We should rejoice over every single one of those that God has saved and reconciled to himself. And every single one that is faithful and obedient in getting baptized as an outward expression of what Jesus has done for them. I was proud of our church this week for rejoicing with the one person we baptized in service, and not canceling it because more didn’t sign up. If Jesus will leave the 99 to save the 1, surely we can leave and change our Planning Center service flow plan to baptize the one.

Musically things went well. Every weak I’m making adjustments tone wise on my amp rig and mic placement, and each week I think it’s improving. We only did 4 songs this week to make time for the baptism, we played the Our God Reigns refrain over the baptism. Here was our set:

1. You Love Me Forever – Merchant Band (loop not yet available)
2. Jesus’ Name – Ryan Delmore
3. True Love – Phil Wickham (loop available)
4. Our God Reigns – Delirious (loop available)

This post is part of Fred McKinnon’s Set List Sundays.

Here’s what caught my attention over this week:

• John Piper’s 4 part interview with Matt Chandler. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, Matt Chandler has the highest CWPM(Convicting Words Per Minute) rating out of anyone I’ve heard.
• ChurchCrunch’s 3 tips for not sucking at ‘Christian’ blogging. I can’t say the post is entirely insightful, but there are some good portions. The problem is it makes some big assumptions and oversights, namely assuming that every Christian blogger wants to become a large blog with diverse readership. That overlooks the very nature of niche blogging. You aren’t going to have diverse readership because your content is very narrow. I do talk a lot about non-christian music and topics but it’s always how it relates to or impacts worship.
• Church Soundguy posts on Dynamics 101: Compressor Application Notes. This details compression settings for the most common instruments coming into your board. This blog has some incredibly useful information, I highly recommend checking it out, especially for you sound men.
• TwiTip’s 11 useful twittor tools that don’t require your password. Good list of useful and safe Twitter tools.
• Joel Brown, worship leader and deacon at Mars Hill Church, talks about his decision to get baptized this Easter. Great story.
• Randy Elrod unleashes on Perry Noble’s Unleashed rant. I understand where Randy is coming from and do agree there was a general irreverence present in Perry’s rant. But I don’t necessarily disagree with Perry’s ultimate conclusions, just in how he presented them, the language he used and the audience they were spoken to.

Previously on a Sunday Set List post I wrote about our amazing baptism service we had on November 9th. We had people testify to being freed from pagan worship, drug addiction, sexual addiction and homosexuality. An incredibly powerful moment and I think probably if not the best, one of the best moments in Life Connection Church’s history.

Baptisms on Stage from Life Connection Church on Vimeo.

Having been a pastor’s kid and raised in the church, there’s a lot that happens in services that I’ve seen and heard many times. While in some cases this can be a positive by being able to have a larger perspective on “hot” issues, it can also be a negative in that you can get used to God’s grace and power and not be in true awe. Well this week’s service I was in awe and experienced something I’ve never experienced in church.

We had baptisms scheduled for today and usually we do it right after service, this time we decided to move the baptismal tank on stage and do it through worship at the end of the set. Before we get to that, let me say that weeks earlier our baptismal tank was stolen (odd I know) and we couldn’t afford to replace it. We had one member, Deb, so eager to get baptized she bought the baptismal tank for us. So after we finished the normal worship set of 5 songs, we started to play Gloria using Taylor Sorensen’s arrangement, not the Tim Smith, with loop, version we normally did. I got through the song one time through to give my pastor time to get people lined up and ready to go. One by one they came up and gave their testimony to the congregation as we played softly, as soon as they were done testifying we brought up the music and sung the “Gloria” chorus as they were dunked and baptized.

It was going great and then Deb came up and testified. I knowing full well the incredible transformation she had gone through was wondering what she would say publicly. Deb starts by acknowledging the prayers of her daughter and our female leaders that had gone on for 2 years, praying for her salvation. Deb encourages us that God works miracles, real life miracles. I’m blown away by God’s saving grace, and then Deb says it. God has delivered her from the sin in her life that had her captive for so long…homosexuality. Never in my life have I seen someone go from totally lost, fully engaged in the homosexual lifestyle, causes etc… Repent, get saved, and publicly testify to her deliverance of homosexuality. Not testify to her new perspective on homosexuality or how to live as a Christian with homosexual tendencies, but her deliverance. Not a single leader in our church having pushed her to say anything, do anything, only God’s loving grace that drew her to him. Truly a work of God and God alone.

The list of incredible testimonies heard is too long to mention. But God moved powerfully and I think this was one of the best services I’ve ever been a part of in my life. Thank you Jesus!

1. Salvation Is Here – Hillsong United (loop used, not yet published)
2. Dress Us Up – John Mark McMillan
   
3. Our God Reigns – Delirious (loop available)
4. Where We Belong – Hillsong (loop available)
5. All I Need Is You – Hillsong United
6. Gloria 34 – Taylor Sorensen

Baptisms on Stage from Life Connection Church on Vimeo.

This post is part of Fred McKinnon’s Set List Sundays.

This is probably one of the most moving videos I’ve seen. Mars Hill baptized 120 people on easter, in the sanctuary, while rocking an amazingly powerful hymn. Seeing people baptized in their street clothes while singing Gloria, man, intense, nothing else to say, so just watch.