The flow of the services went really well this weekend.  Following our Saturday service, we had a Worship Night in The Basement for our college/career group, The Well.  There was some great food (loved the gyros) and an extended time of worship.  A big Thank You to Luis Acosta for putting that together, and to Kha Do for coming out and helping lead.

Here are the songs from our main services this weekend:

New Doxology – G
Holy Is The Lord – G
Wonderful Maker – G
You Are Good – A
Shout Unto God – A
You Never Let Go - A

We did Shout Unto God as special music over the offering in the Sunday services.  I read Psalm 47 as we opened the song.  It was very cool to see our church jump in and get involved in the way that song builds and becomes a celebration.

I pray you will have a great week as you worship God with your whole life!

Andy

Here is the set from this weekend:

Come Thou Fount, Come Thou King – D
My Savior Lives – G
Giving It All – A
I Surrender All – A  (traditional)
Savior – A

Sunday we kicked off a component of our newly revised assimilation process, the Pastor’s Coffee, following each service.  It’s really nothing new in the way churches work, but we’re refining the way this works at our church to make sure we connect with new people coming, and help walk them through the process of becoming fully devoted followers of Jesus.  We’re trying to make sure the process doesn’t get in the way of relationship, but being intentional about connecting with people and giving them every opportunity to be involved and grow in their relationship with God.

The process is pretty simple.  1.) We offer a chance to meet our Pastoral Staff (Pastor’s Coffee.)  2.)  Invite them to attend our Vision & Purpose Class to get acquainted with the history and heart of Living Streams Church.  3.) Invite them to join the Foundations of Faith class.  4.) Invite them to go through the SHAPE class, which helps individuals look at their gifts, talents and abilities, and discover where those fit in serving in ministries in and out of the church.

This is also the process of becoming a member of our church, even though we don’t have an official membership here.  We don’t hand out a membership certificate, but we encourage people to become members because we want everyone to have a place to belong and where they are welcome to use the gifts God has placed in their lives.

It was really fun meeting some new people, and seeing their enthusiasm about what God is doing in their lives.  I’m praying that God will continue to bring people into our church family, not just so we’ll have a bigger church, but because we want to see the Kingdom of God growing and reaching into the lives of the people in our community…and out into the world.

Maybe it was because this was the week following our big Easter push…but it seemed like many things were just out-of-sync for our teams this weekend.  I’m hoping this went mostly undetected by those attending, but from my behind-the-scenes perspective, there were some definite challenges.

We worked hard to resolve the video and projection issues mid-stream and in-between services, so our final service flowed better.  I even felt like my head was in a fog at moments, and started one song out with the lyrics of a song we weren’t even doing this weekend….strange.  Thanks to the diligence of our tech and music teams, we wrestled through these obstacles, and encountered some very cool moments in worship.  As we came in and out of our times of communion, there was a sense of the tangible presence of God…which is the point to begin with!   Here is our set from the weekend:

All Because Of Jesus - A
Your Grace Is Enough – A
Rescue – C
How He Loves – A
Lead Me To The Cross – Bm  (special music: Ivy Weesner)
Be Thou My Vision – E   (with new chorus: Andy Allen original, recording not available yet)

So, THANK YOU very much to the many people I serve with each week as we worship with our church family here at Living Streams.  I appreciate all of you!

I have been so excited about our Easter services.  It really felt as though our staff and church has been experiencing a great deal of spiritual resistance over the last couple weeks.  Over the past few years as a touring worship artist, it became increasingly clear that when our ministry and family was experiencing spiritual challenges, God was about to move in a powerful way.  In time, I learned to become hopeful and excited about what God was going to do in people’s lives when we saw hard circumstances facing us.  That’s what has happened in me these last few weeks…I found myself growing more and more excited as we found ourselves dealing with difficult experiences in our church.

Saturday and Sunday services brought a special energy to our campus this week.  There was a marked sense of hope and anticipation that I haven’t seen in our church yet.  Yes, there were a lot of people here for Easter who don’t usually attend, but there was a difference from our normal weekend services.  My take is this: people showed up celebrating Jesus, and expecting God to move in our time together.  I’m praying that this moves beyond being something we only see once or twice a year, and that our church family will grow into a community of people excited about what God is doing here.  Then, as we get together for our weekly services, I’m praying that everyone will show up with a huge sense of expectation and hope.  I can only imagine what our worship times will be like as we become people who authentically worship Jesus in and out of our entire week.

Here is the set we did for the Saturday & Sunday services:

SATURDAY/SUNDAY SERVICES:

My Savior Lives – G
Mighty To Save – G/A
Jesus Paid It All – A
Revelation Song – D
Christ The Lord Is Risen Today  (special: performed by Jared Utterback)
Nothing But The Blood – G  (my arrangement w/ a nod to Matt Redman)

We also held a service on Good Friday to remember the cost of the Cross, and how much Jesus did for us.  Our pastors and some other leaders in the church, took verses from Isaiah 53 and shared some thoughts on those verses.  Here is the set I led for that service:

GOOD FRIDAY SERVICE:

How Great Is Our God – C
The Wonderful Cross – D
The Old Rugged Cross – A (my arrangement of the traditional hymn)
Once Again – G

I pray that God has blessed you this Easter!

Andy