Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs: Sojourn Church Worship Music Set List, 1/25/2009

You can see the worship service music set lists of churches all over the world in the Blog Carnival at fredmckinnon.com.

1. Invitacion Fountain, by Michael Pritz of The Violet Burning.  This long-time staple song of Sojourn Gathered is a good choice for a musical call to worship.  The male vocalist sings the “call of God,” (“let all who are weak/ all who are weary”) and the female vocalist leads us in our response (“if You lead me Lord, I will follow/ if You lead me Lord, I will go”).

2. O Help My Unbelief, words by Isaac Watts and music by Justin Smith for Indelible Grace.  You can hear this one from their latest record, Indelible Grace V: Wake Thy Slumbering Children.  The lyrics are a confession and a plaintive cry. Here’s a taste, from the second verse:

My soul obeys the almighty call

and runs to this relief

I would believe thy promise, Lord

oh help my unbelief.

3. I Have to Believe, written by Rita Springer.  This is a song of stubborn joy and gritty faith:

He said that He’s forever faithful

He said that He’s forever true

He said that He can move mountains

and if He can move mountains,

He can move my mountain; He can move your mountain, too …

Following this song we celebrated the Giving of the Peace, during which we greeted one another and introduced ourselves to strangers in the peace that Christ one for us on the cross.  Then Pastor Daniel Montgomery continued our 2009 Old Testament series with the story of Abraham (Genesis 12-22).

You can follow along with the Sojourn pastors’ lessons from Abraham and the book of Genesis this week on The B.C. Blog, from our new online magazine TravelBlog. In fact, Worship Arts Pastor Mike Cosper, whom regular sojournmusic.com are quite familiar with, has an article up on the B.C. Blog right now entitled “Guarding Our Sisters,” which focuses on lessons learned from the Rape of Dinah and her brothers’ revenge.

4. Great Is Thy Faithfulness, written by Thomas O. Chisholm and William M. Runyon.  We could talk about many of the lines and phrases in this classic.  I like:

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth

thy own dear presence to cheer and to guide

The hymnist touches on a number of things in these twenty-one syllables: Christ has won, for us, a pardon for sin.  But beyond that, “a peace that endureth.”  And His presence is both “to cheer” and “to guide.”  This is the power of poetry — a compression of ideas that could each be meditated upon and studied in detail.

This was our final song for the week.  We’d taken extra time in the sermon, due to the depth of material found in the story of Abraham.  If you haven’t delved into Genesis lately, I’d encourage you to review Abraham’s story this week and to reflect on the miracle of the body of Christ — Abraham’s seed, as innumerable as the stars of heaven.

Photographer Dan Canales is up in Michigan, so now pics today.  Have no fear — he will return to Louisville shortly.

Worship band for the 9:30 a.m. and 11:15 a.m. services:

Joel Gerdis — vocals and guitar
Lorie King — vocals
Mike Cosper — lead guitar
Bill Bell — keyboard
Brian Meurer — bass guitar
Ryan Harvey — drums
Lachlan Coffey — liturgy readings

Worship band for the 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. services:

Dave Moisan — vocals, guitar, keyboard
Rebecca Dennison — vocals
Mike Cosper — lead guitar
Jacob Goran — saxophone
Charlie Lucas — bass guitar
Matt Harris — drums
Dave Richards — liturgy readings