(still no video camera – stolen last Christmas – not replaced)
sadly, yesterday felt like one of those days where we just went through the motions. there was no groove. we had WAY too much stuff packed into an hour-fifteen (two services). we did a lot of things that we don’t normally do. went kind of like this:
- a promo video.
- announcement of an event related to the promo video
- announcement of something else ???
- baptism (2 – good)
- children’s choir special
- children’s message
- responsive reading (it’s been forever since i’ve been a part of that)
- two songs
- mission’s moment
- more announcements
- welcome members and guests
- everybody shake hands
- two songs
- message
- “formal” invitation (haven’t done this in a while)
- offering/pass the plates (haven’t done this in a while, either)
we never got into a groove. there was definitely no flow. we are without a senior pastor (or a service planner) so everyone is trying to get their own agenda going, AND there’s no one that really steps up and says no. we have a few staffers who have fallen into the trap of “being more concerned with KEEPING people than REACHING people.”
our church family is in a tough spot right now. in one way we’re like a rudderless ship with no direction. in another, we’re like a Koosh ball being stretched in 100 different directions.
it really felt like a throwaway sunday. we just came out of a series focus last week. we’re starting a new series focus next week. this just felt like we said, “let’s just do whatever we want to with this service.”
I’m kind of in a weird spot. technically, all i am in the organization of this church is a staff spouse and fill-in worship leader. forget that i’ve been leading worship for 13 years and have been producing and promoting creativity (and getting paid for it) for at least 8 years whether it’s audio/video/web or print. my opinion is asked after-the-fact. that doesn’t really help shape what we just went through.
recently, we’ve started what we call a ‘worship vision team’ basically a group of five or six of us w/ the worship leader on staff who meets and plans services, etc a month or so out. maybe this will help shape purpose and flow.
our first focus has been on this upcoming series along with a bunch of special events we have in the month of december. i created an 8 panel gate fold CD insert to promote all the things going on in december. you can checkout the panels:
looking back, why we chose to do so much stuff in a month that is already jam-packed is beyond me.
anyway, that got a little off-topic of what happened this past sunday, didn’t it? wow.
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