Sunday morning at Kings

• Holy, holy, holy - Reginald Heber, John Bacchus Dykes

• We stand and lift up our hands - Chris Tomlin
• All my days - Stuart Townend
• He is exalted - Twila Paris

• Saviour of the world - Ben Cantelon
• Your grace is enough - Reuben Morgan
• I exalt thee - Pete Sanchez Jr.
• We bow down - Viola Grafstrom
• When I call on your name - Ben Cantelon

Another good morning.

My sense for the whole thing was to emphasise the greatness of God and the glory of Christ.

I haven't used 'He is exalted' for a while, but it flowed very well out of 'All my days'.

Wes preached an excellent sermon, and we had lots of time for response.

I led Reuben Morgan's 'Your grace is enough' for the first time. A couple of the other worship leaders at Kings have done it, and it's grown on me. It ran together very well with 'I exalt thee'.

I've begun regularly scheduling melody instruments for the Sunday morning band. Our new violinist, Tom, was on fire this morning!

Sunday morning at Kings

• Oh our Lord and King - Alan Rose

• And can it be - Charles Wesley
• Praise is rising - Brenton Brown
• You alone can rescue - Matt Redman, Jonas Myrin

• Create in me a clean heart - Keith Green
• When I survey the wondrous cross - Isaac Watts

• Open the eyes of my heart - Paul Baloche
• Be thou my vision - tr. Eleanor Hull
• Jesus, be the centre - Michael Frye
• All to us - Chris Tomlin, Matt Maher, Matt Redman, Jesse Reeves

A very good morning! The band sounded great, the songs connected well, and people brought excellent contributions.

The final block was partcularly good, with each song connecting perfectly with scriptures and other contributions that people shared.

I have all kinds of plans for developing worship at Kings at the moment. A meeting like that greatly encourages me that we're on track.

Sunday evening at Kings

• Our God saves - Paul Baloche, Brenton Brown

• Jesus, friend of sinners - Paul Oakley
• When I call on your name - Ben Cantelon
• This is my desire - Rueben Morgan

• In the secret - Andy Park
• Surrender - Marc James
• Living for you glory - Tim Hughes

I felt very unprepared for leading this evening. It's been a slightly odd week and I didn't manage to get much properly focussed time.

But God was gracious. The meeting went well.

We celebrated salvation in the first block, and after Mark's sermon on discipleship the second block almost led itself. There were lots of good contributions.

Friday evening at the Kings Student Houseparty

• Our God is a a great big God - Nigel Hemming, Jo Hemming

• To God be the glory - Fanny Crosby
• Our God - Matt Redman, Jonas Myrin, Chris Tomlin, Jesse Reeves
• Holy - Matt Redman, Jonas Myrin, Jason Ingram
• Adoration - Brenton Brown

• Create in me a clean heart - Keith Green
• I lift my eyes up - Brian Doerksen
• Everything - Tim Hughes
• May the words of my mouth - Tim Hughes
• Thank you for the blood - Matt Redman

I was only up for the day this year, and only leading once. That's quite a different experience than getting an overall sense for the three days.

We had a full band this year, which also made for a different dynamic.

'Our God is a great big God' - a kids song, complete with actions - is something of a Student Houseparty tradition. This time it fit very well with my opening theme of the greatness of God.

'To God be the glory' into the chorus of 'Our God' worked very well.

Andy Byers was preaching on our engagment with media and screens, so the response was geared around integrity and vision.

As always, there was real life in the worship at houseparty. Lots of people brought essential contributions. It's a time when it's very obvious that corporate worship is much more than songs.

Sunday morning at Kings

• Crown him with many crowns - Matthew Bridges, Godfrey Thring, George Elvey

• Yesterday, today and forever - Vicky Beeching
• Bless the Lord, O my soul - Matt Redman, Jonas Myrin
• Who is there like you? - Paul Oakley

• In the silence of beginning - Chris Juby
• Thank you for the blood - Matt Redman
• There's a pageant of triumph in glory - David Fellingham
• All to us - Chris Tomlin, Matt Maher, Matt Redman, Jesse Reeves

Considering how difficult it is to find contemporary songs to mark most specific occasions, there's quite an abundance for the first meeting of a new year.

The last verse of 'Crown him' is "...the Lord of years", and 'Yesterday, today and forever' starts "Everlasting God / The years go by but you're unchanging." 'Bless the Lord' has the sense of time passing too.

Our sermon series this term is on key Old Testament passages that anticipate Jesus. My hymn 'In the silence of beginning' - which pictures Christ all through salvation history - is going to be a useful hook. It really went well this morning!

We looked at Genesis 3, where Eve's seed will crush the serpent's head, so we celebrated Christ's victory in the second block. It was lively despite our somewhat reduced band.

I started the morning feeling a little distant. If nothing else, I'd woken up my own soul by the end of the meeting.

Sunday morning at Kings

• Tell out my soul - Timothy Dudley-Smith, Walter Greatorex

• Hark, the herald angels sing - Charles Wesley
• I will worship - David Ruis
• Holy - Matt Redman, Jonas Myrin, Jason Ingram

• You laid aside your majesty - Noel Richards
• My hope is built on nothing less - Edward Mote, William Bradbury

• In the silence of beginning - Chris Juby
• Here I am to worship - Tim Hughes
• Joy to the world - Isaac Watts

My last worship set of the year. In fact, my last time leading till mid-January!

