Barry Westman

We had a wonderful morning of worship today at Bethel, using Romans 8 as the basis for the service.  What an encouraging and promise-filled chapter! Another huge first today was using a click track on one of our songs! I also used the Honor The Brave Countdown from Jitterbug Media for  Memorial Day today – very powerful! This post is part of the Sunday Setlist blog carnival at The Worship Community.

Contemporary Services

So the big news this week in our Contemporary Service was that we were going to try to use click tracks this week for the first time.  We’ve talked about doing this for a while, but after attending the All About Worship Retreat last week, I was inspired and encouraged and informed by talking with other worship leaders, so I decided to finally just try it.  It was quite an adventure, but that whole story is for another blog. You can watch the video of this service and see the Planning Center details.

“God Is With Us Now” (Walker Beach)
–  This is a brand new song that we introduced today from Gateway Worship’s God Be Praised CD.  I’ve been looking for more upbeat service opener type songs, and this one is great. It’s challenging for the band, with lots of punches, breaks and rhythms; a great call to worship. Since Romans 8 was the basis for the message today, I tied in each of the songs with one verse from Romans 8, and read the verse before the song. For this song, I used Romans 8:38 – nothing can ever separate us from the love of God.

“Our God” (Matt Redman, Chris Tomlin and others)
– I used verse 31 here – If God is for us, who could be against us.  We added a click track on this song today, and I have to say it was very challenging! This was our first time using a click track on any song, so it was a new experience for us all.  I downloaded the files from Praise Charts, which included a click on the left, and loop on the right. We used both, sending the click to our in-ears only, and the loop to both the ears and house.  I still have so many questions that I would like to ask those of you who use clicks, but again, that’s for a separate entry. Needless to say, it went OK – meaning, no train wrecks where we had to start over or turn off the click. We made it through. But, I wouldn’t say any of us enjoyed it, or felt more confident because of the click. Our focus was entirely on staying together with the click. The song lacked emotion and joy because we were all so worried about getting ahead of the click.  It was a good challenge, though, and I’m sure that the more we use them the easier it will get – I hope!

“Your Love Never Fails” (Chris McClarney and Anthony Skinner)
– One of my favorites right now! The promise from Romans 8 in this song comes in verse 28 – “God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God.”

“Victory” (Cody Carnes)
– This is another new song from Gateway Worship that ties in just perfectly with our study of Romans. We’ve used it before in this series, and people are starting to know it now and really singing out. It’s such a great song! We used Romans 8:1-2 here where it says the Spirit has freed us from the power of sin.

“You Never Let Go” (Matt Redman and Beth Redman)
– A great way to close our service with this reminder of the promise that if our God is for us, who could stand against us!

 

Cafe Connection Service

I led the team this morning in here from the keyboard, with Zack on percussion/tenor, Brenda and Rob (1st time!) on vocals, and Jake on bass guitar.  They did a great job, and it’s always fun to be part of this service! You can see the Planning Center details for this service.

“Matchless” (Aaron Shust)

“Our God” (Matt Redman, Chris Tomlin and others)
– Since we were in the Cafe, I found the acoustic version of this song on Tomlin’s CD, which actually worked great in this setting.  A nice change of pace for the song.

“Your Love Never Fails” (Chris McClarney and Anthony Skinner)

“You Never Let Go” (Matt Redman and Beth Redman)

 

Traditional Service

Rick led the team today in here, and from what I heard they did super!  You can see the Planning Center details for this service.

“Holy God, We Praise Thy Name”

“Glorious Is Thy Name”

“I Will Sing the Wondrous Story”

“All That Thrills My Soul”

“O Love That Will Not Let Me Go”

“And Can It Be?”

We had a great day today, although it was nothing like a regular Sunday! I spent a few days this week in Kansas City for the All About Worship Retreat. It was a wonderful! (But that’s for another blog post…) Since I was gone this week, I had other people scheduled to lead the teams this morning, so I was able to just make sure things ran smoothly off stage. For the last service, I actually was able to sit with my family and worship together, which is a rare thing! This  post is part of the Sunday Setlist at The Worship Community.

Contemporary Services

Marv led the team in these services, and the whole team did a great job!  We had a guest speaker today talking about how God in creation, and how creation glorifies God, based on Psalm 19.  You can watch the video of this service and also see the Planning Center details.

