This morning at Church at the Mall was a great day of worship. We had Don Piper, author of 90 Minutes in Heaven, as a guest speaker, and he has a pretty incredible story. He was declared dead and covered up with a sheet on the scene of a horrific car accident in which a tractor-trailer semi hit his car head on and drove over his vehicle. After he died, many people, most of whom did not know he was actually dead, were praying for him. After 90 minutes, he came back to life and began singing the hymn "What a Friend We Have in Jesus" along with the pastor who had crawled into the car to pray for him. During those 90 minutes, he had an experience of heaven, and that is much of what he shared. It was pretty amazing. I am a bit of a skeptic, and I was a little unsure of whether or not I would believe it, but he was very down-to-earth, and there was nothing in his testimony which did not align with Scripture, and which was out of the realm of possibility. The time of worshiping through music, both before and after the message, was really enjoyable for me. We were doing some songs that I love and that the church loves, and we had a number of guests this week, who came to hear Don Piper. However, I did feel a little bad for the older folks who clearly didn't know what they were in for when they sat on the front row. They had their ears plugged the entire time, and that's without any stage volume except the drums! I guess that's why we have three services with different options.
Here's the set from this morning:
"God is Alive" [Steve Fee and Eddie Kirkland] "All Because of Jesus" [Steve Fee] "Jesus Paid It All" [Traditional w/ add. chorus by Alex Nifong] "Beautiful" [Phil Wickham] INV - "Mighty to Save" [Ben Fielding, Reuben Morgan] "Lord of All" [Kristian Stanfill]
This morning, we introduced "God is Alive," which is a newer song from Fee's latest release Hope is Rising. It is a high-energy rock song with a powerful and victorious lyric. I think my favorite lines from the song come from the chorus: "Everyone glorify the risen Son/ The Holy One has overcome/ Jesus is alive/ The enemy is broken underneath His feet/ Death is crushed in victory/ Jesus is alive." I love this new song, and we'll be teaching it for the next few weeks.
"All Because of Jesus" by Steve Fee and "Jesus Paid It All" have become standards for our congregation, and it seems we can never go wrong when we sing them together. It's a beautiful thing when the truth and a singable melody come together.
"Beautiful" is yet another great song from the talented Phil Wickham. The selection of this song was a definite God moment, because the last verse tied in PERFECTLY with how Don Piper started his message, the image from Revelation where the Bride of Christ is around the throne of God. The final verse sings, "When we arrive at eternity's shore/ Where death is just a memory and tears are no more/ We'll enter in as the wedding bells ring/ Your Bride will come together and we'll sing, 'You're beautiful.'" I love this song, too. :)
We ended the service with "Lord of All," which is quite possibly my favorite worship song of all time. This, hands-down, is a song that the Church needs to sing. The lyric is so God-focused, so powerful, and so true. It has so many truths that we need to declare together in corporate worship. I would recommend this song for absolutely any church setting, because it translates into any format very well. Following Don's message this morning, the church blew the doors off of the place in worshiping the Great King, singing, "There is none so high and holy/ King of kings, the one and only/ You are adored/ You are the Lord of all." It was an amazing moment that I wish didn't have to end. God is working in a powerful way, and I am privileged to be a part of it at Church at the Mall.
All-in-all, a great morning. Tech-wise, we stayed with the click pretty well, and we had very few mistakes as a team. The lyrics were all correct, and everything worked. Even if that weren't the case, it would have been a great morning, but I think the Spirit is also more free to move when we do our best to stay out of the way. I think it just makes it easier for the people to maintain their focus on the Lord. But that's my opinion, for what it's worth.
I hope you had a great week and a great time worshiping with your church, wherever you are.
Be sure to check out TheWorshipCommunity's Sunday Set Lists page, where worship leaders and team members share their sets and thoughts about their worship experiences at their respective churches. Good stuff.
In the Son,
Bill