Christ Community Church 10/18/09

(This post is included in this week’s Sunday Setlists blog carnival). Yesterday was my first experience as a guest worship leader at Christ Community Church.  For the last three years, my home church has provided worship leaders and musicians to this small, rural congregation in McMinnville, TN.  Here was my set.

1. You’re Worthy of My Praise (David Ruis).  I learned to use this song as a backdrop for declaring Deut. 6:4-5 (what the Jewish tradition calls the “Shema“) from my worship pastor Rob Still.  I use it as a call to worship.  Key:  E.
2. Hallelujah (You’re Love Is Amazing) (Brown/Doerksen).  Key G, but end on C.
3. Hallelujah, What a Savior (arr. Jeremy Johnson).  I love this hymn and Jeremy’s treatment of it.  Key:  G-A.
4. O Praise Him (David Crowder).  I like this song, but it tends to be more difficult to pull off than I think it will be.  Key:  A
5. The Wonderful Cross (Tomlin/Watts/Walt/Reeves/Mason).  I love this.  I dropped my 6th string to D and my drummer introduced a subtle march feel on the snare in the second verse.  This was probably my favorite moment of the set.  It’s how we set up communion.  We sang all three verses without the chorus, there was a communion mediation (which we continued to soflty play under), then we repeated verse 3 and finally did the chorus.  Key:  D.
6. Mighty to Save (Morgan/Fielding).  The church likes to have upbeat music during an informal passing-the-peace time that is affectionately referred to as “meet-n-greet” (welcome to the south).  This was mostly instrumental save for singing the chorus to gather the congregation back together.  Key:  A.
7. As It Is In Heaven (Maher/Cash).  This was Dave’s request as a closer to his sermon.  We did it without the bridge and the pre-chorus to keep things reflective on the text of the Lord’s prayer, especially the “Let Your kingdom come” lyric.  Doing it this way was abetter fit to the sermon.  We did it with keys and finger-picking acoustic, no other rhythm players.

There is always a degree of uncertainty when leading worship at a new church, but Pastor Paul and the other warm folks there quickly put me at ease.  My time was also made easier by the company of Dave Durham and Karlton Scott from Belmont.  Dave was not only my keyboard player, but brought the message as well.  It was a fine first time for me.