“Majestic” (Lincoln Brewster) 

“Cannons” (Phil Wickham)
– A great song that tied right into our theme. One of my favorites right now.

“I Will Follow You” (Chris Tomlin)

“Indescribable” (Laura Story)

Cafe Connection Service

Zack led the team in here today, along with a great team! You can see the Planning Center details for this service.

“Cannons” (Phil Wickham)

“Give Us Clean Hands” (Charlie Hall)

“Majestic” (Lincoln Brewster)

Traditional Service

Rob led the team, and did a great job preparing the transitions and leading the others. It was great to have Dee back with us, too! You can watch the video of this service and see the Planning Center details.

“Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing”

“Praise the Lord, Ye Heavens  Adore Him”

“This Is My Father’s World”

“Fairest Lord Jesus’

“I Sing the Mighty Power of God”

This morning at Bethel was a unique morning, with a special presentation of our Spring Musical, “Until the Whole World Hears”! This post is part of the Sunday Setlist blog carnival  at The Worship Community, where you can read stories of what took place in churches around the country this weekend.

Instead of having our regular four services, we had two special presentations of “Until the Whole World Hears”, which is actually just a collection of all the songs on the latest release by  Casting Crowns, arranged for choir by Travis Cottrell.  We added our own narration between the songs, and rearranged the order of songs for flow, and put it all together in a musical format.

We had close to 50 people in the choir, 5 in the praise team, several soloists, plus a narrator.  There were several familiar songs where we included the congregation. It was a great morning of worship! We only do this once a year, so people look forward to it, and it has been a great way to get more people involved with the worship ministry. We’ve been working on this since February, one rehearsal a week.

You can watch the video of our performance, and also see the Planning Center details.

Songs
“Joyful, Joyful” (Beethoven/Hall)
– The old familiar hymn redone Casting Crowns style!

“Holy One” (Bronleewe/Garrard/Hall/Ingram)
– A nice, energetic song of praise – with choir and praise team

“Shadow of Your Wings” (Mark Hall)
– One of my favorites – love the moving parts and high energy!

“Always Enough” (Armstrong/Cash/Hall)
 – A solid ballad about God’s faithfulness.

“Blessed Redeemer” (Avis B. Christeanse/Hall/Herms)
– This was actually an old hymn repackaged in contemporary style. Very nice! I wasn’t familiar with the original hymn, so I wouldn’t have known that unless I knew the background.

“Jesus, Hold Me Now” (Hall/Herms)
– Very nice solo with choir and piano

“Mercy” (Hall/de Jong/Levine/Tofa)
– This was another great solo with choir song. But, our soloist for this one called me the night before and said she had no voice! Unfortunately, we ended up skipping this song in our musical – too bad!

“At Your Feet” (Hall/Ingram)
– Another nice one for solo and choir!

“If We’ve Ever Needed You” (Hall/Herms)
– This is one where we added the congregation since it was so familiar.

“To Know You” (Hall/Herms/Ingram)
– This was one of the choir’s favorites, as heard by the explosion of sound each time we got the chorus – they sang it out!

“Until the Whole World Hears” (Glidewell/Hall/Herms/McArthur)
– This title song of the musical was another one where we added the congregation and praise team. Powerful song challenging us to take his message out into the world.

“Glorious Day (Living He Loved Me)”  (Chapman/Bleecker/Hall)
– This song also comes from and old hymn called “One Day”, redone by Mark Hall. Our church has been singing it since before Easter, so  it was nice to end with this one that everyone knew so well and could sing it out strong!

Our tech crew did a great job keeping everything running smoothly, and I was so happy with the choir and all the other singers! The recording quality on the video link here really does not do the choir and singers justice. You don’t get the same effect watching it back as it was hearing in person and the room sound/mix. But, it will still give you an idea of what the event was like.

Putting one of these things together is a lot of work, but the reward is so great, and so much fun! I love directing the choir, and this type of event draws people in that aren’t normally involved with the ongoing worship ministry. This group feeds people into our monthly Worship Choir, and that feeds people into our worship teams, so this is a very important part of our worship ministry here.

