon and got it the day after I ordered it.)

Should be some great stuff in here. (Oh, by the way. This book is going in a different direction than you may think it is. Check back. Or get a copy yourself.)

Come, Just As You Are to Worship

"Come, now is the time to worship.

Come, now is the time to give your heart.

Come, just as you are to worship.

Come, just as you are before your God.

Come."

Some people interpret this to mean that you can show up for worship in your shorts and flip flops - you know, just as you are when you were out mowing the lawn.

This is bad theology. Our great, holy God deserves and requires our best in worship. If you look at the Old Testament worship the singers were paid like the priests were so they could devote themselves to worship and preparing to lead in worship. They washed themselves and put on clean clothes before they entered the temple to show that they were coming before God with pure and clean hearts.

What "come as you are" means is that you don't have to be sinless and "good enough" to come to God. He takes us as we are then makes us "new creations." 2 Corinthians 5:17 NIV

Many people use the excuse "I can't come to church, you don't know what all I have done" or "I'm not good enough." This is exactly what this song is speaking about. Don't use not being ready or good or smart or holy or whatever as an excuse. Come as you are to worship. God is the one who will change you and make you into the person you need to be.

What this doesn't mean is that you show up to Sunday morning worship with a cup of coffee and the morning paper in your bathrobe and house shoes. The God of the universe, the great I AM deserves better from you.

Does this mean you need to show up in a three piece suit and a $100 silk tie every week? I don't think so. What would you wear to see the President of the United States? You might be a little more casual if he were a personal friend, but you still wouldn't present yourself at the White House in ratty jeans and a holey t-shirt. The attitude of the heart is what is important, but the attitude of the heart is often reflected in outward appearance. Only you and God can judge your heart, but our casual, try to be sloppier than your neighbor culture shouldn't carry over into sloppy flipant attitudes in worship.

I'm not going to tell you how you should present yourself before God when you come to Him in a corporate worship service. I think if you are honest with yourself and with God you'll know. Obviously there is considerable more that could be - and perhaps should be said about this, but I like to get my readers started thinking and let them sort through things themselves. I'd be interested in your comments.

My original thought for this post was to list Sunday's order of worship for you. So, here it is.

September 27, 2009 AM

Come, Now Is the Time to Worship
Crown Him with Many Crowns

Fellowship song – Your Grace Is Enough

Choir – My Offering

Great Is Thy Faithfulness
Made Me Glad

Special Music – Shannon Jones

Message – Dr. Larry D. Robertson

Invitation – Change My Heart, O God

Baptism – (9:45)

Closing & Announcements – Bro. Tony Lewis

Comments from Yesterday's Post

Before you read today's post you need to look at yesterday's.

http://hilldaleworship.blogspot.com/2009/09/how-to-have-fantastic-worship-every.html

I have received a couple of e-mails in regard to yesterday's post. Since they didn't leave a comment with their name I'm going to remove their names from here, but I wanted you to see what they had to say and encourage you to add your own comments either to this post or yesterday's.

"For me worship is a love song filled with joy and thankfulness, sung to my God, my Savior, my King! "

"Your blog yesterday was so encouraging. My Sunday school class got into a discussion about worship. Everything you mentioned that was not about worship they said. Some stated that southern gospel music was real worship; others blamed the imperfections of people that caused them not to worship, etc…. NO ONE mentioned loving, adoring, thanking, and praising God. I was so saddened.

The best way I can describe worship, since I am a visual person, is to picture myself in a sanctuary where everything is dark and a spotlight from Heaven is shining down on me. You do not see anyone around you, just you and God, and you spend time with Him. That is the main focus of worship, Jesus. Maybe we need to hear the words again from the song, “The Heart of Worship”, “I’m coming back to the heart of worship and it’s all about you, it’s all about you Jesus. I’m sorry Lord for the thing I've made it, it’s all about you, it’s all about you Jesus”."

Your turn. Has this discussion got you thinking about worship?

How to Have Fantastic Worship Every Sunday

I work with a lot of wonderful musicians. Some weeks the music is really good. Some weeks the music is really great! Some weeks are better at one service than the other.

However... it's possible to have fantastic worship EVERY Sunday. Here are just a few ideas for you to help you make your time of worship - at Hilldale or wherever - a great time with God.

