Ever have one of those days where you are just tired?  You are tired and you can’t tell if that’s the reason that others seem less”with it” or if they are tired too?

sʎɐp ǝsoɥʇ ɟo ǝuo sɐʍ ʎɐpoʇ

We intro-ed Happy Day today for the first time and while I thoroughly enjoyed singing it (and really, who can’t?) I felt like it just kinda “was”

Some people seemed to really like it (yay!) and others… well… it just “was”  and I’m not sure if it was just me being tired, or if they just didn’t really dig the song.

oh well.  We’ll give it another try next week, right?

So, the list for this morning was as follows:

• Happy Day [G] (Kim Walker version)
• Trading My Sorrows [G]
• The Solid Rock [D] (David Crowder version)
• Majesty (Here I Am) [Am] (Martin Anderson)
• kids message – Jesus did a yucky job to model being a servant
• Everyday [G]
• announcements
• message – Love ACTually
• Happy Day [G] (slightly shorter version)

We kept the other songs more well known since we were teaching a new one, but I’m just not sure how it went over.  Some people said that they really, really enjoyed it, some were singing along right away, and others were just standing there.  Just. Standing. There.

How?

How can you just stand there during that song?  It has more energy than any other song I know!  I mean I was feeling exhausted and I could barely keep from dancing.

High point:
- I actually worshiped this morning.  No thoughts about how everything sounded, no worries about blending, etc.  I was able to move far past that (other than feeling like the 1st song flopped).

Low point:
- feeling like Happy Day flopped.

I have to say though, that the look of pure joy that was on our pastors wife’s face during worship was WONDERFUL to see.  I love it when she sits where I can see her.

So, how was YOUR Sunday?

**part of Fred’s Sunday Setlist bloggy carnival.  Go check out what churches all over the world are doing each Sunday!**

Yeah, I may try to get in a nap, or just go to bed early.  Who knows.

Wow!  Today was our last day in the Little White Church for the Summer, and we were running with a skeleton crew for the worship team.  Lots of people were out of town or home sick so it was nearly a skeleton crew in the pews too, but we still had the privilege of gathering together to worship God.

Summer scheduling is often difficult, and the past 2 weeks have been ne exception!  We had a piano, acoustic & drums last weekend, and acoustic & drums this weekend… and no male singers at all for either.  Very girlie lately (which ain’t all bad… but is different).

Anywho, here is the list:

• Lord, Light The Fire Again [E]
• Desert Song [D]
• You Gave Your Life Away [E]
• Take My Life [D] (Tomlin/Nockles version)
• kids message on Trust
• Everything To God [D]
• announcements
• Lest I Forget [B] (Rebecca St. James)
• Communion
• Message
• Blessed Be Your Name [G]

Yep, it was a bit more subdued than normal, but that is to be expected when it’s acoustic led (and not rhythmic acoustic).  Taya had a bit of feedback off and on, but it seemed to work itself out by the 2nd song.  She was using a different amp than normal, since we cleaned out as much as possible last week so we’d have room to pack up everything this week.

High Point:
~ Lest I Forget was cool – we haven’t done it in months (unfortunately) and it was nice to do it with just the acoustic & djembe.  They gave it a very different feel.  Finishing up Jim’s sermon with Blessed Be Your Name was pretty amazing too though.  He shared some of the things that God has brought he & his wife through – especially in the last 14 months of looking for a new job.  It’s always amazing to see someone peacefully and joyfully going through something that would make most of us panic!

Low Point:
~ Everything To God.  Wow, it was sssssssllllllllloooooooooooooooooooooooooowwwwwww today.  Still a great song, still went well with the message, but needed to be sped up at least double!  Oh well.  That tempo gave the kids time to get all of the motions in!

So, how was YOUR weekend?

*this is part of Fred’s Sunday Setlist bloggy carnival – head over to check out what worship leaders and congregants all over the world did at church this week!*

Part of Fred’s Sunday Setlist Blog Carnival – see what is happening at churches all over!

Wow, that was a great service!  It was so nice to just worship our heavenly Father and not have to worry about keeping to a time constraint or melding with a message.  There were a couple of new faces and a lot of usual faces missing, but I hope that those that made it were blessed – I know I was.