Our church was full yesterday, too, probably a result of combing 4 services into 2, but also because we encouraged the choir members and others to invite friends, family, co-workers and we had many guests there!

Thanks to Travis Cottrell for doing such a great job of arranging these powerful songs for choir, and to Mark Hall and crew at Casting Crowns!

We had a wonderful time of worship this morning and a celebration of Mother’s Day at Bethel.  For Mother’s Day, we used the Card For Mom Countdown, from Shift Worship before the service, and then The Mom Song video from The Skit Guys during the offering. Both received a very good response – they were great!  We’re going through the book of Romans in church, and today we went through Chapter 7, with a message called “Fighting A Dead Man”. This post is part of the Sunday Setlist blog carnival at The Worship Community.

Contemporary Services

Our team today did a great job! We only had 2 singers on the team, versus 3-4 as we normally have. We still had 3 pt harmony, though with a couple of guys in the band singing as well. It was a nice tight sound, though. How many singers do you normally have on your team?  You can see the Planning Center details and watch the video of this service.

“Praise Him” (Klaus Kuehn and Thomas Miller)
– We introduced this new song today from Gateway Worship’s  God Be Praised album. I was looking for a new fast, upbeat opener and this song worked great! It’s easy to learn, and the words are right from the Psalms! I read Psalm 98:7 as an intro to it.

“Glorified” (Jared Anderson)
– Another one of my recent favorites – such a great song to use as we begin to sing our praises to Him. Our church knows it well now, so it was great to see everyone singing it out!

“Forever Reign” (Jason Ingram and Reuben Morgan)
– Getting to be a classic! Powerful worship song.

“You Alone Can Rescue” (Matt Redman and Jonas Myrin)
– I wasn’t originally planning on using this song today, but our pastor asked if we could do it, because it tied in great with his last point. He was right – it was a perfect way to end the service today. We go back and forth using the Passion version and the version we used today, which is Matt Redman’s original version on “We Will Not Be Shaken”.  I like the piano intro on this version, and today I actually tried playing that piano lick on the last chorus too, which I hadn’t done before.

Cafe Connection Service

Zack led the team today in the Cafe, with Brenda singing, Chris on percussion and Jake on bass. It was Curt’s first time on sound and Makenzie’s first time on Easy Worship. The crew did great! You can see the Planning Center details for this service.

“Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone)” (Chris Tomlin)
– Zack really nailed the guitar part on this song today, working out some really interesting chord progressions!

“Your Grace Is Enough” (Matt Maher)

“What Can I Do?” (Paul Baloche and Graham Kendrick)
– A morning in the Cafe wouldn’t be complete without at least one Paul Baloche song!

“Lift High” (Steve Fee and Eddie Kirkland)
– Great song by Fee!

Traditional Service

The team today did a great job in this service! You can see the Planning Center details and watch the video of this service.

“Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven”

“Praise To The Lord, The Almighty”

“My Jesus, I Love Thee”

“Mother’s Day Hymn”
– I found this hymn several years ago, and we’ve used it pretty much every Mother’s Day since.  It’s a hymn that honors mothers at all stages and life and even those who have already went to be with the Lord.  It’s set to the familiar HYFRYDOL tune, and written by Gary Tapley. I can send a copy of it to you, if you’d like. Just leave me a comment.

“He Lifted Me” 

What a wonderful weekend of celebrations! We had our Good Friday service, which was very powerful, we celebrated the wedding of one our worship ministry members on Saturday, then we celebrated Resurrection Sunday! I was so wiped out from all the celebrating that I’m writing this recap Monday morning instead of Sunday afternoon.  This post is part of the Sunday Setlist blog at The Worship Community, where you can read recaps of worship services from around the world.

Good Friday Service

Did your church have a Good Friday service? It’s been a really neat tradition here to have a service on Good Friday focusing on the cross, and also celebrating communion.  This year, we used a little pamphlet by John Piper called “10 Reasons Jesus Had To Die” as the basis for our service. Each of the 5 pastors took two of the reasons, and we interspersed each pastor’s talk with music, videos and communion. It all came together really well! You can see the Planning Center details here and also watch the video.

