Our God Is Love – Hillsong
Not Ashamed – Passion (Tomlin, Redman, Tofer Brown, Bryan Brown)
Kingdom Come – Elevation Worship
Awakening – Tomlin, Rueben Morgan

You Are The Light – Fee
Give Me Faith – Elevation
Your Love Never Fails – Jesus Culture
How Great Is Our God – Chris Tomlin

Thanks to Gerren Fish for leading us in worship yesterday. Stop by his Facebook page and thank him.

1. It’s Biblical

The Bible is full of repetition.  Jesus repeated himself numerous times.  Paul told the Philippians to, “rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice” (Phil 4:4 ESV).  In the Bible repetition happens to show emphasis and importance, which leads us to #2.

2. It helps us learn

When I was in High School and college if the teacher said something twice I knew it was important and was probably going to reappear on an exam.  So I wrote it down and then when studying I would repeat it so I knew it so I knew it (sorry I couldn’t help myself).  Most of the songs we sing are scripture put to a tune.  If we are repeating a song it usually has really solid Biblical truth that we as a church/congregation/Christ follower can stand on and use in our everyday life.  I have to tell my children repeatedly to clean their room, brush their teeth, go to bed and this is a daily occasion, if we are only in church once a week (some of us once a month, cough cough) we need to repeat the Biblical truths God has given us so we can learn them.

3. If you know the song you might sing it

I know it’s not very popular to sing in church for some people, although we do have a good group of singers in our congregation.  We also have people that like to not sing, not because they can’t, but because they won’t.  The most common reason is fear, well here is some repetition for you, the Bible has 366 verses that tell us not to fear.  But the chances of you singing a song that you do not know or have never heard if you don’t like to sing are slim to none.  So we try to do at least 2 songs that are very familiar so no one can have excuses for not doing some congregation singing.

4. I want to honor our musicians hard work

Our band spends countless hours learning each song we do and if we are singing different songs each week that adds to the practice time.  When we do a new song on Sunday each band member has spent approximately 8-10 extra hours on that one song, listening to it and learning it.  We have spent as a band an extra 1-2 hours rehearsing it and learning it together.  We usually play it 6-8 times together before we ever play it in front of the congregation.  All of our musicians are volunteers and give of their time, talent, and treasure to ensure each week is the best.  They all work full time jobs, are spouses, and parents if I’m constantly loading them with music to learn they will have to compromise their responsibility to be a disciple, spouse, parent, and steward.  If they are already familiar with the song we are doing if cuts their prep time significantly.  I feel as one of their pastors I need to honor their time or something in their personal life may suffer.

I would love to hear your thoughts on repeating songs on Sunday morning

Mickey

Go – Hillsong United
We Are Free – Newspring Worship
One Thing Remains – Jesus Culture
Our God – Chris Tomlin

Like A Lion – Daniel Bashta (Kristian Stanfill arrangement)
We Are Free – Newspring Worship
Mighty To Save – Hillsong
How He Loves – John Mark McMillan

You – Hillsong United
Exalted One – Elevation Worship
Never Once – Matt Redman
No Other Name – Newspring Worship

Aftermath – Hillsong United
The Stand – Hillsong
The Anthem – Planetshakers
With Everything – Hillsong United

Our God Is Love – Hillsong
Exalted One – Elevation
Give Me Faith – Elevation
Came To My Rescue – Hillsong

A special thanks to Brian Wilson (not the beach boy or the MLB pitcher) for filling in on the drums.

God is Able – Hillsong
Here For You – Matt Redman/Chris Tomlin
Never Once – Matt Redman
Great Is Thy Faithfulness – Thomas Chisolm (Traditional Hymn)

You – Hillsong Live
Here For You – Matt Redman/Tomlin
Furious – Jeremy Riddle
Awakening – Tomlin/Hillsong