Worship Team Report

Highlights

As ever, the Worship teams feel very privileged to serve Tillicoultry Baptist Church in music and worship. We really are a church who love to sing, and the joy of getting together as a community to raise our voices in worship continues week after week. There is something of the Kingdom to be seen when we are united in praise of our great God.

Trying to pick out individual highlights is difficult as these things are so very personal. I wonder if it might be more helpful to review a couple of the things which seem  to characterise our worship.

Good music

For a small town and a small church we do seem to attract rather a lot of musicians! We continue to strive to do the best we can, musically. Things are never perfect, and we can be a little hard on ourselves for that, but the teams do work hard to make sure that we help the church to sing worship.  There are almost 20 musicians and singers who give up a lot of time to practice and play, and we are thankful for their willingness to serve. It is a huge amount of fun, too, and we have  been blessed by serving.

A strong team

There have been a fair few changes in the teams over this year. Marion has had to step down for various reasons, and we are very thankful for her joyful service enthusiasm over the past few years. Gill Sword has been singing from the chairs rather than behind a mic, and we miss her voice and presence on the worship teams - welcome back anytime! Jon has also decided to take a step back too. We will miss his contribution to the music, and his wisdom and support have been a great blessing to me personally. We have been glad to welcome Malcolm back with his massive guitar collection, and to have George playing more regularly. Andy and Ruth Walker and Joseph’s talents have been great additions, and we look forward to more leading from Andy.

We've had some great special services this year, and big thanks go to Bob McQueen, who gave a great deal of energy to making sure the Devonvale service went well.

We had new sound folks too, and are always grateful for their willingness to try and make us sound good. The projection team are another group of unsung heroes. It’s not an easy task at times, especially when plans change mid-service.

To help us grow together as a team, and to work out how we do discipleship as a group, we have initiated a monthly music team meeting. This is a bit of a mix of band practice and small group. We hope this will be a good opportunity for us to discern where God is leading us as we seek to serve the church better.

There is also a blog which is currently available to Worship team members but if anyone is interested in following along with new songs, bits of writing and inspiration we have come across do get in touch and you can have an invitation!

Stories

Worship is most definitely not confined to singing. Some of the most amazing moments on Sunday mornings over the past year have been the times when we’ve heard stories from one another of how God is at work. We’ve been aware of the inspiring way He is transforming lives amongst our church family and further afield as we've learned about mission trips and Street Pastors, and heard other personal stories. Easter Sunday this year was particularly powerful. The various folks standing up and proclaiming why they believe in the resurrection will not be forgotten soon.

We would love to hear from more voices on Sunday morning, so let’s tell one another more stories. May God raise our expectations of what He can do through and with us, and let us consider how we can spur one another on to love and good deeds (Heb 10:24)!

Challenges

Complexity

“Always measure your life solely by the standards of Jesus. Submit yourself to His yoke, and His alone; and always be careful never to place a yoke on others that is not of Jesus Christ. It takes God a long time to get us to stop thinking that unless everyone sees things exactly as we do, they must be wrong. That is never God’s view. There is only one true liberty— the liberty of Jesus at work in our conscience enabling us to do what is right.”

Oswald Chambers

Sunday morning services are incredibly complicated things! Can you think of any other area of life where there is such an age range represented, and such a mix of styles, preferences and expectations to cram into an hour and 20 minutes? Putting together a service which incorporates  time for sung worship, something to engage the children and young people, fits in teaching and preaching, allows for prayer, gives space for meaningful communion, transmits information about events and meetings, and balances both joyful celebration and quiet reflection is no mean feat. No wonder the queue for coffee sometimes stretches up the aisle!

It is a continual challenge and responsibility for the Worship Team Leaders (Gyda, Jacqueline, Colin, Gillian and Alastair) along with Peter to do this well. We would ask for your prayers and patience as we seek God’s wisdom and the Holy Spirit’s inspiration.

We know that there are times when we choose songs or styles or orders of things which would not be your first choice. There are times we get it wrong, and services when things are out of balance or hurried. We believe God can take our weakness and failures and transform them into something which will bring Him glory...and this does happen, by His grace, time after time on Sunday mornings.

Sunday evening worship times can be a lovely time for quieter praise and prayer. If you find Sunday mornings a bit full on, please do come along some evening. These will continue monthly for now, but we welcome your feedback and suggestions.

On that note, we believe that church works best when we do things in community. If you have comments or ideas about Sunday morning services, or the worship at Tillicoultry Baptist Church, please do share that with us.

Diversity and encountering God

“Spiritual experiences aren’t meant to be homogeneous, only harmonious – not in unison, but in unity.” - Sue Monk Kidd

Each of us comes to worship with our own baggage and our own stories. Some of us have bold and extravagant experiences of the presence of God, some of us struggle with doubt. Some of us find it easy to “feel” worship, and to respond visibly and loudly. Some of us are less inclined to respond emotionally and to the onlooker might look less “worshippy”. Some of us like to sing and dance, some of us prefer to stand in quiet contemplation. Some of us are tempted to wonder if there’s something “wrong” with the way we respond to God. Some of us may be tempted to judge the person standing beside us for seeming to worship in a different way.

And you know the beautiful thing? None of us worship “right”, and none of us worship “wrong”. We are all broken, messed up, imperfect, forgiven children of a perfect Father who loves us with unending love.  Zephaniah talks of our God taking delight in us, calming our fears, and rejoicing over us with singing. I don’t know about you, but that inspires me to come to worship.

Here is the good news for Tillicoultry Baptist Church. He longs to bless us with more of Himself. How that looks for me may be completely different to how it looks for you. That is not important. The important thing is for us as a community to devote ourselves to seeking Him in spirit and truth, to asking Him how He wants to lead us on. All I know for sure about how this works  is that we will not be the same once we encounter Him.

So, as we gather as a diverse bunch of people, perhaps the heart of the matter is that we decide to be a community which seeks encounter with our living, active, powerful God. Our worship may well be different from anything we’ve known before, but we can be sure that we will see our lives, and lives around us, changed.

Question

Last year’s ministry area report concluded with the big questions “is our expectation of  God too low, are we seeing real transformation and encounter with God, do we hunger and thirst for more”. Unsurprisingly, there are no neatly measurable answers to them after 12 months have passed! The theme of discipleship has been born out of these and similar  questions, and I believe that as a church we continue to work these things out together and as individuals.

So where next for 2014/15?

“You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart”.

Jeremiah 29 v 13

The question stirring in me as we end another year together is, am I really prepared to seek God with all my heart? Am I prepared to lay aside my own ambitions, ideas and plans, to humble myself, to seek His face and pray?

Are we, collectively as the expression of the Church here in Tillicoultry, stumbling towards Jesus together? Are we asking for His grace to enable us to seek Him with our whole heart?

May God bless us as we work this out together, and may we see more of the Kingdom coming here as it has always been and will always be in Heaven.