This blog post is one of many taking part in the Blog Carnival at fredmckinnon.com — a series of churches each blogging about their music set lists from this weekend’s services.  Regular photographer Dan Canales is out of town, so I took the photos myself.

We did something new this week.  The same band led worship at all four Sojourn Church services (9:30 and 11:15 a.m., and 5 and 7 p.m.)  We kept the instrumentation very sparse, and featured four vocalists — we’ll call them “The Sojourn Quartet Singers.”  Or “The Singing Sojourn Family.”  Or “The Sojourn Gospel Hour Quartet.”  Or feel free to nominate your own name in the comment section.

Our lineup:

Rebecca Dennison, Brooks Ritter, Katie Vaughn and Jamie Barnes.  Like a modern day Chuckwagon Gang.

In addition to singing, Brooks played guitar while Jamie switched off on guitar and, believe it or not,  hurdy gurdy.  Dony Erwin backed up the vocal group on the upright bass.  So there’s another potential name: “Dony and The Sojourn Four.”

1. Africa (Now Shall My Inward Joys Arise), by Isaac Watts (1709) and William Billings (1770).  The Innocence Mission covered this common metre hymn in Help Me To Sing: Songs of the Sacred Harp.  The folks at the Hallock Hill blog have some information about the song, and free streaming audio of the mp3 from that album.

2. Our Great God, written by Fernando Ortega and Mac Powell.  Despite our unique arrangement this week, Sojourners are very familiar with “Our Great God” and love to sing this song of adoration:

Let every creature in the sea and every flying bird

let every mountain, every field and valley of the earth

let all the moons and all the stars in all the universe

sing praises to the living God who rules them by His Word.

3. My Rock and My Redeemer, by Sojourn songwriter Rebecca Dennison.  You can view the chord sheet from our These Things I Remember page and stream the mp3 for free from Last FM.  Also, read the story behind the uplifting psalm-based ”My Rock and My Redeemer” in Rebecca’s own words here at sojournmusic.com.  We’ve been singing this one at Sojourn for over three years, and it never gets tired.

4. It Is Well With My Soul, written by Horatio G. Spafford and Philip Paul Bliss.  If ever a song was enhanced by acapella (or near acapella) congregational singing, it is this gospel hymn of faith and assurance.  The lyrics acknowledge God’s sovereignty whether “peace like a river attendeth to my way” or “sorrows like sea billows roll.”  And as we move toward Advent, the season of the Church Year when we emphasize the hope and surety of Christ’s second coming, the final verse of “It Is Well” prepares us:

And Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight

the clouds be rolled back, as a scroll.

The trumpet shall sound, and the Lord shall descend,

even so, it is well with my soul.

5. In Christ Alone, by Keith and Kristyn Getty.  I’m glad to see this contemporary hymn showing up in modern hymnals, like the brand new 2008 Baptist Hymnal (also published as “The Worship Hymnal” for non-Baptists.  Same great resource of hymns, gospel songs and praise tunes though).

This is a fantastic example of how a song can be expositional and brimming with action.  It takes us on a journey through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus, ending with the promise of His return and the assurance of His power to keep “all that the Father has given” Him until that day:

No power of hell, no scheme of man

can ever pluck me from His hand;

‘til He returns or calls me home,

here in the power of Christ I’ll stand.

6. There is a Fountain, by William Cowper.  I love how, in succeeding verses, the great poet Cowper uses line repetition to emphasize that this fountain of Christ’s blood makes sinners “lose all their guilty stains,” “wash all their sins away,” and “be saved, to sin no more,”  knowing that redeeming love “has been my theme, and shall be till I die.”  I also love the connection Cowper makes between us and the thief on the cross:

the dying thief rejoiced to see

that fountain in his day;

and there may I, though vile as he,

wash all my sins away.

7. Where Your Praise Never Ends, by Sojourn songwriter Charlie Richardson.  This is one of our favorite celebratory songs “for the sending” here in Louisville.  Again, the emphasis is on the surety of Christ’s return and the “Kingdom of Light”:

Ones that have gone before us

saints that have joined Your chorus

know of Your glory now.

My voice prepares the notes

that I’ll sing before Your throne

Rehearsing the day I’ll see You face to face.

• description: Worship music set list for Sojourn, with photos and links to free mps3s
• keywords: gospel quartet, Sojourn worship service, 2008 Baptist Hymnal, My Rock and My Redeemer, Where Your Praise Never Ends
• title: Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs: Gospel Quartet Day At Sojourn, 11-16-2008

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