HBC service recaps: 1-15 May 2011

(Here’s a recap of the service and the songs we chose over the past weekends at Howick Baptist Church. You can find links to the set lists of this church and many other churches each week at theworshipcommunity.com. You can also read through previous HBC service recaps here.)

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Order of Service AM (1 May 2011)

(leader: Joe Fleener)

Props to Joe for taking the church through the gathered worship, even with a nagging cough!

Welcome
1. How Great is Our God – Chris Tomlin
Welcome/Notices/Pastoral Prayer — Peter
Mission Focus: For the start of the new month, we introduced Voice of the Martyrs, a ministry to the persecuted Church.

Scripture Reading — Psalms 26 and 27
2. Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise
3. How Deep the Father’s Love for Us
4. Grace Unmeasured

Message: Let No One Despise Your Youth – 1 Tim 4:12 (Peter Somervell)

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Order of Service AM (8 May 2011)

(leader: William Chong)

Welcome
Scripture Reading – Psalm 28 and 29
1. A Mighty Fortress – Martin Luther
2. How Great Thou Art
3. Grace Greater than our Sin
4. Jesus Paid It All
The Lord’s Table

Music item: Consider Christ – Bryson Smith, Philip Percival. This was a song from Emu Music we tried for the first time. Mandy sang a beautiful solo and I gave a simple guitar accompaniment. Fantastic words that sum up what Christ has done for us, and is still doing to “transform, renew and change me”, and that we can respond in thankfulness.

Message: Do Not Neglect Your Gift – 1 Tim 4:14 (Peter Somervell)

5. Wonderful Merciful Saviour

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Order of Service AM (15 May 2011)

(leader: Jon Scanlan)

Proud father of 4 Jon led the church in singing – it was a pretty busy Sunday morning so we sang four songs, all solid and well worth singing.

1. By Faith – Keith and Kristyn Getty, Stuart Townend. It’s still a bit low in the verses, after doing it all these times. Might have to make some parts in B flat instead of A in the near future.

A special guest from Myanmar, Dr Aung Mang spoke to us briefly.

Reading: Psalm 30

2. All I Have Is Christ – Devon Kauflin. We sang this right after watching a great video of it, set in the context of a persecuted Christian.
3. Salvation’s Song – Andrew Small, Stuart Townend.

Message – Fear Not, Stand Firm, and See the Salvation of the Lord – Exodus 3 to 14 (Joe Fleener)

4. Salvation Belongs to our God

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– William Chong

On improving your web browsing productivity

Get back to work!

Here’s a stat I read recently: one-third of women between 18-34 years of age check Facebook when they first wake up (before even getting up for the bathroom). I cringe because I find myself doing the same thing often. And then when I eventually get to my computer, I would be loathe to count how many hours I’ve spent procrastinating instead of working on an imminent work project.

In a post today, author Tim Challies explains how he’s found it helpful to use a blocking tool called Leechblock to improve his productivity at the computer. This tool would be particularly useful for people who work from home (e.g. myself), as well as those who work without any supervision for most of the day (e.g. students, pastors, etc).

Anyways, the original Leechblocker can be found here – however, it’s only available for Firefox.

From a quick search, here are some alternatives, whether it’s for another browser or for all browsers on your computer:

  • Google Chrome – StayFocused. This has most of the features from Leechblocker. It includes a devilishly hard challenge that you must type correctly, with NO mistakes before you can change settings that you’ve set up (in case you’re tempted to tweak them afterwards). I replaced it with the words from Psalm 119:32-37.
  • For those on Windows, you could try BinarySwitch. It doesn’t have as many features but it works across ALL your browsers.
  • For those on Macs, SelfControl is a simple tool that works not just for your internet browser, but also for any other apps you want to list in the program as well.

Of course, simply installing external tools without also examining our hearts and desires would make this a futile exercise. Our hearts are weak in that I know even if I was successful in improving the productivity of my internet browsing, I could just as easily waste time on other things, like playing video games, chatting, emails, changing your wallpaper. Even the Apostle Paul acknowledged that sins remained a battle through his life (Romans 7:21-8:4). So it’s not enough to simply change our habits to have victory over an area of our life (you could extend this to other spheres like mobile phone use, pornography, bible reading, prayer/devotional time).

Additionally, forcing ourselves into external changes – without acknowledging our need for the Spirit of Christ to empower our actions – will inevitably lead to a period of ability, then failure when our own self-effort is unable to sustain the work, and our subsequent guilt discourages us from continuing the effort. Perhaps even worse, if it’s by sheer willpower we sustain these habits, then we just get a proud heart, thinking that we were able to do it on our own.

So if you trust Christ as your  Lord and Saviour, take heart that His finished work not only brings us from darkness to light, but clothes us with power to do what is right. Perhaps for you and me, one of these internet browser tools might be one of His means to do that.

