It happens. No matter how much we practice sometimes we make mistakes. It's not like we are professional musicians. I mean, they write their own songs, they arrange their own songs, they record their own songs, they sing their own songs, and then they go out and tour with the songs, they've written, arranged, and recorded. Mistakes? Probably not. But we continue to play and sing different songs each week. And when a new song is added how much time do we really have to practice it? Maybe two weeks if we are really lucky. We might even be able to practice along with an mp3 of the recording, as long as it's in the same key we want to sing it in. (Ever try singing all of Chris Tomlin's song in the original key?) A recording made with all professional musicians, rehearsed and then mushed through a whole series of recording effects before it is allowed to be released to the public.
However, I am not advocating that we not practice, that we not give the Lord our best; that we not work at improving the talent the Lord has given us. I'm just saying that sometimes mistakes happen. And when they do, we tend to beat ourselves down. Especially when it's a team that works hard at playing the best they can, and then one person makes a mistake. We can really feel down, and pretty bummed out. But it's not about us remember? It's not about our doing a great job that will make the people turn towards God. It's not about how well we played that helps people come closer to the Lord. It's about making room for the Holy Spirit to move and letting Him do the job He was sent to do.
Something like that happened here recently. We played our best, but there was a mistake. "What if that mistake made someone think less of our church and not want to come forward?" Right then and there I couldn't think of the answer to that question. (hey, it happens when you get old.) But one of the other players did have an answer for it right then. We have a time right after the service for people to come down to the front if they want to know more about Mountain, we call it MI5 (Mountain In 5 minutes) and other questions they may have about what we believe. We also have counselors up front for people who want to make a commitment to Christ. So he turned to the person posing the question and said, "Look at all the people who came up to MI5." The Holy Spirit was at work and will always be at work when we are presenting the gospel of Christ; when we are presenting this gospel from our hearts.
Mistakes? God knows, God forgives and anyway did He really even hear them?
John
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Passion week 08
I'll start with the weekend and work backwards.
We just had 8 worship services over 6 different time slots. We started on Saturday and went 3, 5, and 7. Yes, it was just a bit early for Easter, but I think somewhere in the world it was already Easter morning. Then on Sunday we had another 3 services. The two we always have, 9 and 11 and then added another service at 1 PM. At the 9 and 11 we also held services in Cook auditorium like we normally do on Sunday mornings.
We used the theme of The Bridge. I think Willow did that several years ago. We did use the bridge concept, and the drama from Willow, but we changed the other elements and the sermon idea was just a little different.
But even as great as Sunday was, it was the elements and services leading up to Sunday that made this weekend great for me.
On Maunday Thursday we had Jews for Jesus here and were led through a Seder service. It was called Christ in the Passover. Stan Katz led us through the Passover section by section and explained how in each section of the the Passover service Christ can be seen, or the foreshadowing of Christ can be found. I've experienced this before and I still enjoyed it. Actually the next Passover service I'd like to see is what the Passover was like when Jesus had his finally Passover with his disciples. I've only been to one service like that and it was at least 30 years ago. I'd like to see it presented again.
Then on Friday night we had a self-guided tour of a Good Friday service. It started with Communion and then went through 11 of the Stations of the Cross. Each Station had it's own writings to read and to meditated on. And when you felt like it you moved on to the next station.
Thursday, Friday and then Saturday/Sunday. It was a terrible week, and at the same time it was a week of glorious hope and excitement. It ended with hearing the story once again, of the resurrected Savior. It ended with us singing, 'for the glory of the risen King!'
John
We just had 8 worship services over 6 different time slots. We started on Saturday and went 3, 5, and 7. Yes, it was just a bit early for Easter, but I think somewhere in the world it was already Easter morning. Then on Sunday we had another 3 services. The two we always have, 9 and 11 and then added another service at 1 PM. At the 9 and 11 we also held services in Cook auditorium like we normally do on Sunday mornings.
We used the theme of The Bridge. I think Willow did that several years ago. We did use the bridge concept, and the drama from Willow, but we changed the other elements and the sermon idea was just a little different.
But even as great as Sunday was, it was the elements and services leading up to Sunday that made this weekend great for me.
On Maunday Thursday we had Jews for Jesus here and were led through a Seder service. It was called Christ in the Passover. Stan Katz led us through the Passover section by section and explained how in each section of the the Passover service Christ can be seen, or the foreshadowing of Christ can be found. I've experienced this before and I still enjoyed it. Actually the next Passover service I'd like to see is what the Passover was like when Jesus had his finally Passover with his disciples. I've only been to one service like that and it was at least 30 years ago. I'd like to see it presented again.
