Julie and I went out to dinner last night to celebrate some of the many evidences of grace we experienced at the conference. She has been amazingly gracious, supportive, and helpful to me during this season. One of the things I told her was that it was a joy to meet many of you who read this blog and are faithfully serving your local churches with integrity, passion, biblical faithfulness, humility, and a desire to see the Savior exalted. Thank you for coming to the conference. More importantly, thank you for honoring Jesus Christ with your lives.
If you weren’t able to make the WorshipGod06 conference, or if you’d like to listen to the messages again (which I’d highly suggest), you can download MP3’s of the main …
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We have been enjoying an abundance of God’s grace at the WorshipGod06 conference these past two days. I’ve met many kind and encouraging folks who have sacrificed finances, time, vacation days, and family relationships to spend these days with us. I trust their investment will be rewarded many times over by our gracious heavenly Father.
Tim Challies is doing a great job live-blogging the conference. You can check it out here. I’ll resume normal blogging next week, Lord willing.
If you happen to live in the metro D.C. area, I want to personally (somewhat) invite you to come to any of the sessions of the WorshipGod06 conference, which begins tomorrow. Morning sessions start at 9 AM (Saturday starts at 11 AM) and evening sessions begin at 7 PM. Main session passes will be available at the door for $15 (these passes are
for the main sessions only…they do not include seminars or lunch). Day passes are also available for Thursday and Friday for $60 each. These
passes include main sessions, seminars, and lunch.
Here’s an idea of what will be taking place:
Wednesday nightJeff Purswell will be speaking on A People of His Presence. Jeff is one my favorite speakers, and one of my best friends. Neither of those are reasons
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Waiting for a CD project to be released is a little bit like having a baby. I say "a little bit" because I’ve experienced absolutely nothing like labor pains that every mother goes through. However, we have been working on this for about nine months…
If you’re a regular reader of Worship Matters, you know how much I appreciate The Valley of Vision. Edited by Arthur Bennet, The Valley of Vision is a collection of prayers and devotions from various Puritans, including John Bunyan, Richard Baxter, and Isaac Watts. We might assume that people who lived three hundred years ago wouldn’t have many relevant things to say to us about
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I’m in the midst of preparing for preaching this coming Sunday at Covenant Life Church. I’ll be speaking on Pursuing God’s Presence, which is also the message I’ll be giving at the WorshipGod06 conference next week. It will be great to have a "dry run" at home before the conference.
This is a message that has been on my heart to give for a number of years. I’ve been stirred as I ‘ve realized again how eager God is to reveal Himself to us in evident ways as we meet to worship Him. Our faith isn’t merely academic or mental. We serve a living God who is actively present among His people. Without in any way minimizing how God is present with us through preaching, the Lord’s supper,
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Some of you who have heard me talk about the WorshipGod06 conference, "The Glory of His Presence," are still wondering whether or not you should come. To help you with your decision, I’ve taken the liberty of listing the top ten reasons why you should make this a matter of prayer.
#10. Gaithersburg, Maryland, like all of metropolitan Washington, D.C., is lovely in August; a veritable tropical paradise, a vacation hot-spot, rivaling the Bahamas in appeal.
#9. Pre-registration ends in 5 days, July 23. You can still register at the door, but you won’t get a fancy pre-printed name tag, and you’ll avoid the potentially dangerous experience of on-site
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Last May 50 folks took me up on my offer to receive a WorshipGod Live CD and post a review on their blog. Thanks so much for participating! The comments were overwhelmingly encouraging, but I was even more grateful for the constructive feedback you gave us. Here are some of the comments, along with my thoughts.
Most reviewers seems to think the songs were singable and easy to pick up. Dan wrote, “My personal opinion is that a strong song stands on its own even if stripped down to a solo instrument and a single voice…These are all strong songs, in my opinion.” Brian agreed. “No melody was too complex for any congregation to learn quickly.” Chris didn’t think so. “My chief difficulty with the album
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I’ve asked a new question on the WorshipGod06 Conference blog. Whether or not you’re coming to the conference, I’d benefit from knowing your thoughts:
One of the seminars I’ll be teaching at
the WorshipGod conference is called “Healthy Tensions in Corporate
Worship.” I’ll be addressing our tendency to think in a polarized way
when it comes to worship. God is either transcendent or immanent.
Corporate worship should be either historically rooted or culturally
relevant. Worship is either for God or for us, reverent or celebratory,
edifying or evangelistic.
What tensions have you dealt with in your own church? You might
still be in the midst of them, or have found ways of resolving them.
Let us know what you’ve learned or would like to learn.
You can share your thoughts on the Worship Matters blog or here.
For over 20 years, Sovereign Grace has been seeking to write and publish biblically faithful, Christ-exalting, emotionally moving songs to serve our churches in congregational worship. Songs that help us, as John Piper has said, think truly so that we might feel duly. Songs that enable God’s Word and purposes to be planted deeply in our hearts.
About 7 years ago, we published our first songbook. I’m happy to let you know that we’ve finally updated that songbook and released a a two-volume set that contains nearly every song we’ve published for the past twenty one years, including Mark Altrogge’s "I Stand in Awe," "Forever Grateful," and Vikki Cook’s "Before the
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For those of you who might be interested in a foretaste of the Valley of Vision CD we’re releasing in August, you can listen to a few samples and watch a video trailer here. To download the trailer, don’t worry about choosing the format. Just click on the picture frame.
Here’s a portion of what I wrote on the website:
Someone might ask, "Why produce a CD inspired by the prayers of a bunch of dead guys?" That’s an easy one. Puritans like John Bunyan, Thomas Watson, Richard Baxter, and Isaac Watts knew their hearts, their Bibles, and their God much better than we do. Many of them wrote down their prayers not to be published, but to assess their own spiritual growth and to encourage themselves in times
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