Setlist - 8 Jan 2017
Sunday morning at Kings

Tags: communion

Our first meeting of 2017. The venue was very cold, and after the gap of two Sundays we also needed to warm up into our regular rhythm of worship.

At the beginning of the new year I was keen for us to start by acknowledging the reality of God in his holiness and mercy. I weaved together those themes in the opening block, leading toward communion.

I've come up with a nice arrangement of 'Joy to the World'. The same melody but various tweaked harmonies. It may seem a bit odd to sing a carol in January, but 'Joy to the World' wasn't actually written as a Christmas song. We included the usually-omitted third verse, which I only learned about last year:

No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found.

The song is a profound call for the advance of the Kingdom of God, well fitting as a way to segue from Christmas themes to the business of the year.

'Crowns' worked really well, stripped down a bit, as a meditation while we shared communion. The sense of the central line "my wealth is in the cross" is very tangible as we gather at the Lord's table.

Mark started our new preaching series on 1 and 2 Timothy. We responded by centring ourselves in the faith for the year ahead with 'This, I Believe' and 'All To Us'.