Then on Friday night we had a self-guided tour of a Good Friday service. It started with Communion and then went through 11 of the Stations of the Cross. Each Station had it's own writings to read and to meditated on. And when you felt like it you moved on to the next station.
Thursday, Friday and then Saturday/Sunday. It was a terrible week, and at the same time it was a week of glorious hope and excitement. It ended with hearing the story once again, of the resurrected Savior. It ended with us singing, 'for the glory of the risen King!'
John
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
just plain mistakes
i just read an article in the magizine christian musician, by keith mohr. it was entitled 'the danger of mediocrity'. he started off by mentioning the gallo wine tag line from several years back, "we will sell no wine before it's time." technology has helped people with just a little talent produce a CD's. and they sound pretty much, well, mediocre. they believe they have enough talent that they head on out to what he calls ccm central, franklin, tennessee. then he talked about the many, many musicians moving to nashville with aspirations of stardom and fame.i think there is way too much grape juice out there and the little that does become wine all tastes the same. but enough about wine and ccm and nashville.what about the worship service as a platform for musicians with just a little talent? are they still grape juice? do you use them anyway because you have no one else? doctors have said that a little glass of red wine at night can be good for you because of the antioxidants found in it. they have also said that red grape juice has antioxidants in it too. Both as it turns out are good for you. How far can you take this analogy? probably not too far. but the heart is first on the list of important items that a leader of worship needs.i'm not going to take this any further. i believe you can figure out what you need to do in your situation. but i will ask one more question, 'when does just plain mistakes become mediocre?
jts
jts
Thursday, March 6, 2008
New building for North Shore Christian
Last Sunday, the North Shore christian church in Riverhead, Long Island, NY moved into their new facilities about 4 miles from where they were meeting in a school. They were using a cafe-a-gym-atorium. The new building was built as part of an industrial park. They have a lease on one section of it now.
144 people showed up for there for their opening service. And as near as I can tell only my parents, Pam, me and one other couple were the only people not from the area.
The church is just about 1 and 1/2 years old now. It really was exciting to see all the people. I know the tech people, and the set-up people are really happy that they have their own building now. No more "church in a box". No more... get the trailer, unload it, set up, worship service, tear down and put back into the trailer and move it. The worship team will now have a permanent place to practice also. That's a huge plus too.
Here are some pic's of us putting the last minute finishes to the place on Saturday, and then some Sunday pic's of everyone that was there.
These last four pictures were taken on Saturday when we were still putting the finishing touches on some things. We were still putting the main house speakers up and the projector besides cleaning up.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Κ Δ Π
Last past Sunday was the third sermon in a series we called Κ Δ Π. The subtitle of the series was God’s Frat Party. You could really go overboard with a title like that. K or Kappa was for Koinonia, fellowship. Δ. Delta was Doulos the idea of being a slave. This past week was Π, Pi for Proskuneo or worship. The word actually means more like bending low, or bowing the knee or even to kiss in a holy or reverent manner. It was a great series. One that I believe we should include at least once a year in some manner.
While the first two words are nouns, the last word Proskuneo is a verb. Worship is a verb. Now where have I heard that before? Oh yea, now I remember, it’s the title of a book by Robert Webber. If you are interested in worship in any way and you’ve not read any of Dr. Webber’s books or articles you just have to! We lost a great teacher recently, but we have the wealth of his knowledge contained in his books.
Even though Koinonia is a noun, you really can’t Koinonia without doing it in fellowship. Yes, you can have fellowship with God, one on one. Or should that be three on one? That’s your private Koinonia. That’s what you do in private during the week. There might even be Koinonia that happens with a small group sometime during the week. But then there is the Koinonia that happens on the weekends. Both of these happen when you are doing fellowship. You can’t fellowship by yourself.
The same with Doulos, it’s also a noun. But you can’t be a slave by yourself. Well, maybe you can. If you just do things for yourself and no one else. Then you become a slave to yourself. A term we have heard used about others, but never ourselves. Here again, you can’t Doulos without DOING Doulos, being a slave or serving someone else. In fact with this word you put yourself somewhat (really completely) in another persons control. Very few people really want to live a life like that. Well, I guess you can go off and live in some monastery somewhere and just live a life of solitude and work. But I’m not sure that is what Jesus really wants out of our lives. We need to be in the world, not of. By living in a monastery we take ourselves out of the world.