1. Remember that you are at church for God. It's not really all about you (don't mean to hurt your feelings). If your focus is on Him and not on hoping to hear your favorite song then true worship can happen.

2. Don't rely on the worship pastor or the band or the choir to get you all revved up or feeling good. Feelings are great, but in reality, worship is telling God how great He is and how much you love Him.

3. Worship with your mind as well as your heart. So many of the songs we sing have really terrific texts. We sometimes sing songs so many times that we just sing along and don't even think about the words. But the words are really the point. They tell of God's greatness, they encourage us, they teach us, they inspire us...

4. Come to worship expecting it to be wonderful. In most things in life you get out of them what you bring to them.

5. Pray before you come. (don't make me tell you everything. figure this part out yourself)

6. Worship during the week. It's good practice and your heart will be more in tune with God.

7. Some thinking about others more than yourself. (Ooops. There we go again with the "it's not all about you part.") Be happy to sing some old song knowing it speaks to the hearts of so many others. Be happy to sing that new song you don't know because it speaks to the hearts of so many others. (Get the idea?)

Well.... there are probably more, but these are the first things that popped into my head. Why don't you leave a comment with YOUR ideas of how to have worship be wonderful every week. I would love to hear from you.

Family Television Repost

I first posted this in March of 2008. I wanted to give you the opportunity to see it again - in case you missed it.

Family Television


I’m happy to report that I have now seen an episode of “Hannah Montana.” My granddaughter loves the Disney channel. After a week in Oklahoma I’ve actually seen many new things on TV.

We watched some show with Alton the cook on the food channel where he was in Minnesota eating nasty things like rotten fish head jelly. My son loves to watch the food network.



My daughter-in-law likes to watch Diane Sawyer on “Good Morning America”, but she likes to see it around 10:00, so it’s on the TiVO schedule.
Now and then they watched Fox News with me. But most of the time we watched Gibson bowl and play tennis on Wii.

It was nice, in this day of every room having its own TV, for us to be together as a family. Would I have watched Hannah or Alton or Diane if I had been home by myself? Nope. I guess I could have gone to a different room and watched what I wanted to watch all day long, but then I wouldn’t have been with my son and grandchildren and we wouldn’t have those shared – even if it was TV – experiences together.

Guess where I’m going with this: Sunday morning worship. Our congregation is blessed to have people of all ages worshipping together. How nice it is that when we gather together on a Sunday morning that we sing a great variety of music that speaks to all generations. How nice it is that grandparents, parents and children are singing God’s praises together. They may not sit together (It’s definitely not cool to sit with mom when you are 16.) but they have that same shared experience that helps make a family.
It would be quite sad for grandma to go to one service, mom and dad to another, teenage brother go to another and kid sister to a fourth service. In that situation, where is the common bond, the shared experience, the give and take of loving someone and giving up some of your own wants to meet the needs of another?

The Apostle Pauls' words apply to worship too.
Philippians 2:3-4 NASB
Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves ; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.

Bottom line.
I hope that when I am 70 and my grandchildren are 25, 24, 22, 21, 21 and 19 that we will go to church together. I hope that they will sing “old” songs that I like, like “How Great Is Our God” and that I will want to sing whatever “new” songs are written in 2028 and that we will worship together because we are “family!” I also hope that we’ll still be singing “Holy, Holy, Holy” which was written in 1861. It’s part of our Christian heritage and it connects us with all of the saints who have gone before us (but that is a whole other post).

Who knows, by then we may have rediscovered the grandeur of a pipe organ and how well it expresses the greatness of God and they’ll be replacing guitars and drums…

This Mind in You

Bro. Larry preached from Philippians 2 yesterday. He was preaching about holiness - and did a fine job, I might add.

I like to use some of these same verses to talk about worship in today's churches.
Philippians 2:

1.
If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion,
2.
then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose.
3.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.
4.
Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

What does that have to do with worship?
Too easy. I don't like that song it's too...
fast
slow
old
new
loud
soft
boring
crazy

That song just doesn't do anything for me.
I just can't worship when we sing that song.

If we follow Paul's admonition to look out for the interests of others and not just for ourselves and focus on being united with Christ and fellowshipping with His Spirit then we'll say things like.