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– William Chong

A word about Powerpoint in church

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Here’s a thought-provoking quote from Tim Challies’s book “The Next Story”:

“It is usually only after a new technology is invented that we use our creativity and ingenuity to find ways of integrating it into our lives. This exacerbates its unintended consequences. If a technology was created specifically for business application and we adapt it to a worship service, we will see that there are some businesslike ideologies wrapped up in that technology (eg when we take PowerPoint from the boardroom to the sanctuary).” – p.62

I’m finding it a fantastic read at the moment, and it’s really challenging me to identify why I use the technologies around me the way I do, and to have almost a theology of technology. Challies draws much of his research from a guy named Neil Postman, a technologist whose work I’d probably be interested in reading in the future too!

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– William

Why people sing in church

Thought I’d share a quote from a conversation between DA Carson and Tony Payne. Here, Carson suggests what he’d say during a church gathering/service to explain why there’s singing.

“Historically Christians are a singing people because we have so much to sing about. In this church, we sing songs from centuries past, and songs that have been written in the last five years. We’ll sing some of both tonight. And if some of these lyrics seem strange to you, nevertheless listen to the people of God as we delight to sing to the God who made us and has redeemed us.”

I’d say something like that. Then the very joy of corporate singing can have a telling effect on people. When I was here for the Katoomba Men’s Convention, I heard reports of guys who had never been to a Christian meeting of any sort, dialling up their wives on their mobile phones and saying, “Dear, these guys are nuts but just listen to them sing” and holding up their phones.

And of course there’s plenty in the Scriptures to help us understand the value of singing in a gathering of believers (Col 3:16-17, many of the Psalms, 1 Cor 14).

The  rest of the discussion is worth a read –  it articulates (much better) some of the same thoughts we explored as a music team a couple of weeks back when discussing our definitions of worship.

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– William

HBC Easter Weekend recap: grace behind the scenes

(Here’s a recap of the service and the songs we chose this past weekend at Howick Baptist Church. You can find links to the set lists of this church and many other churches each week at theworshipcommunity.com. You can also read through previous HBC service recaps here.)

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Easter Weekend is always a busy time if you’re involved in music ministry. By God’s grace we made it through three different services. Instead of starting with observations of what you may already have seen, I’m going to share about some behind-the-scene moments and thoughts:

  • “He’s gone home to get the CD” – About 10 minutes before the Good Friday service was meant to commence, we got word from that Luke (our youth intern) need to rush home to grab a missing music/video file for the youth group’s drama presentation (a modified version of the Lifehouse – Everything skit). So we had to shift that item from where it was earlier in the order to after Joe’s message so that there would be enough time for Luke to get back. By God’s providence, the clear gospel presentation from Joe helped to set the framework for understanding the metaphors and the themes presented by the teens, and it all weaved together perfectly. Yes, it made for a very tense morning praying that the Lord would keep Luke safe on his last-minute dash (to Manurewa and back!)
  • Guitar stops working – I was slated to play a solo of “Man of Sorrows” after all that. And as the big moment arrived, I stood in front of the congregation, I picked up my guitar… and realised it had no sound (it’s a semiacoustic). Frantic looks at the sound desk. Quick glance behind me at the mass of cables. I ended up just playing it without amplification which meant folks at the back of the church only heard vocals. But in all that God humbled me to not think too highly of my own abilities, and some people commented that without the guitar, they were able to focus more on the fantastic words. Praise the Lord!
  • He is risen! he is nervous! On Easter Sunday… not really sure why, but under all the expectation I didn’t feel as relaxed as other weeks. Fluffed through the opening welcome, and even as I was describing the scene on the third day in preparation for singing the Getty’s Resurrection Hymn, I mixed up the gospel accounts and spoke of the angel rather than Jesus appearing to the women.
  • I love what I do – I think it was about 2 hours into the Thursday night rehearsal, in the midst of the laughing as someone said something funny, and looking around at the team, that a thought clearly hit me: God has been so good to bless me with such wonderful ministry partners. It’s so good that I can’t think of anyone in the team that doesn’t have a heart attitude to serve the church during our gathered worship. It’s so good that I can’t think of anyone that wants to be on team for the ego trip, or for the status and prominence. It’s wonderful to see, and it makes me love serving alongside these brothers and sisters in Christ! To God be the glory!

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Here’s the songs we chose over the Easter weekend…

Order of Service (22 April 2011, Good Friday)

(worship leader: William Chong)

Welcome: Isaiah 52-53

1. How Deep the Father’s Love for Us – Stuart Townend.
2. Jesus Thank You – Pat Sczebel.

Message – The Most Tragic Death The World Has Ever Known (Joe Fleener)

180 Youth Drama Presentation

3. Man of Sorrows – Philip B Bliss, arr. David Potter. I  made a recording of it here.

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Order of Service (24 April 2011, Easter Sunday)

(worship leader: William Chong)

Welcome

1. Jesus Came to Earth – Solomon Campbell, Daved Campbell, Bob Kauflin. We had the Sunday School children lead us in singing this song. Great stuff!
2. Resurrection Hymn (See What a Morning) – Pat Sczebel.

Announcements

Reading: Psalm 25

3. The Greatest of All – Pat Sczebel, Fanny Crosby.

4. How Deep the Father’s Love For Us – Stuart Townend.

Message: God’s Right-hand Man (Peter Somervell)

5. In Christ Alone – Townend/Getty.

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– William