I’m going to chase a rabbit right now, so stay with me if you would. Take a step back right now. Take a bigger look at the world you live in, and the world you work in. What radio station do you listen to most of the day? What station is on in your car? What CD is in your CD player? What album is on your iPod, or mp3 player? Okay, I know I’m gonna get hammered on this next thought, but here it goes. They called it a Christian Book store. Next time you go in one, how many books are there compared to all the other stuff they sell. Can’t you buy mints in other stores? Well, maybe not Test-a-mints but a mint is a mint. “But it has a Bible verse on it”, you say. But it goes in your mouth, you might let it dissolve slowly, you might chew it up fast (depending how bad your breath is). It’s gone. It’s a mint! All the nick-naks, khochkies, the figurines, the jewelry, the music… Let’s face it we have created a Christian subculture. Our own little culture within a bigger culture. This exists so we can say, “we in the world but not of it.” Really? Is that really being ‘in’ the world? Okay, I’m gonna stop now.
Back to Κ Δ Π. For me, it kind of all fits together into what worship is. The fellowship, the serving, all of that, which happens during the week, all comes together on the weekend in one big Proskuneo, what we would call our worship service. Ben has said this about what we do on Sunday, worship is our “Cooperate celebration of what we are doing all week long.” I have been teaching this concept for about 7 years now. For me I have simplified this just a bit more, Worship is service is worship. The first worship and service is what happens during the week. The last worship is our cooperate worship. I just wish I could have understood this about 40 years ago! What I have learned in these past few years, is that in the different countries I have taught in, in Eastern Europe, not one of them translate the word Proskuneo like we do. In English we translate for the most part as worship. In Russian, Bulgarian, Estonian, Polish, Czech, Ukrainian, Hungarian and Romanian that word gets translated as bending the knee, or bowing down, or kissing. They understand these terms as worship, but not as our English word worship. We have translated several different Greek words into one our one word worship. Kerygma, Koinonia, and Leitourgia are three Greek terms that get translated worship in our bibles. No Greek lessons for now, sorry.
To bring this to a close.
During the week DO Koinonia, DO Doulos, DO Proskuneo. Let your next cooperate experience be a culmination of what you have been doing all week long. Give to the Lord this Sunday. Give without expecting and see what He will give back to you!
John
While the first two words are nouns, the last word Proskuneo is a verb. Worship is a verb. Now where have I heard that before? Oh yea, now I remember, it’s the title of a book by Robert Webber. If you are interested in worship in any way and you’ve not read any of Dr. Webber’s books or articles you just have to! We lost a great teacher recently, but we have the wealth of his knowledge contained in his books.
Even though Koinonia is a noun, you really can’t Koinonia without doing it in fellowship. Yes, you can have fellowship with God, one on one. Or should that be three on one? That’s your private Koinonia. That’s what you do in private during the week. There might even be Koinonia that happens with a small group sometime during the week. But then there is the Koinonia that happens on the weekends. Both of these happen when you are doing fellowship. You can’t fellowship by yourself.
The same with Doulos, it’s also a noun. But you can’t be a slave by yourself. Well, maybe you can. If you just do things for yourself and no one else. Then you become a slave to yourself. A term we have heard used about others, but never ourselves. Here again, you can’t Doulos without DOING Doulos, being a slave or serving someone else. In fact with this word you put yourself somewhat (really completely) in another persons control. Very few people really want to live a life like that. Well, I guess you can go off and live in some monastery somewhere and just live a life of solitude and work. But I’m not sure that is what Jesus really wants out of our lives. We need to be in the world, not of. By living in a monastery we take ourselves out of the world.
I’m going to chase a rabbit right now, so stay with me if you would. Take a step back right now. Take a bigger look at the world you live in, and the world you work in. What radio station do you listen to most of the day? What station is on in your car? What CD is in your CD player? What album is on your iPod, or mp3 player? Okay, I know I’m gonna get hammered on this next thought, but here it goes. They called it a Christian Book store. Next time you go in one, how many books are there compared to all the other stuff they sell. Can’t you buy mints in other stores? Well, maybe not Test-a-mints but a mint is a mint. “But it has a Bible verse on it”, you say. But it goes in your mouth, you might let it dissolve slowly, you might chew it up fast (depending how bad your breath is). It’s gone. It’s a mint! All the nick-naks, khochkies, the figurines, the jewelry, the music… Let’s face it we have created a Christian subculture. Our own little culture within a bigger culture. This exists so we can say, “we in the world but not of it.” Really? Is that really being ‘in’ the world? Okay, I’m gonna stop now.