I sing this old song because it is our Sr. adults' favorite and I care about their worship.
I sing this loud upbeat song because the younger people at church really like it.
I focus on Jesus and not on the style of music so that our church is united with Christ.
I like all of our music because it all helps me focus on Jesus.

Preach your own sermon to yourself from here...

Here's another great post (if I say so myself) on worship.
http://hilldaleworship.blogspot.com/2008/03/family-television.html

I had a picture. I can't get it to upload. Sorry.

Great Minds Think Alike

or so they say.

Yesterday morning on the way to church I was thinking about many things I would like to say on my worship blog about worship. I was working up a pretty good train of thought and then I realized I was writing a book in my head and I would need to figure out how to write in short paragraphs so it would be easy to read (and would keep the attention of some of our readers - no names mentioned)

and then - how 'bout that - Bro. Larry preached a fantastic sermon on worship and then Sunday night he preached another great sermon on worship!

Later in the week the sermon will be up on our church webg site. www.hilldale.org I encourage you to watch it if you missed it. Or watch it again if you need to hear it again.

Worship to the Ends of the Earth

Below is a great article on worship I read on LifeWay's home page today. I encourage you to click the "more" link and read the entire article.

Worship to the Ends of the Earth
Written by Kenneth Hemphill

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)--What comes to mind when you think about worship? Do you think about something that occurs on Sunday morning, or do you think about the total context of your life? Do you “hear” worship in terms of Southern Gospel melodies, contemporary choruses, or a multiplicity of tongues with strange melodies?

Worship has, in some quarters, become an issue of controversy related to various styles of music. These debates about worship styles are simply another symptom of our spiritual myopia, which evaluates most church events or experiences in terms of what pleases or appeals to us. Worship is not about us! We are not the audience. God is both object and audience, and we are those who participate in worship through the offering of ourselves to the King.
MORE...

Family Television

I’m happy to report that I have now seen an episode of “Hannah Montana.” My granddaughter loves the Disney channel. After a week in Oklahoma I’ve actually seen many new things on TV.

We watched some show with Alton the cook on the food channel where he was in Minnesota eating nasty things like rotten fish head jelly. My son loves to watch the food network.

My daughter-in-law likes to watch “Good Morning America”, but she likes to see it around 10:00, so it’s on the TiVO schedule. Now and then they watched Fox News with me. But most of the time we watched Gibson bowl and play tennis on Wii.

It was nice, in this day of every room having its own TV, for us to be together as a family. Would I have watched Hannah or Alton or Diane if I had been home by myself? Nope. I guess I could have gone to a different room and watched what I wanted to watch all day long, but then I wouldn’t have been with my son and grandchildren and we wouldn’t have those shared – even if it was TV – experiences together.

Guess where I’m going with this: Sunday morning worship. Our congregation is blessed to have people of all ages worshipping together. How nice it is that when we gather together on a Sunday morning that we sing a great variety of music that speaks to all generations. How nice it is that grandparents, parents and children are singing God’s praises together. They may not sit together (It’s definitely not cool to sit with mom when you are 16.) but they have that same shared experience that helps make a family. It would be quite sad for grandma to go to one service, mom and dad to another, teenage brother go to another and kid sister to a fourth service. In that situation, where is the common bond, the shared experience, the give and take of loving someone and giving up some of your own wants to meet the needs of another?

Oooo, he’s gone to preachin’. Land the plane! (If you missed yesterday’s sermon I’ll explain that one to you.)

Bottom line. I hope that when I am 70 and my grandchildren are 25, 24, 22, 21, 21 and 19 that we will go to church together. I hope that they will sing “old” songs that I like, like “How Great Is Our God” and that I will want to sing whatever “new” songs are written in 2028 and that we will worship together because we are “family!” I also hope that we’ll still be singing “Holy, Holy, Holy” which was written in 1861. It’s part of our Christian heritage and it connects us with all of the saints who have gone before us (but that is a whole other post).

Who knows, by then we may have rediscovered the grandeur of a pipe organ and how well it expresses the greatness of God and they’ll be replacing guitars and drums…

A Good Day

It's day 18 on our countdown. We had a few technical difficulties, but those kinds of things happen. Some of those issues will be more easily avoided when we get our new in-ear hear system for the band and praise teams. But worship isn't - or shouldn't be - determined by whether or not the sound is perfect or whether the Worship Pastor picked your favorite songs, or whether the sermon was what you wanted to hear. True worship happens when you spend time in God's presence, hearing from Him, telling Him of your love... The music, the sermon, the prayers, fellowshipping with friends and family - these all help provide an atmosphere for worship, but worship happens in our hearts and minds as we worship "in spirit and in truth."

