Easter Sunday part 1: Worship Confessional 03.23.08

For a variety of reasons, we offered three identical services on Easter Sunday, rather than our usual 2 blended & 1 contemporary. My co-director and I had worked hard to find music that would include the various groups & styles of musicians that usually are involved in our worship services: the choir that sings every week in our blended services…. the orchestra that plays once a month and for large events…. the worship bands that play in all services…. the worship vocalists that lead. It was the first time we used orchestra + band as accompaniment for congregational worship songs. With those two groups having such different cultures of operation, it was a bit tricky to navigate. But we figured it out.

On and around the platform we had a 50 voice choir, a 35 piece orchestra, 6 piece band, and 3 worship vocalists leading in various ways throughout the service. All the songs had orchestrations that we followed, although we cut and altered and melded them to make the arrangements more ‘congregationally friendly’. Here’s the flow of our service, the songs we used, and some notes about them:

Welcome…. greet each other…. opening prayer

Alleluia! Alleluia! (to Ode to Joy, Beethoven; arr & orchestrated by Robert Sterling)
Alive Forever, Amen (Cottrell, Moffitt, Smith; arr & orchestrated by Robert Sterling)
- these two were a part of a medley that came as one piece of music, including narration which we cut. The ‘Alleluia!’ piece was big, choral, heavy orchestration, but written as a very short ‘intro’ piece. ‘Alive Forever Amen’ was new for our congregation and was led by band and worship vocals (which choir backing). Love love love this song. We’ll keep it in our repertoire for the worship bands, but it was excellent to incorporate live orchestra with it this time around.

Crown Him with Many Crowns (Bridges, Thring/Elvey; arr & orchestrated by David T. Clydesdale)
- flowed directly out of ‘Alive Forever’. A choral/orchestral arrangement that allowed for congregational singing as well.

Message part 1: We Were There: the Story of Peter, the failure

Once Again (Redman; arr & orchestrated by Robert Sterling)
In Christ Alone (Townend, Getty; arr & orchestrated by Robert Sterling)
- these two arrangements were the ones we altered the most, allowing them to flow together. Worship band & vocals were the lead musicians, but the addition of orchestral parts was absolutely breathtaking. We’ve been singing ‘In Christ Alone’ for several years, but it still makes me cry.

Message part 2: We Were There: the Story of Peter, the forgiven

Amazing Grace (a cappella)
That’s Why They Call it Grace (Bosarge, Johnson; arr & orchestrated by David T. Clydesdale)
- male solo, choir, orchestra

Prayer/ message conclusion

Worthy is the Lamb (Zschech) with All Hail the Power (Perronet & Holden; arr & orchestrated by David T. Clydesdale)
- female solo, choir, orchestra, with congregation joining.

Christ the Lord is Risen Today (postlude)
- a piano, organ, orchestral arrangement that is incredibly powerful. The organist, who was a first time player with us, became ill over the weekend, so this piece got cut down for piano and orchestra only.

The thematic flow of the morning worked very well; I’m so grateful for a senior pastor who gets how music and spoken word can support each other. The collaboration between choir/orchestra/worship team also worked well and will be something we’ll likely do more of as we move toward transitioning our worship services to a new format in the coming months. Despite the fact that there’s a part of me that wishes for a completely contemporary Easter service sometime, there is something undeniably powerful about voices and instruments covering every singable and playable octave in praise. And there is something beautiful about watching the people I play with every week work hard to unify complicated rhythms and effectively add their ‘voice’ to a differentl kind of larger picture. It moves me to tears, actually.

We know from verbal and written feedback we’ve received, that there were many who were challenged by the message of the day, and some who were emotionally flattened by it. We pray that God will continue the work he started in all of us.