Sojourn’s Liturgy Recap, February 16-17, 2013

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, 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.

Midtown campus photos by Tom Branch.

Prelude: In The Hours

Call to Worship:

Lent is a season that leads us to Easter, calling us to reflect on the brokenness of the world around us, and the brokenness of our hearts. God invites us to draw near to Him in the midst of our sadness, and our joy. So wherever you’ve come from today, hear his invitation. Let’s draw together and see God in his glory, grace and love. Hear the word of the Lord:

I will praise the Lord at all times. I will constantly speak his praises.
I will boast only in the Lord; let all who are helpless take heart.
Come, let us tell of the Lord’s greatness; let us exalt his name together.
I prayed to the Lord, and he answered me.
He freed me from all my fears.
Those who look to him for help will be radiant with joy;
no shadow of shame will darken their faces.
In my desperation I prayed, and the Lord listened;
he saved me from all my troubles.
For the angel of the Lord is a guard; he surrounds and defends all who fear him.
Taste and see that the Lord is good.
Oh, the joys of those who take refuge in him! – Psalm 34:1-8

Song: With Every Breath

Prayer of Lament:
Pray with me:

God, our refuge, we are surrounded by pain and suffering.
We lament over tragedy in our world,
the war and the desperation we see all around us.
Lord, you promise in your word that you are near to the broken hearted.
Lord, bring peace and healing. Comfort the hearts of those that grieve.
This world is not what it’s supposed to be. We recognize that it was our sin that gave birth to suffering; it was our rebellion that brought death into your creation.
But you restore life through your son Jesus.
Lord, continue to show us the depth of our sin so that we will continue to seek the rescue of Your grace. Help our unbelief and increase our faith in your promises. Amen.

[READ WHILE THE SONG IS BEGINNING]

The song we’re about to sing talks about broken cisterns – which are like wells or water containers. In Jeremiah chapter 2, God tells us that he’s a fountain of living water, but we’re not content to draw near to him. Instead, we think we need to dig our own cisterns – we need to solve our own problems. In our unbelief, we miss out on the boundless living water that God provides.  So as we sing, we are confessing our sense of independence, and asking the Lord to help us in our unbelief.

Song: Begone Unbelief

Assurance:
This is how God dealt with the problem of sin and death:

Because God’s children are human beings—made of flesh and blood—the Son also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death. Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying.  - Hebrews 2:14-15

Song: In Christ Alone

Passing of Peace: Because of the hope we have in Christ, we can both rejoice and cry with each other as a family. Let’s take a moment now to welcome another as we continue to celebrate God’s grace.

Giving

Then our preacher taught from Job 1, the first sermon in our series on the Book of Job. You can hear Sojourn sermons in theSojourn Church iTunes podcast or in the Sermon Resource library at sojournchurch.com.

Song: Come to Me our Communion song of the week.

Song: Blessed Be Your Name

Reading:
The blood of Christ gives us hope in the wake of great suffering. Hear the good news:

Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will reveal to us later.  For all creation is waiting eagerly for that future day when God will reveal who his children really are. We as believers long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us. We were given this hope when we were saved – Based on Romans 8:18-24

Song: Absent From Flesh written by our Jamie Barnes, adapted from an Isaac Watts hymn text. We recorded this twice: on The Mercy Seat/The War and on The Water And The Blood: The Hymns Of Isaac Watts, Volume Two.

Benediction:
God has made you alive through the death of His son. Step forward today with confidence and faith that He is able to keep and sustain you. Peace be with you.