Seeking God Together

This Sunday at Calvary, we get an introduction to our time in November/December with Life Action Revival Ministries. At that time we will be setting aside a week of our lives and activities to spend time collectively seeking the Lord for a spiritual awakening in our lives, church and community. I am looking forward to that time with great expectancy. Allen Mazelin, from Life Action will be our guest speaker and will be introducing our church to Life Action and encouraging us to prepare our hearts for a great movement of the Holy Spirit.

The songs we will be using are We Are Listening from Sojourn Music, Always from Kristian Stanfill and the Passion Worship Movement, Living Faith also from Sojourn, and an arrangement of the hymn Come Thou Fount Of Every Blessing. A number of months ago we posted a video of our Praise Band singing We Are Listening. You can find a link to the video here.

Come Thou Fount had become one of my favorite hymns over the years because it so accurately describes the condition of the human heart and the wondrous glory of God’s grace.  We are all prone to wander, prone to leave the God we love yet how amazing is His love that continually pursues us and calls us back to Him.

I am looking forward to meeting God in worship with our church on Sunday.  Be in prayer for our Praise 

Band as we minister on Saturday night at an event for the Holland Rescue Mission. Our desire is that God would be glorified through our lives and our music.

Soli Deo Gloria,

Trent

Worship Leaders Expectations

I came across a series of blogs from a worship leader that I found interesting and helpful. The leader is telling each member of his worship team what he expects from them. While every church and situation is different, I think there is much that we can learn.

Whether you play guitar, run sound, sing or play the drums I think you will find this series useful.

Check out the blog here:


What your worship leader wants you to know

Avoiding God's Wrath

In Exodus 32, Moses interceded for the nation of Israel before the Lord and the Lord relented from pouring out His wrath upon the people. Although not a perfect analogy, it certainly foreshadows Christ, suffering on the cross as God pours out His wrath for mankind upon Christ. This is the backdrop of the message on Sunday in the series Awkward People Awesome God.

In choosing our songs for Sunday, I was reminded of this text:

When Satan tempts me to despair and tells me of the guilt within, upward I look and see Him there who made an end to all my sin. Because the sinless Savior died, my sinful soul is counted free; For God, the Just is satisfied to look on Him and pardon me. – Charitie L Bancroft/Vikki Cook

So of course I had to choose Before The Throne Of God Above as the centerpiece of our music for Sunday. Other songs chosen to support that theme are Always, which we began learning a couple of weeks ago and 10,000 Reasons. We will begin the service with worship chorus Rise Up And Praise Him.

Randy and Darlene Schaap will be providing special music during the offertory this week and we will also celebrate Baptism in our Sunday gathering.

I am looking forward to being back and leading Calvary in worship on Sunday. I want to express my gratitude to Jeremy Banks and the entire team who ministered Sunday in my absence. It is a joy and very satisfying to know that our dedicated Worship Arts team can carry on in all circumstances.

In Christ Alone

I am grateful to God for Jeremy Banks who will be leading worship this Sunday at Calvary while I spend a few days in Arkansas with my family. My father turns 84 later this week and I am excited about the opportunity to celebrate with him.

As Jeremy and I walked through planning this service, this passage particularly the latter part of verse 27 came to mind:

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints. To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.  (Colossians 1:24-29 ESV)

Christ in you, the hope of glory became our theme as we planned music to coordinate with Pastor Paul’s message series Awkward People Awesome God.

The songs we chose were designed to build into that theme. We begin singing Holy Is The Lord which is intended to communicate the aspect of God’s character that transcends all other aspects. One author I read recently said that the Lord is holy in all that He does and all that He is. There is more to chew on that I can write here but I want to recommend to you the book Recalling the Hope of Glory by Allen P. Ross.

We will also sing The Name of The Lord and You Are My All in All, two songs which declare our dependence upon God. Just before the message, we will sing In Christ Alone.  This modern hymn by Stuart Townend and Keith Getty has become a favorite by many in our congregation because of the rich lyrics and beautiful melody. Through this song we declare our dependence on Christ, our hope in Christ, and our freedom through Christ as we retell the story of his death, burial and resurrection.

I am getting excited about our service even as I write this. I trust that Sunday will be a wonderful time for God’s people at Calvary to worship Him together.

Soli Deo Gloria,

Pastor Trent

The Very First Blog

Although I am not much of a writer, here is my first blog in what I intend to be a weekly post about worship at Calvary Baptist Church. I also intend to highlight useful posts from others that will be a blessing and benefit to our Worship Arts team. I hope you indulge me by reading the occasional post related to my favorite sports teams or other musical endeavors that I pursue.  

This weekend we start a three week sermon series entitled “Awkward People Awesome God.” One of overarching themes will be that God doesn’t call the qualified, He qualifies the called. As people who are prone to failure and temptation, we are really not much different than the countless people whose stories are recorded in the Scriptures that were used by God to accomplish great things even though they had significant personal flaws.

I am reminded of what David wrote in Psalm 8:

                When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,

                                the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,

                what is man that you are mindful of him,

                                and the son of man that you care for him?

                (Psalm 8:3-4 ESV)

The story of God and His relationship to man could have been one of indifference due to human insignificance and frailty or even a story of retribution and condemnation. But instead it is a story of pursuit, sacrifice and love. This is the theme that we will celebrate as we gather to worship God this Sunday at Calvary.

Here is the list of songs that have been chosen to communicate this theme:

                Friend of God

                Counting On God

                You Never Let Go

                Always

Most of these will be familiar to Calvary with the exception of Always. It is a newer song that has been recorded by Kristian Stanfill. I first heard it about a year ago when my son came back from serving at Joni and Friends Family Camp. I have linked the YouTube video of the song so you can get a preview of the song.

Kristian Stanfill Always 

Soli Deo Gloria,

Trent