This was our last evening communion service until the end of Sept (we will still take communion every other week on Sunday mornings) and I for one will miss them.  But with the crazy Summer schedules we decided to take a break.

The list…

• Cry Out To Jesus [C]
• How Marvelous (I Stand Amazed) [C] Tomlin
• Communion devotional
• Take Me In [Em] similar to Kutless
• Jesus Blood [G] Martin Smith
• Majesty (Here I Am) [Em] Martin Smith
• How Deep The Father’s Love [E]
• Guided Prayer
• Grace Flows Down [C]
• Revelation Song [C] Jennie Lee Riddle

Cry Out To Jesus was a request that has been waiting for the perfect time, and Art nailed it.  It was wonderful!  It is a song that just needs to be led buy a guy, and I happily stepped back and let him take it away.  The ladies & I added our voices in on the chorus but let him solo the verses, which worked out really well.  It was very well received too (which is always a good thing!)

We did Take Me In, Jesus Blood and Majesty as a medley with Phil. 4:4-7 read between Jesus Blood & Majesty.  It went off without a hitch (which was great!)  I like to put More Love, More Power in between Take Me In & Jesus Blood too, but we didn’t do that tonight.

At rehearsal I realized that I had Revelation Song & Grace Flows Down backwards… I just couldn’t sing Grace Flows Down after Rev. Song!  So we swapped them in the moments before we started the service, and I am SO glad we did!  This was our first time leading Revelation Song, and I got sooooooo many comments afterwords.  Almost everyone there expressed interest in doing it again… as soon as Sunday if possible!  Thank you to David and the others that introduced it to me!  This Sunday Setlist carnival has helped me find quite a few wonderful songs that I hadn’t ever heard of before.  Thank you Fred for hosting all of us.

Personally, this service was just what I needed.  A chance to just worship.  To sing songs of praise and worship and adoration and acknowledgment of His sacrifice and pray for an hour was… well, words can’t describe it.  As a worship leader I often feel the pressure to make sure everyone else gets to enter into worship, that everything goes off without a hitch (right, like THAT ever happens!) and to be engaging.  I’m still figuring out the engaging part and the worshiping while being engaging part.  Tonight I decided that I’d forgo the engaging portion and just worship – no one was looking at me anyway, which was really nice!  The few people that were there were fully entering in and we were just there to worship with them.

Thank you team for putting in the time to practice and giving up your Sunday evening – I really, really appreciate it!  I hope that everyone else there was at least half as blessed as I was.  I’m sure that God was.

Um… yeah.

So it’s Memorial Day weekend, and a bright and sunny one at that.  We were a little lower on attendance, but not a huge amount.  Pastor Chris showed a great video (from To End All Wars, I believe) that reminded us the cost of our freedom (wow, it was powerful!) and then tied it in very nicely with his sermon on Grace.  We are still studying King David, so the passage for this week was from 2 Samuel 9 – the story of David & Mephibosheth.

Over all it was a great service!  A little convicting from time to time, but I’ll get to that.

The set:

• Sing Sing Sing [G]
• Desert Song [D]
• God of Wonders [F]
• How Great Is Our God [F]
• kids message
• Every Move I Make [G]
• announcements
• video & prayer
• message
• How Great Is Our God recap

It’s a great set… when your worship leader doesn’t decide to dump a bottle of water on the keyboard and pianist.  Yep.  It was a lesson in self control and learning to not be so sarcastic (and such a smart you-know-what).  Oy.  Fortunately, the keyboard still mostly worked – a few keys didn’t want to play at all, and a few played extra loud.  I may be taking my keyboard down for a few weeks until I can afford to replace it.  Ugh.

It personally tied in with the message quite well though.  Nancy was so gracious about being fully baptized 25 minutes before the service started.  Everyone else was gracious about not getting on me for causing issues with having to clean everything up (and possibly ruining the keyboard) and I got a little lesson on learning to curb myself a bit.

That being said, I was a little off today.  I was feeling bad about Nancy being soaked (through the whole service!) and about the clunky sound coming through the speakers.  I was distracted, but tried to simply worship in the midst of it all.  It always amazes me how He meets us wherever we are, in the midst of what ever circumstances we find ourselves in.  It’s amazing.

I pray that this is a close to watered-down as our worship (or our faith) ever gets!  Oh, and that I stop threatening to throw things at people who smart off at (with) me.

