Welcome to sojournmusic.com’s weekly worship music set list review & service recap. You’ll not only read a list of the songs we led following the Call To Worship, but also the readings and prayers from our liturgy. You can find links to the set lists of this church and many other churches each week in the Worship Blog Carnival at theworshipcommunity.com. And you can learn about some of the songs we sing at Sojourn Gathered each week in advance of the Sunday service by reading my “Getting Ready For Sunday” post each Thursday at Sojourn’s online journal, TravelBlog.
Photos this week courtesy Chuck Heeke.
Call to Worship:
We come together to respond to God’s open invitation to sinners. Sunday gatherings aren’t a rally to celebrate our good deeds or pat ourselves on the back. Rather, we are here to celebrate God’s goodness in that He invites broken people like us into His presence and provides healing. Hear his word:
Praise the LORD.
It is so good to sing praises to our God,
Praising him is beautiful, it’s how the world should be.
The LORD builds up his people;
he gathers them together out of exile.
He heals the brokenhearted and bandages their wounds.
Let’s sing to the LORD with thanksgiving;
make music to our God with instruments and voices.
For he delights in those who fear him,
who put their hope in his unfailing love.
- Based on Psalm 147
Song: Invitation Fountain
Confession:
Let’s pray-
Have mercy on us, O God, because of your unfailing love.
Because of your great compassion, remove the stain of our sins.
Wash us clean from our guilt.
Purify us from sin.
We recognize our rebellion;
Against you, and you alone, have we sinned
and have done what is evil in your sight.
Restore to us the joy of salvation and make us wiling to obey our voice.
Unseal our lips so that we may give praise to you, for you will not reject a broken and repentant heart. We pray this in Jesus name, Amen.
– Based on Psalm 51
In this next song we will sing “Cleanse me with Hyssop, and I will be clean”.
In the Old Testament Hyssop was a plant used for purification. It was dipped in the blood of the sacrifice and used to “cleanse” the ceremonially unclean.
So when you sing that phrase, “Cleanse me with Hyssop”, think of Christ, the perfect lamb of God, the once for all sacrifice, whose blood was shed so that you might be made clean.
Song: Psalm 51 from our album These Things I Remember, written by Sojourn’s Jeremy Quillo. Hear “Psalm 51″ in its entirety here.
Song: Let Your Blood Plead For Me from our album The Water And The Blood: The Hymns Of Isaac Watts, Volume Two, written by me (Bobby Gilles), Jeremy Quillo and Pastor Mike Cosper. Hear “Let Your Blood Plead For Me” in its entirety here. You can also watch a live performance of “Let Your Blood Plead For Me” by Sojourn here.
Assurance/Peace:
We praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us who belong to his dear Son. He is so rich in kindness and grace that he purchased our freedom with the blood of his Son and forgave our sins. – Ephesians 1:6-7
As we celebrate this wonderful gift of forgiveness, let’s extend a warm welcome to those around us and even meet a new face or two.
Giving:
God has extended grace to us in Christ’s sacrifice. He calls us to be faithful and to honor Him with our lives -
Do good and share what you have,
for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.
—from Hebrews 13:16, NRSV
We give today not out of obligation or penance, but out of grateful hearts in response to His kindness. Let’s pray:
God of wonder,
we offer you these humble gifts, signs of your goodness and mercy.
Receive them with our gratitude, that through us all people may know the riches of your love in the Word-made-flesh. Amen.
Then our pastor preached the fourth sermon in our new Genesis sermon series, taking his text from Genesis 3, the fall of man and woman in the Garden of Eden. You can hear Sojourn sermons in theSojourn Church iTunes podcast or in the Sermon Resource library at sojournchurch.com.
Song: Christ or Else I Die, our Communion hymn of the week.
Song: Deep In Our Hearts from our album The Water And The Blood, written by Joel Gerdis, Brooks Ritter and Mike Cosper. Hear “Deep In Our Hearts” in full at this link.
Reading:
God in his mercy emptied His wrath at the cross of Jesus so that we could be declared innocent and righteous.
Christ has rescued us from the curse pronounced by the law. When he was hung on the cross, he took upon himself the curse for our wrongdoing. For it is written in the Scriptures, “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree. Through Christ Jesus, God has blessed His people, so that we who are believers might receive the promised Holy Spirit through faith.- Based on Galatians 3:13-14
Song: Only Your Blood Is Enough from our album Over The Grave: The Hymns Of Isaac Watts, Volume One. Hear “Only Your Blood Is Enough,” written by Neil and Kate Robins, here.
Benediction: We were once cursed prisoners, but now through Jesus Christ, we are declared innocent and freed from our sin. Let us live in the open air of his grace. Peace be with you.