“This Is How We Know” (Matt Redman and Beth Redman)
– We actually read John 3:16 together before we sang this song, as this song is based on that verse and others. Great song with a great piano lick! 🙂

“More Than Amazing” (Lincoln Brewster and Mia Fieldes)
– One of my favorites right now! So easy to sing, and with the reference to the familiar hymn in the bridge, it really makes a great song for all generations.

“The Wonderful Cross” (Chris Tomlin)

“The Wonder of the Cross” (Vicky Beeching)
– We used this song and the next one during our time of communion. We did communion differently this time; usually we pass out the elements, but during this service we asked people to come up to a table to get the elements, and then either take them at the front or take them back to their seats and take them as a family.  Instead of us leading them through, we just had the music playing and they were more on their own. It was neat to see everyone come up and take it together. This song is one of my favorites from Vicky!

“Sweetly Broken” (Jeremy Riddle)

“Jesus Messiah” (Chris Tomlin, Ed Cash, Jesse Reeves)
– Always a favorite way to end this service!

Contemporary Easter Services

What a celebration we had this morning!  We had the full worship team and worship choir leading us today. We followed up our theme on Good Friday this morning with “10 Reasons Jesus Had To Rise”.   We also used two videos – “He Rose” from Centerline and “Come Awake” with Matt Maher’s song “Christ Is Risen”.  You can see the Planning Center details.

“Alive, Forever Amen” (Travis Cottrell, David Moffitt, Sue C. Smith)
– This is one of our team’s favorite Easter songs! We first used it in a musical we did a few years ago, and we’ve been using it ever since. Very fun song to sing, and perfect for Easter!

“My Savior Lives” (Jon Egan  and Glenn Packiam)

“Glorious” (Paul Baloche and Brenton Brown)

“Glorious Day (Living He Loved Me)” (Casting Crowns)
–  A new song by Casting Crowns using the words to the old hymn “One Day” with a new melody. Great song!

“My Redeemer Lives” (Reuben Morgan)
– Wow, it’s been a long time since we’ve done this one! I was looking for an upbeat closer that everyone knew, and this one came to mind. It was so fun with the choir leading and praise team singing the backup vocal parts! He lives!

Cafe Connection Video Venue

Zack led the team this morning in the Cafe, and Patti did such a neat job making it festive in there! Andrew led the service since Jamie was preaching this morning with Pastor Tim.  You can see a pic below of the Cafe crew in their Easter suits!  Here’s the Planning Center details.

“My Savior Lives” (Jon Egan and Glenn Packiam)

“Jesus Paid It All”

(John Thomas Grape, Elvina M. Hall and Alex Nifong)
– This was the Passion arrangement of this song, which keeps all the verses and chorus, then adds a new bridge.  The team did a great job!

“My Redeemer Lives” (Reuben Morgan)

“Alive, Forever Amen” (Travis Cottrell, David Moffitt, Sue C. Smith)

Traditional Easter Service

We sang many familiar, favorite Easter hymns in this service and Rick sang “The Holy City” as special music with piano. He did a great job! You can see the Planning Center details and watch the video.

“Alleluia, Alleluia!”

“Christ the Lord Is Risen Today”

“Christ Arose”

“He Lives”

“The Holy City” (Stephen R. Adams)
– Rick sang this as a solo, and I accompanied on piano. Wow, it’s been a long time since I’ve heard this song, but what a powerful story! Great job, Rick!

“Because He Lives”

We had a great morning of worship today on this Palm Sunday! Along with one or two songs related to Palm Sunday, (it’s hard to find specific things about that, but of course we used Paul Baloche’s “Hosanna”), we also continued our series in Romans, and had a special baptism service! We also used a hilarious video today from the Skit Guys – their “Easter Invite”  video. Very well received and so funny!!  This post is part of the Sunday Setlist blog at The Worship Community, where you can read worship recaps from other worship leaders.

Contemporary Services

The team did a great job today – we focused on Palm Sunday with “Hosanna”, then on God’s reign, and also on God’s justification from Romans 5. We finished with a baptism of 3 individuals. It was quite a grab bag of themes today! You can see the video of this  service and the Planning Center details.

“Hosanna” (Paul Baloche and Brenton Brown)
– One of the few tunes I’ve found that works well relating directly to Palm Sunday. What did you find to use for today? I’d love to get more ideas I can jot down for next year!