So, have you ever had technical difficulties that you were solely responsible for?  How did you handle it?

As always, this is part of Fred’s Sunday Setlist carnival.

Wow, I can’t believe it’s May already!  It was a busy weekend for us before we ever got to church, so yesterday was spent resting.  Sorry for the delay!

Das liszt…

• Everlasting God
• Desert Song
• AG (My Chains Are Gone)
• Indescribable
• kids message
• Everything To God
• announcements
• message – He Said What?
• I Will Rise
• Communion
• Amazing Grace – verse 1, acapella

Most of the songs on the list are very well known… to make up for the newer ones, of course!  Desert Song kept coming up on these lists a couple of months ago, so I had to check it out.  Yesterday was the first Sunday we led it, and it seemed to be pretty well received.  We don’t quite have the members to pull it off like the recording, so instead we added & subtracted people from time to time to add dynamics.  It was a very fun song to plan out, oh, and to sing too!

We did Everything To God again this week, to give the kids (and adults) another chance to learn it.  Once again we slowed it down a tad to make catching those breaths a little bit easier.  The kids did a better job of keeping up with the motions this week too (perhaps because they had seen them before?)

Art led I Will Rise for communion and it sounded great.  It was just the 2 of us singing this week, so I managed to squeeze in a few harmonies here and there and let him lead most everything.   We sang I WIll Rise for Easter with the choir, so it’s still a pretty new song (for those not in choir) but people seem to like it, and were singing along.

Sorry… I’m still beat from the lack of sleep last week, so I’m not terribly talkative today.  Not even the knowledge that I have tickets in my little hand for Wicked is adding to the excitement today.  I just hope I’m not getting sick…

How was your weekend?

as always, if you want to check out the rest of these, head over to Fred’s blog!

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Part of Fred’s carnival.  See what other worship leaders are doing too @ Fred’s blog.

This morning was fun!  There were lots of people out sick, traveling or enjoying the sun (who knows) but there were also a few new faces.  We started a little more low-key than normal, and I was thrilled to see that many people were lifting their hands and fully entering into worship by the chorus of the first song – yay!

I was going to upload a vlog here, but I can’t get it to load (and I’m tired of messing with it) so you just get a normal blog today.  Sorry!

Da list:

• Reign In Us [F] Starfield
• Lifesong [G] Casting Crowns
• Praise Adonai [Am] Baloche
• Sweetly Broken [F] Riddle
• kids message
• Everything To God [F] Anderson
• announcements
• message – Patience
• Reign In Us [F] – short version

Again, it was so great to see people really entering into worship way early in the first song.  It was the third week we had done Reign In Us, and between us leading it and it starting to be played on the radio, I think people are starting to know it pretty well.  And the bad did is flawlessly   the transitions were perfect!

We followed that up with Lifesong, which we haven’t done in about a year.  When we used to sing it we had an amazing tenor who led it (and he nailed it every single time – it was fabulous!)  Unfortunately, we no longer have Ernie… we have me (NOT a tenor) and Art (an amazing baritone) so we made do.  I was pushing for doing it in A, but everyone else thought the chorus would be too high (boo!) so we dropped it to G (too low on the verses for me) and Art led the verses while I led the chorus. I think it worked out well, but I’d love to hear back from someone else who was there!

Then we moved to Praise Adonai (another one we haven’t done in months) and Warren went to town on the drums.  He was making all kinds of cool sounds back there using his 8″ tom and the plastic ends of his hott sticks.  It was kewl.

Confessional time:  Sweetly Broken is a song I love to hat, or hate to love, or something like that.  I love the chorus, the lyrics are great… I just can’t ever remember how the dumb thing starts!  Oy!  I think it goes back to the first time I tried to lead it (ever) and TOTALLY BOMBED!!!!  No, really.  Complete blank on how it started, how it went, etc.  It was bad.  So, now that memory haunts me every time I lead it.  It brings it’s bad ju-ju with it.  BUT, I love the song, and keep getting requests to lead it, so I guess it’s working out now!

Mrs. J came up after that for the kids message and used dandelions to share about patience.  You can check out that message here, if you’re interested.

