Sunday, May 21, 2006

5th Week: St. Aldate's Live Album, Take Two

A fantastic evening of worship - just pure and powerful seeking the heart of God and praising Him, for a good three hours. No chairs, no sermon, and no doughnuts (contrary to what we were promised...) - just an amazing atmosphere of praise. It wouldn't be a shock if this sort of evening (albeit minus the expensive recording equipment!) became regular at St. Aldate's - as Gordon Hickson (or possibly Anita Cleverly) said, "Sunday evenings will never be the same again!"

A new song that was introduced for the CD is "Hosanna" by Brenton Brown and Paul Baloche (full lyrics and chords are up at pwarchive.com):

'Cause when we see You, we find strength to face the day
In Your presence all our fears are washed away
Washed away

Hosanna, hosanna
You are the God who saves us
Worthy of all our praises
Hosanna, hosanna
Come have your way among us
We welcome You here, Lord Jesus

An amazing song about an amazing God. Hosanna - save now! Worthy of our praises, we welcome you, Lord Jesus. Amen!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Glad you enjoyed it. I don't want to be negative although I feel a bit negative but whether it will become "regular" - we shall see - not everyone enjoyed it, quite a lot walked out.

And was it representative of "Live Worship at St Aldates?" From someone who has been a part of Aldates for a very long time I dont think so...

James Muscat said...

Of course, by it becoming "regular" it doesn't mean that the evening service as we know it will disappear. There's been talk of a new late-night service starting, and the format could be similar. In fact, I think that replacing the evening service with such a format would be a bad idea, precisely because (as you point out) many people simply don't find it helps them to worship.

As for it being representative of live worship at Aldate's... I have to disagree with you. Maybe magnified, distilled a little, and compressed into a 74-minute CD, but still representative of a church with worship at it's heart. (Of course, I lack your experience with the church, having only been here for two and a half terms...)