Sunday, July 15, 2007

Culture Current Worship

Greetings to all you members of the blog sphere.....well my network of bloggers at least. I submit this for discussion and thought this afternoon.

Today as sat in Sunday morning worship we sang two familiar songs one was "I Will Call Upon The Lord" and the other was "Shine Jesus Shine." We took and sang these two songs at a incredibly slow tempo if you ask me; slower than I'm used to. I'm a musician....well I like to think of myself as one; as a person who has led worship on many different occasions and I can tell you from first-hand experience that the style of the music has an effect on people. The music you pick and play will either energize them or bore and depress them.

I find that the majority of worship in our churches is bored and played out. There are a slight few that have a mixture and worship in those churches is exciting and great. I know and will admit that the majority of churches have to consider the makeup of their congregations. Consider any fast paced song that you think of and slowing it down and even removing two maybe even three of the instruments(guitars, drums, and bass) used to originally record it and replacing them with a piano and organ. This is done so that the older and more influential members will be happy and want to sing that Sunday. Still I have to sit and think: Why do we worship through singing?......is it for our enjoyment and pleasure, or do really grasp the concept that it is God the Father to whom we are singing.

Don't get me wrong I'm not for the removal of hymns there are some outstanding pieces of music that I would cry if we never sang them again: "Come Thou Fount", "O For Thousand Tongues","How Great Thou Art." These are only a few that have awesome truths contained within in them.

I think that it was do us some good to consider the culture and time that we're in when we put our minds to doing worship.

A song like "Trading My Sorrows" at a slow tempo doesn't come off sounding too joyful.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Confessions of an Amateur Believer Review


Title: Confessions of an Amateur Believer
Author: Patty Kirk
Genre: Christian, Faith
Rating: (1-5) - 5

Review:

Confessions of an Amateur Believer by Patty Kirk is a brief glimpse into the life of the author and how she goes from unbelief to the faith of a young adult to struggling with owning her faith to the deepest, darkest hours of questioning whats the point of having faith wondering whether or not the promises of God told of in the bible were true. This book approaches the Faith Journey in a down to earth way that everyone who reads this work can at some point identify with the author and take comfort in the notion that they are not the first to experience struggle with knowing what they believe and why they believe it.



Personal Word:

I loved every moment of this book.....there were times where I could put myself in the author's shoes and clearly identify with the struggle.

I recommend this book to any and all who wish to be encouraged and edified by the struggle and eventual victory of a fellow believer.

Monday, July 09, 2007

Dried Up

Like much of the south right about now with hardly any rain in past several weeks so is my mind when it comes of thinking about topics or good blogging fodder.

with the fall semester right around the corner. Plus two conferences here @ Southeastern one entitled the Convergent Conference with topics such as the emergent church to be discussed with the like of Ed Stetzer and Mark Driscoll and the other a conference on the life and works of C.S Lewis I'm sure to have plenty of stuff to discuss.

That book review is right around the corner just have to gather my thoughts on it...


Hope everyone is doing well....love to hear from ya.....look me up

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