The Sunday after our Carol Service is always a bit eclectic. We shift to out-of-uni-term mode, there are some carols, some regular worship songs and we take communion. It's the end of a long term and always a little ragged.

This year was no exception, featuring (amongst other chaos) such perrenial favourites as a broken string and a forgotten melody.

That said, because of the ever-increasing pool of musicians at Kings, we still had seven in the band and sounded a lot less ramshackle than in previous years.

I liked my 'Hark, the herald' into 'I will worship' move. I love running a solid hymn into a devotional chorus anyway, and the hymn being a carol is an extra bonus!

We then paused to consider that the God who came amongst us in flesh 2,000 years ago still comes into the midst of our lives and our circumstances by the Holy Spirit today.

Unusually, we took communion after the sermon. It was good to lead into the final block of worship from communion. There's always a deep sense of attentiveness to God after we've shared bread and wine.

We slightly fudged 'Joy to the world' at the end of the meeting. The broken string (in the rehearsal beforehand) meant that we hadn't practised it and we fluffed the ending. But the sense of family and of God amongst us at this time of year greatly overwhelmed any untidiness in our liturgy.

Happy Christmas, everyone! May you know God's presence with you, whatever the season holds.

The Kings Carol Service

• O come, all ye faithful - John F. Wade
• His name, his name - Unknown, Jean Sibelius
• Once in royal David's city - Cecil Alexander, Henry Gauntlett
• From the squalor of a borrowed stable - Stuart Townend
• Hark, the herald angels sing - Charles Wesley

A really fantastic Carol Service!

There was, as usual, a great choir piece, a hilarious home-grown drama and our now-traditional (meaning it's happened twice) brass band playing the carols with us. Jon Burns spoke well on 'A child is born! A son is given!'

The theme was from Isaiah 9, so we sang 'His name, his name': a version of verse 6 to the tune 'Finlandia'. I wasn't sure how it was going to work - there are limits to what guitar-led band can manage - but with the brass band taking the lead and an instrumental first verse, it came off wonderfully!

We've opened our Carol Services with 'O come all ye faithful' and closed with 'Hark, the herald' for a number of years now. I always wonder about dropping one or both in favour of something else, but I think they must be the two richest carols from a worshipping point of view, so I can never justify it.

The verse starting "God of God, light of light" in 'O come all ye faithful' is straight from the Nicene Creed, and Wesley's 'Hark the herald' is just brilliant, particularly:

Veiled in flesh, the Godhead see
Hail the incarnate deity
Pleased as man with men to dwell
Jesus, our Immanuel

Before any old friends ask - no, I didn't mix up 'One in royal' and 'Hark, the herald' this year. I think that's a mistake you only make once!

It's always such a joy playing with the brass band. They add huge dimensions to our sound. I'll have to look for more opportunites for them.

All in all, a happy morning!

Sunday morning at Kings

• Here for you - Matt Redman, Jesse Reeves, Tim Wanstall, Matt Maher

• Our God saves - Paul Baloche, Brenton Brown
• Here I am to worship - Tim Hughes
• From the squalor of a borrowed stable - Stuart Townend

• My hope is built on nothing less - Edward Mote, William Bradbury
• Surrender - Marc James
• Adoration - Brenton Brown
• Living for you glory - Tim Hughes

I often feel somewhat uncertain as I lead at the moment, but the meetings are going well.

I knew I had a good set this morning. It's the first Sunday of Advent, and although we don't pay a huge amount of attention to the church year, I sounded the notes of the incarnation in the first block.

I didn't manage to get in touch with Richard, who was preaching, during the week. But I prayed that I would have the right sense of where things should go, and sure enough the second block really clicked.

Richard preached on Paul's 'foolishness' in 2 Cor 11, so I picked up the theme of boasting and pride, and led a response of surrender. There seemed to be deep engagement in the room.

I had a big band this morning, with several new musicians. It gave much greater breadth to the sound. (Much greater volume in the room as well, I'm told, which was also to do with the absence of the barriers that normally separate the stage form the room.)

Nate, our drummer, broke his bass pedal during the first song!

I've not led 'My hope is built' before. The lyrics followed the sermon well, and seemed doubly appropriate after a real life "high and stormy gale" last night. I played it in E in 6:8.

I may be feeling uncertain as I lead at the moment, but that's not a bad position to be in.

On Christ, the solid rock, I stand
All other ground is sinking sand
All other ground is sinking sand

I'm reading Bernard L Manning's 'The Hymns of Wesley and Watts'. The following line from the end of the first paper struck me; Manning is trying to locate the genius of Wesley's hymnwriting:

There is the solid structure of historic dogma; there is the passionate thrill of present experience; but there is, too, the glory of a mystic sunlight coming directly from another world.

Dogma, experience and mysticism—the past, the present and the future.

Kids worship at Kings

• Anyhow, any who, any why, anywhere - Chris Juby
• I will lift up the name of the Lord - Mike Burn
• Father God, I wonder - Ian Smale

It was chaos this morning! Almost impossible to keep some of the kids from messing with the projector and/or wandering off. It's not normally like that at all!

Those who were engaged had a good time, but I found it pretty hard to focus on the things that were going well.

I'll need to have a think about what to do for next time...