When Creator comes together as community memorable things happen.
Creator came together as a community again on Sunday in more ways than can be detailed here, Suffice to say when Pastor Dayle arrived at the church on Sunday she exclaimed "It feels like Easter to have so many people already busy here at church."
She did express her appreciation of Susan Nolte's banners (made specially for the occasion} and the bulletin board that listed all the important life events she had presided over as pastor at Creator.
Creator Praise opened with singing All Are Welcome. How many times this has been sung at Creator with hope together with affirmation? It also brought memories of how this music connected to my heart at my first RIC Sunday service at Central with what was happening then at Creator.
The congregational voice was strong, resonant and confident with so many of the congregation is attendance and a larger group than usual leading the singing. It sounded like the house was proclaiming from floor to rafter that all are welcome in this place..
After Creator Praise and the announcements the opening music for the service was a spontaneous choice Pastor Dayle made last Wednesday and so was not in the bulletin. She included a song I wrote about her retirement and Wednesday was the first opportunity to sing it to her. It was completely in keeping with her style of letting something not completely or fully planned simply happen.
Creator Praise opened with singing All Are Welcome. How many times this has been sung at Creator with hope together with affirmation? It also brought memories of how this music connected to my heart at my first RIC Sunday service at Central with what was happening then at Creator.
The congregational voice was strong, resonant and confident with so many of the congregation is attendance and a larger group than usual leading the singing. It sounded like the house was proclaiming from floor to rafter that all are welcome in this place..
After Creator Praise and the announcements the opening music for the service was a spontaneous choice Pastor Dayle made last Wednesday and so was not in the bulletin. She included a song I wrote about her retirement and Wednesday was the first opportunity to sing it to her. It was completely in keeping with her style of letting something not completely or fully planned simply happen.
Kelly Carlisle played piano for the music he composed and the liturgy he wrote during his time at Creator.
This is a place where creativity is valued and nourished as it is offered. Kelly's liturgy, the Call Us Home liturgy and David Lee's liturgy each have unique and powerful places of meaning for Creator during worship.
This is a place where creativity is valued and nourished as it is offered. Kelly's liturgy, the Call Us Home liturgy and David Lee's liturgy each have unique and powerful places of meaning for Creator during worship.
Pastor Dayle planned a service that was very personal and very public. These were at once words and music that I know she holds dear personally but simultaneously spoke to Creator's communal identity. Many in the congregation met Kelly for the first time last Sunday and yet felt completely at home with his songs, musicianship and ministry in this service because of their Creator connection.
The Gospel for the Day was Luke 3:15-17, 21-22 - The Baptism of Jesus.
The difference from the attendance in worship a week before because of weather conditions and today underscored and highlighted how many were gathered. The public and personal also played in my mind as the word was read.
The service helped capture something that resonated for me.
Normally, reading Luke's account of the Baptism of the Lord, Jesus is singled out in my thoughts. Heavenly spotlight from the clouds switches on and the booming voice proclaims being well-pleased. Today I thought about all the others being baptized around Jesus. He was, after all, one of a crowd being baptized.
Singled out, certainly, yet what was everybody else's experience of that moment? Was that event personal and public for them as well? My bet is that it was and they felt the change around them. The change was in the water, where all of them together were wading to reach John the Baptist, in the prayers that they were praying, and in each other.
Today, for me, this was not simply describing an overwhelming cosmic event that might be restated in the often quoted Robert Browning lines "God's in his heaven - And all is right with the world." Everyone was transformed and the action wasn't taking place in heaven, or between God and Jesus alone but here, in the river of life. And God affirmed that it all was good, that well-pleased blessing expressed love for all of us - spreading as far and wide as the ripples from this baptism.
There was a strong personal and public sense that flowed through and was emphasized in Kelly's music throughout the service as well with Yours Is The Song, A Holy People, God Has Shown You, Come As You Are, All That I Have, Quiet Our Souls and Nunc Dimittis.
The Farewell and Godspeed to Pastor Dayle with the Signs of the Office Returned to the People of the Deinstallation hit home emotionally for many of us. All that was left was a sweet and appropriate Thy Holy Wings to close the service.
And it was sweet and everyone was enveloped in the spell of the music yet there was something more needed to be expressed for the celebrating ahead. What seemed right for after service's sending out was not an ethereal reprise of Thy Holy Wings but a full-throated, powerful rendition of Wade In the Water. with Matt on piano, some gleeful guitar punctuation, and the lead singers alive with the musical energy of the moment.
God's a-goin'-a trouble the water, indeed! Now it is time for the partying!
Photos - Linda Kiggans
The difference from the attendance in worship a week before because of weather conditions and today underscored and highlighted how many were gathered. The public and personal also played in my mind as the word was read.
The service helped capture something that resonated for me.
Normally, reading Luke's account of the Baptism of the Lord, Jesus is singled out in my thoughts. Heavenly spotlight from the clouds switches on and the booming voice proclaims being well-pleased. Today I thought about all the others being baptized around Jesus. He was, after all, one of a crowd being baptized.
Singled out, certainly, yet what was everybody else's experience of that moment? Was that event personal and public for them as well? My bet is that it was and they felt the change around them. The change was in the water, where all of them together were wading to reach John the Baptist, in the prayers that they were praying, and in each other.
Today, for me, this was not simply describing an overwhelming cosmic event that might be restated in the often quoted Robert Browning lines "God's in his heaven - And all is right with the world." Everyone was transformed and the action wasn't taking place in heaven, or between God and Jesus alone but here, in the river of life. And God affirmed that it all was good, that well-pleased blessing expressed love for all of us - spreading as far and wide as the ripples from this baptism.
There was a strong personal and public sense that flowed through and was emphasized in Kelly's music throughout the service as well with Yours Is The Song, A Holy People, God Has Shown You, Come As You Are, All That I Have, Quiet Our Souls and Nunc Dimittis.
The Farewell and Godspeed to Pastor Dayle with the Signs of the Office Returned to the People of the Deinstallation hit home emotionally for many of us. All that was left was a sweet and appropriate Thy Holy Wings to close the service.
And it was sweet and everyone was enveloped in the spell of the music yet there was something more needed to be expressed for the celebrating ahead. What seemed right for after service's sending out was not an ethereal reprise of Thy Holy Wings but a full-throated, powerful rendition of Wade In the Water. with Matt on piano, some gleeful guitar punctuation, and the lead singers alive with the musical energy of the moment.
God's a-goin'-a trouble the water, indeed! Now it is time for the partying!
Photos - Linda Kiggans
No comments:
Post a Comment