This is where we kicked up the morning (it had been pretty laid-back up to this point).  We introduced Everything To God (from New Life Worship) for the kids song.  Oh, and we slowed it down just a little bit.  Made it easier to play and gave opportunity to grab an extra breath here and there.  Oy.  I think it went over pretty well for the first time – especiall as we were teaching everything – including motions.

Pastor Chris taught on patience this morning, as we continued out voyage through the life of King David.  We started out in 1 Samusl 26, following the story of when David was being chased by Saul, and David walked into the sleeping camp and took Saul’s spear and water jug – but not his life.  David had many opportunities to take matters into his own hands, but he chose instead to wait on God’s timing.  That must have been hard, as he was anointed king 15 years before he was crowned (and then it was only over Judah).  It was a great message – if you are interested it will be available for listening later today over here.

We ended the service with the 2nd bridge and chorus of Reign In Us, which fit really well with the message – I just love it when God does that, don’t you?

That was our morning… now onto the evening service.

Once a month we have an evening communion service – a time of worship, prayer and communion as a body.  Those that attend it say that it’s a service that they really enjoy, and that they like the chance to just gather together and spend time with God as a body.  Unfortunately not too many people make it.  Last night there was an equal number of people leading and sitting in the pews (actually, 2 of the men in the pews were helping lead) so I’m somewhat discouraged.  BUT – I have had people thank me for taking the time to lead this service even though it’s not well attended yet because it was something that they really needed.  It’s my favorite service too

The list of music:

• Agnus Dei
• How Marvelous/I Stand Amazed (Tomlin’s version)
• intro to communion
• Lest I Forget (Rebecca St. James)
• Jesus Blood (Martin Smith)
• Once Again
• All I Have
• time of corporate prayer
• Hungry (Kathryn Scott)
• Only You (Andy Park)

Yeah, it was a pretty Vineyard-heavy night, but it worked really well.  I usually try to incorporate a few scripture readings into the bridges of songs, but I only found one for last night (I think I was a little distracted by a kitchen remodel last week or something).  This used to be a candlelight service… but it’s at 6pm, and the sun isn’t going down until around 7:30-8:00 these days, so we skipped all of the candles.  Makes it easier to see the music though!

There isn’t too much to say about this service, except that it was nice to just spend the time in worship of our amazing God.  Much less “Am I doing this right?” stress and just praising God with the benefit of a band to play along.  Oh, and I got to sing a little more harmony which is ALWAYS a good think in my book!

Well, that was our weekend!  I’m heading around to read about some others, but I’d love to hear how yours went too!

What a beautiful Spring day!  The clouds have rolled in a bit, but it’s still 61F outside this afternoon – I’ll take it!

We picked up our series on the King of Hearts this morning after taking a break for Palm Sunday & Easter, and our topic this morning was on friendship – as exemplified by David and Jonathan.  We all want a Jonathan, don’t we?  Someone who is willing to sacrifice everything they have for us… but God is calling us to more that having a Jonathan for a friend – He is calling us to BE a Jonathan to someone.  That, my friends, is much harder to do!

Well, since I wasn’t in the mood to sing Friends, and I don’t know too many other songs that have to do with friendship, we didn’t follow the theme too closely this morning.  Here is the list of what we did sing, however!

• You’re Worthy Of My Praise [E]
• God of Wonders [F]
• Reign In Us [F] (Starfield)
• The Solid Rock [D]
• kids msg.
• Love The Lord  (Lincoln Brewster)
• announcements
• message – Two of A Kind
• When I Survey The Wondrous Cross – CHOIR
• communion

The first two songs kinda call for a male/female lead… and I am so thankful that Art decided to go ahead and come today even though he wasn’t feeling well!  I ended up singing with him for a lot of it and letting the other 3 ladies do the echoes, since his voice was not it normal full-bodied self today.  Something I can relate with entirely too well lately!

God of Wonders posed a small problem during our rehearsal… we sang this a LOT at CCB, but we sang it slightly differently than the team is used to singing it.  Oops!  So there I was hapily singing along from memory and I started in on the alternate chorus as I am used to… and everyone else stopped.  They skip to the “Precious Lord” instead of starting over with “God of Wonders” (which I am used to doing).  Oops!  That also means that the charts I typed were… incorrect.  Oh well.