The Holman Christian Standard Bible
John 4:23-24 "But an hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. Yes, the Father wants such people to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." Read This Chapter

Be looking for a note in the mail with a detailed rehearsal schedule. We will need to have some extra rehearsals. I'll spread them out on different days so in case you can't come to one perhaps you can come to another. AND THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT SNOW AGAIN THIS WEDNESDAY!!! AAaaaaarrrgh!

I found this picture titled "Why People Move South".

I'll be looking for everyone in choir Wednesday night!

A Ride to Tulsa and Singing in Heaven

As most of you know, we left Whites Creek this morning for Tulsa - my son driving his van with his wife, three children and me (Papa) while Grani (Cheryl) drove her car with Christy and her two babies. I got to ride in the back. Wow! Riding down I-40 at 200 miles an hour is a whole different experience form the back! Twelve and a half hours later we arrived. Try keeping five children cooped up in a car for twelve hours then let them loose in great-grandma's house and watch the fun! Wheeee!!


Gibson, my oldest grandson (five) knew Grandmama and wanted to know how she died. One of the relatives - who will remain nameless to protect her bad theology - said, "Jesus came and got her." Gibson lit up and was very excited. "Did you get a picture?"


Wouldn't that be cool? We didn't get a picture, but we know Grandmama is with Jesus. I'll leave the preaching for the preachers, but I know once you're in heaven it's all music and dancing 'round the throne. Grandmama is there now singing the song of the redeemed, "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain."

We actually get to have a head start on what is taking place in heaven as we gather together every Sunday morning! I'll be looking for you all as we worship together this Sunday.

What Station Are You On?

I heard an interesting conversation this morning. Someone said, "Do you listen to the oldies station?" "I used to, but the one I liked went off the air", was the reply. Well, that started a whole series of radio comments. "I listen to WXYZ. It's the best." "Oh, I never listen to that one. The best one is 82.7!" "I used to listen to oldies but they changed it to something else." "Southern gospel saxophone is the only thing I ever listen to." "You should try that new station out of, where was that? anyway, they play the most relaxing music. It's wonderful."

And on they went. (OK, I'll admit I made up some of that.) But the interesting thing was that out of the 5 people listening to the radio this morning there were 7 opinions of which station played the best music.

After hearing everyone's views on music I was really glad to be the Worship Pastor of a church that likes all kinds of music. And what makes it work so nicely is that everyone at Hilldale is happy to sing all the different styles. It's part of living out Phillipians 2:3 "Do nothing out of rivalry or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves."

As we willingly sing music that isn't particularly our favorite style, just because we know it touches the heart of others, we are considering them more important. As someone else sings music that you like they are treating you as more important.

Pretty cool, huh? How we can model the Christian life for each other and to the world as we gather together and worship. What station are you on? I hope you are the station where you can worship God with us each Sunday as we gather together. I'll be looking for you this Sunday! (If you are in choir I'll be looking for you Wednesday!)

The King and I

Rogers and Hammerstein created many wonderful Broadway musicals. Since I was born and raised in Oklahoma, "Oklahoma" is my favorite. but another of my favorites is "The King and I". I remember whistling "Whenever I Feel Afraid" with my children during many a stormy Oklahoma afternoon.

Today, however, I'm singing "Getting to Know You".
"Getting to know you, getting to know all about you.
Getting to like you, getting to hope you like me."

I'm getting to know many of you (I guess that should be "us" now) during VBS! What a great way to start at a new church - jump right in full speed ahead!

There is another King that I want you to know about. And I know you probably do know Him or you wouldn't be reading this blog right now. I want you to know that it is my heart for all of us through our worship ministry to honor and glorify and worship the King of kings, our Lord Jesus Christ. As we work together to prepare and lead our weekly times of worship, we will get to know each other better and we will know our King better. I'm looking forward to both.

I'll be looking for all the musicians in rehearsals this Saturday night. I'll be looking for a thousand worshippers Sunday morning.

Rejoice!
Bro. Lyndel