12-7-08

Confessions of Worship Director

O.k., I know this is not what many people want to hear but I am going to lay my cards on the table. Christmas is a hard time for me. This is mainly due to the music of the season. For all the years I have been a musician (maybe 25 or so) I have played and sang the same carols and hymns for a month every year. This proves difficult for me because the music tends to become stale and lifeless.

Well, this Sunday I did have a "breakthrough" of sorts. As the Children's Choir led us in worship I was greatly refreshed and encouraged to have them lead us...lead me... in worship to start the Advent season. What a blessing this was! I was able to come to the hymns we sang with new "ears to hear with." It was very moving service for me and it is my prayer that it was for our people as well. I hope that this spirit of worship will carry through this advent season and on into Ephiphany and eventually Lent and Easter as we look forward to the celebration of the ressurection.

This Sunday we will look at what it meant for Jesus to take on flesh (i.e. incarnation) and more particuarly in light of John's baptism to which he submitted himself. One aspect of this that has impacted me this week is from an essay by Alistar Begg in a great little book called Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus edited by Nancy Guthrie.

I paraphrase Begg:

"It is not by diminution that he makes himself nothing. It is by an addition that he makes himself nothing. He has not ceased to be who he is. But by taking on flesh - by pouring himself into it - he constitutes a completely different entity. He who was somebody in his own right has become a nobody so that he might serve others."

Consequently we will close our service this week with the hymn this book is titled after, Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus. There is a new verse we will sing that is found in the Trinity hymnal.

Here it is:

Come to earth to taste our sadness,
He whose glories knew no end;
By his life he brings us gladness,
Our Redeemer, Shepherd, Friend.
Leaving riches without number,
born within a cattle stall;
This the everlasting wonder,
Christ was born the Lord of all.