Setlist - 8 Nov 2015
Sunday morning at Kings

Remembrance Sunday and preaching from Romans 13 on submission to authorities. A very coherent theme.

We were delayed by a full hour getting into our venue this morning. It could have been a huge stress, but as a testament to how much difference it makes when everyone knows what they're doing it actually went fine. Credit to the setup team and my experienced band.

I've tended to open with 'Crown Him With Many Crowns' the past few Remembrance Sundays. The line "that war may cease/and all be prayer and praise" always seems very appropriate. But I'm wary of truning it into a cliché by repeating it every time. Mindful that we were going to be focussing on Christ's Lordship over the rest of the morning, we sang 'Come, Let Us Worship Jesus'. A very suitable alternative.

Through the whole morning I was exploring the question 'What kind of ruler is our God?'. The opening set explored those themes in various ways, including a spontaneous song explicitly asking that question after 'Praise, My Soul'.

Paul preached on submission to authorities, and we continued with 'This Is Amazing Grace' - an incredibly versatile song, with the verses and bridge coming to the fore today. Then several people brought spoken contributions, and we took a practical turn in reflecting on the same theme with 'God In My Living' and 'O God of Burning'.

I find it incredibly satisfying when there's a deep coherence to all the elements of a meeting. When you have unplanned contributions like we do (and when your communication ahead of the meeting is not what it could be, as is often the case for us) there are no guarantees. But it all really clicked today.