“The Lord Reigns” (Klaus Kuehn)
– I did two songs in a row about the reign of God. It actually tied in perfectly with Pastor Tim’s message, an outcome I didn’t plan on!  This is a great upbeat, fast song of praise!

“God You Reign” (Lincoln Brewster and Mia Fieldes)
–  We did this song and the previous in B, so it was a smooth transition from one to the next with both key and theme. Great song!

“You Alone Can Rescue” (Jonas Myrin and Matt Redman)
– We did kind of a mix of the Passion arrangement and the Matt Redman arrangement today.

“Happy Day” (Ben Cantelon and Tim Hughes)
– This is normally a song we would do on Easter, but it fit so well with today’s theme from Romans 5, that I thought we’d use it this week.  The team does such a great job on this one, and it’s always so fun to do! It also led very well into our baptism service.

Cafe Connection

Things were back to normal in the Cafe this week, after a bunch of mishaps with the technology last week. Adam led the team today – for the last time… 😦  Thanks for the great job you’ve done in the Cafe, Adam!  You can see the Planning Center details for this service.

“Meet With Me” (Lamont Hiebert)

“Salvation Is Here” (Joel Houston)

“Happy Day” (Ben Cantelon and Tim Hughes)

“Nothing But The Blood” (Matt Redman)

Traditional Service

We did the most for Palm Sunday in this service, with a few reading, and several hymns related to Palm  Sunday. The team did a great job. You can watch the video of this service and see the Planning Center details.

“Hosanna, Loud Hosanna”

“In the Name of the Lord” (Gloria Gaither, Sandi Patti, Phil McHugh)

“All Glory, Laud and Honor”

“We Will Glorify” (Twila Paris)

“I Will Sing of My Redeemer”

“He Lifted Me”

We had a very full morning of worship today at Bethel, and a few surprises as well.  Pastor Tim was back and we continued our walk through Romans with Ch. 5 with “Living Like a King”.  Usually I post a link to the video of our services, but part of our camera system wasn’t working this week, and we weren’t able to livestream or record today.  This post is part of the Sunday Setlists at The Worship Community, where you can read worship recaps from other worship leaders.

Contemporary Services

The team did a great job today! It was a little bitter-sweet, though, as it was Bekah’s last time on the team before she gets married and off on their own.  She has done such a great job over the years! Sad to not be able to work with her now, but hopefully will get the opportunity to again in the future! It’s been great to have Aaron, a 9th grader,  join us on guitar recently! He’s doing a great job! You can see the Planning Center details for this service.

“You, You Are God” (Walker Beach)

“Glorious One” (Steve Fee)

“How  Great Is Our God” (Chris Tomlin, Ed Cash, Jesse Reeves)

“Glorious Day (Living He Loved Me)” (Michael Bleeker and Mark Hall)
–  This was the first time we’ve used this one, and it seemed to go over very well! We’re going to be using it at Easter, so I wanted to teach it to the congregation now. We’ll also be singing it as part of our Spring Musical in May. If you’re not familiar with it, Casting Crowns took the words to the old hymn “One  Day”, and added a new melody. Great song!

 

Cafe Connection Service

This service was quite eventful today! I led  in this service today, and it we barely got everything together just before the service started.  We had been hosting the men’s homeless shelter this week, and everything had gotten all disconnected. Our monitors were plugged in to the wrong place, our camera picture was black and white, and other things. We just called it our “Retro Cafe” week, and people seemed to be very understanding. You can see the Planning Center details for this service.

Songs were the same as in Cafe except we did Brenton Brown’s “Hallelujah (Your Love is Amazing)” instead of “Glorious Day”.

 

Traditional Service

Rick led the team in this service, and did a great job!  You can see the Planning Center details.

“Blessed Assurance”
“Crown Him With Many Crowns”
“Redeemed”
“A Child of the King”
“One Day”

Worship leaders: are you looking for a wonderful retreat this Spring to be refreshed, recharged and to connect with other worship leaders in a smaller, more personal environment? If so, then the All About Worship Retreat 2011 is the one for you!  I was privileged to attend the retreat last year, and it really was a highlight of my year! There’s only about 60 attendees at the conference, and with worship leaders such as Brenton Brown, Pocket Full of Rocks and Sarah Reeves there this year, you really get the chance to interact with them, ask them questions, and even get to know them on a personal level.