This was the 2nd week for Reign In Us, and a few more people were singing along (some were even raising their hands – yay!)  We skipped last week for it since it was Easter, so it had been two weeks since we sang it last.  I think we’ll do it next week to, just to help it get in there.  Fiting that chart all on one page (and still have it readable) is a challenge – and our chart has arrows all over it directing you to the next spot!  Eventually it will become second nature, but until then there will still be the pauses as everyone remembers where we are going to next!  We are getting it though.

The version of The Solid Rock that we do is the Passion one, and we stick pretty close to that.  We haven’t done it for a bit, simply because we didn’t have the chart.  It’s a great one though, and people really seemed to be entering in.

Then there’s the kids song…

I’ve seem Lincoln Brewster perform this live, and I LOVED it (even when I was sick of doing it).  Unfortunately, we don’t sound like Lincoln Brewster, and it often turns into the song that never ends – ever.  My sweet husband kept grinning in amusement during it this morning, and I nearly broke down because I know what he was thinking.  I hope it passed off as more of a hiccup that a giggle, but I can’t be too sure.  It’s a great song, and the kids love it… it just goes on and on and on and on…

It was a communion Sunday today, and instead of the band leading a song, we had the choir sing their song from our Good Friday service so that more people could hear it.  Karen requested that Jennifer join her on the solo since she is also fighting off a cold, and it sounded great.  From what I heard today, people were blessed by it.  This is a very different arrangement of it – set to a tune similar to “The Water Is Wide” that starts with a solo, addsin female voices, then adds in men and harmonies for the third verse.  It is gorgeous!

Again, the sermon was on being a friend to those around you.  If you are interested in hearing it, you can head over to FalconRidgeFellowship.com – it’s worth the listen, if only for the childhood stories and the hike.  Yes Chris, I’m making sure that those get heard!  LOL

Well, that was our day, how was yours?

As always, this is part of Fred’s carnival – click here to see what other churches are doing all over the world!

Well, the service wasn’t ON a Sunday, so it can’t be a Sunday Setlist, right?  That’s the logic behind the different title anyway…

So, we had our Good Friday service last night.  We did a candlelight communion service – lots of music, some scripture & a (very) short message.  And it was the most attended communion service we’ve had to date!  yay!

Das Muzik:

• When I Survery The Wondrous Cross
  ~ The choir sang this, and the melody was similar to The Water Is Wide.. Very lovely
• The Love Of God [A]
• Forever (The Nails In Your Hands) [D]
  ~ The Legend of the Three Trees – Kids Story Time
  ~ Communion Intro
  ~John 12:23-36
  ~ John 14:1-21
• You Gave Your Life Away [E]
• How Deep The Father’s Love For Us [D]
• Here Is Love [D]
• Lead Me To The Cross [D]
  ~Message
• I’m Amazed [C]

We found this beautiful arrangement of The Wonderous Cross that starts out with a solo, adds in the women, and adds in parts on the 3rd verse.  I got feedback that there were goosebumps, which is always a good response!

In case you aren’t seeing the trend… we were focusing in on the fact that God loves us enough to sacrifice His Son/die on a cross for US.  When you really stop to think about that, it’s pretty amazing.

Jen R led You Gave Your Life Away (similar to Kathryn Scott’s version) and How Deep The Father’s Love (which meant I got to sing harmony – yay!).  I led Here Is Love and ended up singing a solo for Lead Me To The Cross.  P. Chris ended up alternating between bass and keyboard last night, which was pertty cool. He usually plays lead guitar, but he also plays piano very well.  I have recently decided that Lead Me To The Cross is really a song for the piano…  no, really.  Try it sometime.

We finished up with I’m Amazed, which really sums up what this weekend is all about.

We generally fit the songs together in such a way that the worship team can rotate off the stage throughout those 4 songs and participate in taking communion.  Unfortunately we ran out of some essential items for the service… namely the bread and grape juice!  Not sure how that happened, but I know of at least 10 people who didn’t get to participate (namely the worship team, Eric and a couple of others)  Oops!

The biggest issue I had was simply that more & more I’m finding that I can’t sing all that low anymore.  I’m a soprano, and as such should avoid singing below mid C if I can help it.  No, I really should.  An octave or 2 above mid C are fine, but below needs to be avoided.

I’d love any feedback from those who attended the service – how did it go?

Oh, and this post is part of Fred’s Sunday Setlist carnival.