Back to Κ Δ Π. For me, it kind of all fits together into what worship is. The fellowship, the serving, all of that, which happens during the week, all comes together on the weekend in one big Proskuneo, what we would call our worship service. Ben has said this about what we do on Sunday, worship is our “Cooperate celebration of what we are doing all week long.” I have been teaching this concept for about 7 years now. For me I have simplified this just a bit more, Worship is service is worship. The first worship and service is what happens during the week. The last worship is our cooperate worship. I just wish I could have understood this about 40 years ago! What I have learned in these past few years, is that in the different countries I have taught in, in Eastern Europe, not one of them translate the word Proskuneo like we do. In English we translate for the most part as worship. In Russian, Bulgarian, Estonian, Polish, Czech, Ukrainian, Hungarian and Romanian that word gets translated as bending the knee, or bowing down, or kissing. They understand these terms as worship, but not as our English word worship. We have translated several different Greek words into one our one word worship. Kerygma, Koinonia, and Leitourgia are three Greek terms that get translated worship in our bibles. No Greek lessons for now, sorry.
To bring this to a close.
During the week DO Koinonia, DO Doulos, DO Proskuneo. Let your next cooperate experience be a culmination of what you have been doing all week long. Give to the Lord this Sunday. Give without expecting and see what He will give back to you!
John
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Little boxes
Today our worship arts ministry team met with Rob our executive pastor. He went over some ideas and thoughts on how to help us within our ministry. With two venues and several of our lead volunteers stepping down recently we found ourselves in a bit of a mess. We found ourselves doing more to fill in the gaps. That may be okay for a short time, but it won't work for the long haul. And that's what we are in this for. We are all committed to making worship not only a priority for Mountain, but also making it the best we can.
Anyway, Rob showed us through the use of circles, boxes, arrows, lines of multi colored markers on a white board how we might be able to delegate our responsibilities. (Almost sounded like an old Arlo Guthrie song with all the circles, boxes, arrows, all we were missing were the black and white photo-graphs). Delegate is probably not the right word though. Through mentoring, teaching, modeling, taking someone along side us we can help them become a leader of a section of our ministry. Letting them take over one part of the ministry would also mean that they would 'own' that. Then in turn we would have more time to do the same with other people. not really working our selves out of a job though. Because with more venues and the possibility of other campuses, we will need more people running tech, media, band, vocal, lights, etc. that means more mentoring, more teaching, more modeling, taking more people along side of us.
After that meeting (2 hours) Bob and I had to go to a funeral where Bob was running sound and I was playing keys for a couple of songs during the service. Setting up for choir and going over the vocal music for Sunday and the choir music for tonight's rehearsal, I'm tired and I still have a meeting with the worship leader, band leader, me and Eric to go over this Sunday's music. Then vocal worship rehearsal, and finally choir. Busy night ahead of me.
Little boxes, little boxes, made of ticky tacky...it might have been a cute song by Malvina Reynolds, but using boxes like Rob did is a very important concept for us to implement.
john
Anyway, Rob showed us through the use of circles, boxes, arrows, lines of multi colored markers on a white board how we might be able to delegate our responsibilities. (Almost sounded like an old Arlo Guthrie song with all the circles, boxes, arrows, all we were missing were the black and white photo-graphs). Delegate is probably not the right word though. Through mentoring, teaching, modeling, taking someone along side us we can help them become a leader of a section of our ministry. Letting them take over one part of the ministry would also mean that they would 'own' that. Then in turn we would have more time to do the same with other people. not really working our selves out of a job though. Because with more venues and the possibility of other campuses, we will need more people running tech, media, band, vocal, lights, etc. that means more mentoring, more teaching, more modeling, taking more people along side of us.
After that meeting (2 hours) Bob and I had to go to a funeral where Bob was running sound and I was playing keys for a couple of songs during the service. Setting up for choir and going over the vocal music for Sunday and the choir music for tonight's rehearsal, I'm tired and I still have a meeting with the worship leader, band leader, me and Eric to go over this Sunday's music. Then vocal worship rehearsal, and finally choir. Busy night ahead of me.
