Reflections on the Music from 5/16/10

Reflections on the Music from 5/16/10
by Alden Powers, Worship Leader @Roosevelt Community Church

As I mentioned in last week’s blog, the music I pick for the opening set tries to follow a progression from acknowledging our sinfulness and need of salvation, being assured of our salvation and praising God for our salvation. To this end, here are the songs I picked and why.

“More Like You”

Lincoln Brewster’s song “More Like You” sets the worshipper in the right mindset. Using Isaiah 55:9: “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts”; we acknowledge that we are sinful and God is Holy. Until we admit this, we can never truly worship God because we will have a wrong idea of who God is. God is the supreme, righteous, holy, wrathful, loving and eternal God and we are his fallen creation. We need to be more like Him, and not the other way around which our sinful nature tempts us to feel.

“You Are Good”

So if we are to be more like God, then what is God like? God is good … … ALL THE TIME. He is never changing and his mercy endures forever. Israel Houghton’s song “You Are Good” is a great song to sing about this.

“Those Who Trust”

Now we begin the “assurance” part of our singing. As Psalm 125 tells us, those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion, they cannot be moved. When we put our faith in the Lord Jesus and now live for Him, then we will be unmovable and eternal like our great God.

Reading

I then read a passage from Mark Dever’s book The Gospel and Personal Evangelism. The passage in mind is a great reminder of what exactly this good news is that we celebrate and proclaim to the world. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to grow in their evangelistic skills.

“Forever Blessed be the Lord”

This is an arrangement of an old hymn done by Park Slope Church. It’s on an album called Kingsborough Hymns Vol. 1. Now that we have assurance that we stand forgiven because of the righteous sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we rejoice and sing “Allelujah! Allelujah! His shall be the praise!"

“Jesus Draw Me Close”

I love to sing this song after communion. It’s a great song we can sing to help us now recommit our lives to worshiping and obeying Jesus Christ.,which is what is called of us after partaking in the Lord’s Table.