The Joint: Skillet – Alive

The Joint review the new album from Skillet.

The Rich Fool

The Rich Fool

I was reading my daughter a bedtime story a few nights ago.  She loves to hear stories from her “God book” (Stories Jesus Told by Nick Butterworth and Mick Inkpen).  We flipped through and stopped to read the Parable of the Rich Farmer which is based on Jesus’ Parable of the Rich Fool in Luke 12:16-21.

For days later, the story has kept coming back to me and I have been trying to work out what I should take out of it.

¹⁶And He told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man was very productive.

¹⁷“And he began reasoning to himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no place to store my crops?’

¹⁸“Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.

¹⁹‘And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come; take your ease, eat, drink and be merry.”‘

²⁰“But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your soul is required of you; and now who will own what you have prepared?’

²¹“So is the man who stores up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”

Taken literally, the story is a warning against building up and storing away all our worldly treasures when we could drop dead at any second.  We should be applying our earthly resources more to the things of God which will bring change that is not temporary, but everlasting.  We should be living for the here and now and not worrying about the future.

I am not putting large amounts of money away every month because we don’t have it.  My only financial safety net for the future is a (weak) personal pension that I contribute to back in the UK.  It’s not quite the barn described in this story.  So, what else could the barn represent?

The Rich Fool

It could represent personal dreams and ambitions.  I might not have anything to put in my barn yet, but if I’m busy designing my barn for that one day when I finally get my breakthrough, I’d be in the same situation as this rich fool.  If I am so focused on my future, how can I be as effective for God as He would like me to be?  I am at major risk of disobeying a command from God that I believe could compromise our current lifestyle or dream future.

But it’s soooo, so easy for me to fall into this line of thinking especially when I have a family and are responsible for their livelihood.  Every financial, or potential life altering decision I make impacts, not only me, but my family also.

There is an amazing truth that has been reinforced to me recently.  God has made us for His purposes.  We were made to worship Him only.  It’s not about us.  It’s not about me, or even my family.  What will happen when we retire, will we all have enough?  The truth is, I don’t know.  All I know is we need to learn to focus more on what God is doing and what God wants to do, not what we are doing and what we want to do.  Our purpose is to worship God and point people to Him.

It’s been great talking over this with my wife Liz and thinking of how, as a family, we need to approach life differently based on this parable.  We need to keep thinking how can we invest more in Kingdom projects and continually put our future in God’s hands.  We’re more valuable than birds, right?

 

Set List – 07 Nov 2009

How He Loves – John Mark McMillan
Another Hallelujah – Lincoln Brewster
Mighty To Save – Reuben Morgan, Ben Fielding

It was the first time I’ve used How He Loves. I really enjoyed playing it but the arrangement is a little difficult for people to follow. I will have to play about with it before using next week at our third preview service.

Recent Joint Album Reviews…!

Here’s a slew of recent reviews over at The Joint.  Check them out if you’re itching to freshen up your current music library.

For me, this is the definition of a worship album

It’s new, fresh and totally engages you in worship

If you are a Matt Maher fan you will probably love this album

A great worship cd/dvd package that hopefully will propel Tim Hughes’ music throughout the United States and beyond

A solid album, perhaps lacking a little excitement

Set List – 11 Oct 2009 (Preview #2)

Service Notes

It has happened again!  Story Church hosted it’s second public service at Spring Valley Elementary School in Durham, NC.

How did we do against the points raised in our debrief meeting from Preview #1?

1. We all had jobs assigned and setup seemed to be much faster.
2. We had less obstacles this time – but this can always change!
3. We agreed a time when everything should be complete, to give us time to pray as a team and take up our positions before everyone arrived.
4. We had a better sized, and a way groovier screen this time.
5. I think transitions worked a lot better this time but there is still room for improvement here.
6. We are still borrowing from other sound systems, but getting closer to our goal.
7. We used a much better approach with the connection cards this time – i.e. mention it during announcements but let everyone fill them out in their own time.
8. We didn’t fumble when talking about the offering.
9. We had a different drummer this time and it still worked out great.  I loved flowing seamlessly from one song into another.  I’m still not sure people understand me when I talk!  I wanted to ask people to stand.  I should have asked people to stand.
10. Even though it’s hard work at times, it is exciting and fun to be a part of this.  That’s for sure!