Little boxes, little boxes, made of ticky tacky...it might have been a cute song by Malvina Reynolds, but using boxes like Rob did is a very important concept for us to implement.
john
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
3 inches of snow and everything stops
You have to understand, Marylanders don't do snow well. I came from Long Island and we have a good snow there (a couple of feet) most winters. Ben our preacher comes from Minnesota and he says unless there's three feet of snow, it's not really snow, it's just flurries.
Anyway we got a snow storm this past Thursday. It started in the early afternoon and by 5:00 there was about 3 good inches on the ground. Big, wet flakes of snow, great for making snowballs!
Thursday is also our worship rehearsal night. Schools let out early and cancelled evening activities. This was also the first night our choir was to be back from their winter break. It was also the Thursday that the choir gets ready to lead worship on Sunday.
Do we cancel everything? Do we cancel choir and have the rest of the musicians still show up?
Bob and I set up the stage, with risers for the choir and mic's, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, keyboard, drums, percussion and the sound cart so everything would be ready for rehearsal.
The choir was leading all the congregational songs but they were not going to sing a special. Most of them took the music a couple of weeks ago, and had been listening and singing all the music. We make a music booklet of all the songs for that Sunday along with a cut sheet to guide them on how the song will be sung.
We first decided to cancel choir practice. The choir had the music, they were learning it on their own, so we thought we could cancel and just have them come at 7:26AM on Sunday morning to rehearse and we would be fine. We were still going to have the band members show up and go over the music. This way the band would know the music, and the choir would sing along. Real easy!
Well, then we decided that we should cancel all of the worship rehearsal including the band members and not have anyone come to the church.
So, NO REHEARSAL on Thursday for anyone.
I have to say, everyone was ready to go on Sunday morning. There were about 40 members, and all the band members ready to sing and play. I have to brag again! We have some great worship team people.
We had only an hour and 20 minutes to go over all the songs, get the tempo right, get the cuts and repeats right, get the words right. I was a bit nervous, but God was there all the time. As I look back now, I knew I was nervous, but not as much as I would have been in the past. I finally was relying more on the worship team (band and choir) knowing the music and letting the Holy Spirit work, and not so worried about how was I going to pull it all together.
God was there. It was a great service. The theme was on Koinonia and it really happened. We all banded together to lift our praises to the Lord.
I really can't wait for next week now. The theme is Proskuneo, Worship!!
John
Anyway we got a snow storm this past Thursday. It started in the early afternoon and by 5:00 there was about 3 good inches on the ground. Big, wet flakes of snow, great for making snowballs!
Thursday is also our worship rehearsal night. Schools let out early and cancelled evening activities. This was also the first night our choir was to be back from their winter break. It was also the Thursday that the choir gets ready to lead worship on Sunday.
Do we cancel everything? Do we cancel choir and have the rest of the musicians still show up?
Bob and I set up the stage, with risers for the choir and mic's, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, keyboard, drums, percussion and the sound cart so everything would be ready for rehearsal.
The choir was leading all the congregational songs but they were not going to sing a special. Most of them took the music a couple of weeks ago, and had been listening and singing all the music. We make a music booklet of all the songs for that Sunday along with a cut sheet to guide them on how the song will be sung.
We first decided to cancel choir practice. The choir had the music, they were learning it on their own, so we thought we could cancel and just have them come at 7:26AM on Sunday morning to rehearse and we would be fine. We were still going to have the band members show up and go over the music. This way the band would know the music, and the choir would sing along. Real easy!
Well, then we decided that we should cancel all of the worship rehearsal including the band members and not have anyone come to the church.
So, NO REHEARSAL on Thursday for anyone.
I have to say, everyone was ready to go on Sunday morning. There were about 40 members, and all the band members ready to sing and play. I have to brag again! We have some great worship team people.
We had only an hour and 20 minutes to go over all the songs, get the tempo right, get the cuts and repeats right, get the words right. I was a bit nervous, but God was there all the time. As I look back now, I knew I was nervous, but not as much as I would have been in the past. I finally was relying more on the worship team (band and choir) knowing the music and letting the Holy Spirit work, and not so worried about how was I going to pull it all together.
God was there. It was a great service. The theme was on Koinonia and it really happened. We all banded together to lift our praises to the Lord.
I really can't wait for next week now. The theme is Proskuneo, Worship!!
John
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