The schedule includes times for some general sessions with worship by Brenton Brown, Dave Fitzgerald, Sarah Reeves and others; worship teaching times with Brenton  Brown and Michael Farren from Pocket Full of Rocks; breakout sessions on a variety of worship-related topics; small group discussion times; some free time/jam session built in; and even a song feedback panel where you can play your own songs and get productive feedback from these amazing worship artists.

One of the best things about this retreat for me last year was the chance to connect with other worship leaders, some of whom I’ve continued discussions and relationships with all year.  I look forward to seeing them again this May, and meeting many more.

Watch this video to take a look at what you can experience this year at the All About Worship Retreat!

Wow — what a powerful morning of worship today! The team did a super job today in all services, and the Lord was gracious, and allowed everything to go just great! We hosted a concert last night with the Bethel University Women’s Chorale, and all 40+ of them were in church today, so we not only had a packed house, but a room full of singers! I could hear them singing out – even with the earbuds in! We used “O The Blood” again today, and that song is so powerful! Pastor Andrew, our youth pastor, preached for the first time here. He did a great job!

We also started the service today in a special way. Instead of starting with announcements and the usual, we had a special prayer time for some families in our church who recently experienced some tragedies.  We skipped the announcements, and just started right with huddling up and praying for them. This really set the tone for the rest of the service!  This post is part of the Sunday Setlist blog at The Worship Community.

Contemporary Services

Maybe it was the extra people,  or that we knew the songs well, but there was such a sense of energy and excitement today in this service! You can see the video of this service and also the Planning Center details.

“Today is The Day” (Paul Baloche and Lincoln Brewster)
– This is the second time we’ve done the Paul Baloche version of this song, and I’ve heard a lot of good responses! The team has liked not singing the “Oh, oh oh” at the start of the song, and I really like the “feel” of this arrangement!

“This Is How We Know” (Matt  Redman and Beth Redman)
– Great song! It tied in perfectly, too, to Pastor Andrew’s message on God’s love for us.  One part of the song that has always been a challenge for us is the ending, when we sing “King Jesus, we love You”. But, this week, the great team of singers – Bekah, Jan, Michael, Marv and Zack did a super job singing it out and on the harmonies. I played the piano lick as they sang that, and it all worked out great.

“O The Blood” (Mary Elizabeth Miller and Thomas Miller)
– What a powerful song! After Andrew’s message on love, this song fit perfectly as a transition into communion. If you haven’t heard this song yet, you need to! Kari Jobe sings it on Gateway’s newest release, God Be Praised. Great song as we approach Good Friday and Easter.

“Remembrance (Communion Song)” (Matt Redman, Matt Maher)
– This is a song written especially for communion, and it focuses on the element of mystery in the act of communion. We typically do the vocals from Matt Maher’s arrangement, but the band parts from Matt Redman’s arrangement of this co-write.

“Lead Me To The Cross” (Brooke Fraser)

Cafe Connection Service

Adam led the team in the Cafe today, which consisted of Adam on guitar and vocals, Zack on vocals and percussion, Bekah and Susan on vocals, and Jake on everything else! (Ukulele, guitar, bass guitar, tambourine)  Our senior pastor, who has been on vacation for a couple weeks, actually was able to attend this service today for the first time. Usually he’s there, but on the screen via video as he preaches in the sanctuary during the Traditional service. I was so glad he was able to experience it and see what it’s really like!

“That Where I Am” (Rich Mullins)
– This song was a perfect fit for this team, given the instruments they use, and the acoustic feel of the service. Great choice!

“Unchanging” (Chris Tomlin)

“You Are The Light” (Steve Fee)

“Shine” (Matt Redman)

Traditional Service

It was nice to have Pastor Kalb back this morning, too, after being gone for a couple weeks! The team did a great job this morning on the hymns! You can watch the video of this service and see the Planning Center details.

“O Worship The King”

“The Love of God”

“My Savior’s Love”

“How Deep the Father’s Love For Us” (Stuart Townend)

“Calvary Covers it All”