Set List

• Praise Is Rising – Brenton Brown / Paul Baloche
• For Who You Are – Marty Sampson
• Announcements
• Glory To God Forever – Steve Fee / Vicky Beeching
• Holy Is The Lord – Chris Tomlin
• Cannons – Phil Wickham
• Message
• Praise Is Rising – Brenton Brown / Paul Baloche

Next Time

Our next preview service is on November 15 at 10am.  Note the time change.  The last two preview services were in the evening.  The next one will be in the morning and it’s going to be different for a few reasons.

• We will need to get up early to setup.  Boo.  ;-)
• The room will be lighter.
• Our pool of musicians may be smaller as people have commitments to other churches.
• Our congregation may be smaller as people have commitments to other churches.
• A few of us will need to know more about sound setup than we currently know.
• I’m flying to the UK straight after the service!

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See what other churches got up to this weekend over at Sunday Setlists.

The Joint Review: Christy Nockels – Life Light Up

Christy Nockels is a female vocalist and worship leader who over the years has been involved in the passion movement.  This is her first solo album outside of that and it’s great (in my humble opinion).

Her album contains a number of cover songs which has spawned a debate on The Joint on whether artists should record cover songs or not.  What do you think?  Head over there for the full review and participate in the conversation!

“Don’t get me wrong its is well done, has some good cover songs and She can sing like an angel, but nothing on this CD is exciting.”	“Life Light Up offers us 12 tracks that are a good blend of musical styles that I think helps us get a glimpse of Nockels own personality apart from the Passion crew.”
Joel Klampert	Connor Bryd
“Christy has got some serious vocal chops.  Her voice can be tender, emotional or powerful, and she does a great job matching the quality of the vocals to the songs. And she’s clearly a talented songwriter.”	“A great album from Christy.  Her voice is fantastic.  Her worship style is fresh and chirpy.”
Mike Mahoney	Alastair Vance

Visit The Joint for the full review of Hope Rising.

Set List – 07 Oct 2009

• Praise Is Rising – Paul Baloche / Brenton Brown
• From The Inside Out – Joel Houston
• Take All Of Me – Marty Sampson
• Surrender – Marc James

I led worship for Refuge Student Ministries tonight.  I loved reviving some old songs that I haven’t played in ages.  “Praise Is Rising” is new for me, so I’m playing that everywhere right now.  “From the Inside Out” and “Take All Of Me” are absolute classics and “Surrender” is a great worship song that fitted great with tonight’s theme.

Eyes Open? Eyes Closed?

Yes, the age old argument.  I’ve never been too fussed either way whether a worship leader keeps their eyes open or closed.  A bit of both works for me usually.

However last night I watched a video that made me think that the eyes OOpen thing can get a little weird.  Now, I like Chris as much as the next worship leader, but now I have his wee face burned into the back of my retinas after watching this.  In-flip-in-tense.

Set List – 03 Oct 2009

• Praise Is Rising – Paul Baloche / Brenton Brown
• For Who You Are – Marty Sampson

I introduced Praise Is Rising tonight.  I’ve been meaning to play it for ages and was reminded again recently when I reviewed the new Brenton Brown CD.  Everyone seemed to like the song, so it will definitely make the setlist for our 2nd preview service.

There is only one week left now to Oct 11 and we still need a drummer!  No panic!

Update Oct 05, 2009: We have a drummer.

(story church)

Story Church DB

I’m involved in a church plant and we hope to launch after a series of preview services on January 10 2010.  Church plant people will know that money does not grow on trees, so we need to come up with lots of imaginative ways to save cash.

One way of saving money is to write our own church database system.  This will end up potentially saving us $$$ every month that would normally go to a company like Fellowship One.

Initially our system will allow us to record adults and kids attending our services, and record giving.  The system will also provide a range of reports and email functionality.

I hope to chronicle the development of this system – codenamed StoryChurchDB – over at my geek blog snowjunkiedev.wordpress.com.  In the future we will probably look at making it generic and available to other churches, so please feel free to suggest features you’d love to see.