(If you missed the original post about why I am posting the upcoming weeks songs instead of last weeks, you can find it HERE.)

Last week we kicked off our summer series called “A King And A Kingdom.”  We are going through the book of Mark all summer long on Sunday mornings, our small groups are going to be discussing it more in-depth each week as they meet, and there is a scripture reading guide for people to do on their own or with their families.

I am super excited about this whole thing, and I really believe that if we open our hearts this summer, our lives will be changed in radical ways!

I tried to choose songs this week that speak of the Kingdom of God, what it means, and what it looks like.  It was a little difficult for me, as this is one of those weeks where I was somewhat dissatisfied with the songs I was choosing from, but I really feel like I ended up being able to pull together some songs that will really help people move from looking at the Kingdom, to living in the Kingdom.

Everlasting God – Brenton Brown
How Great Is Our God – Chris Tomlin
We Fall – Chris Kretzu
With Everything – Hillsong
Mighty To Save – Hillsong

If you would like to hear the songs, you can hear them HERE – but as always, I really hope you buy some of these albums for yourself.  One of the most powerful things we can do is to have our own personal worship times during the week and a lot of these songs and albums will help with that. As you memorize the lyrics, you memorize God’s word and His heart for you and this city.  With that stirring inside of us, there is no limit to the things we can do.

~chris

(If you missed the original post about why I am posting the upcoming weeks songs instead of last weeks, you can find it HERE.)

This week at The Gateway Church is going to be awesome.  There isn’t any specific thing that we are doing or special service element planned, but God has really been moving in our community over the last few months and I feel like we are growing and maturing in really incredible ways.  Because of that, each Sunday I am just so excited to see what happens.  To hear people’s stories of what God is doing in their lives.  To see people get lost in worship that haven’t experienced that freedom before.

Did I mention that last week the entire church started clapping?  On their own?

Does that mean that they worshiping with sincerity?  No…but it does mean that there is a freedom and comfort level growing in that room.  Something I have been praying for and working towards since August 2nd.

So this week as we cry out “let love tear down these walls, so that all creation would come back to You, because it’s all for You,” I am praying and confident and thrilled to know that our walls are crumbling, and that our love is being made known.  That God is feeling our love and worship, and that the city is beginning to experience our love, which is ultimately God’s love.

I feel like that is one of the most grammatically dysfunctional paragraphs I’ve ever written, but I can’t think of a better way to write it so just go with it.

Anyhoo, this weeks worship set looks like this:

Your Love Never Fails – Jesus Culture (Original by Chris McClarney.)
Here Is Our King – David Crowder Band
From The Inside Out – Hillsong United
Tear Down The Walls – Hillsong United
Hosanna – Paul Baloche

You can listen to this Sunday’s MP3’s by clicking HERE, but I encourage you to pick up some of these albums.  These people are making incredible music.

Can’t wait to worship with you guys again…

~chris

So this is my third week trying this out.  I think that it’s a little difficult to gauge how effective it is being this early in, but I’m gonna keep going with it.

If you missed the original post about why I am posting the upcoming weeks songs instead of last weeks, you can find it HERE.

This week at The Gateway Church is the third week in our series “The Gospel.”  I have really enjoyed the simplicity of this series, and also the simplicity of our services programming.  The whole idea is to take away all the frills, gimmicks, and flashy stuff.  Each week has consisted of worship, scripture reading, offering, and the message.

It seems silly to have to say this, but it’s amazing to see what happens when you just leave room for God’s grace to rest, God’s Word to speak, and God’s Spirit to move.

I have been trying to pick songs that lyrically and dynamically lead people to a one-on-one interaction and response to God.

This Sunday, we are playing:

How He Loves – by John Mark McMillan
Cannons – by Phil Wickham
We Fall – by Chris Kretzu
From The Inside Out – by Hillsong United
Everlasting God – by Brenton Brown

As always, I encourage you to read the lyrics without the music.  Just read through them like a story, poem, or letter.  Look for yourself, and for God, in the lines. (Lyrics can be found by clicking on each song title.  MP3’s can be heard by clicking HERE.)

If you have been following along with these posts or have found them helpful in your worship time, let me know.  Or if there is something else that I could do to help you grow your personal or weekend worship experience, leave a comment.  Just trying to figure out what works best here.

~chris

Yo!

I hope you all had a great weekend and Easter.

Per my blog post last week, I wanted to go ahead and post this weeks worship set.  Again, these are the songs we are doing this coming Sunday, April 11th, at The Gateway Church.

How Great Is Our God – Chris Tomlin
Beautiful Jesus – Kristian Stanfill
Cannons – Phil Wickham
Here Is Our King – David Crowder

I encourage you to listen to them (here, if you’d like), worship with them, read the lyrics with and without the music, and possibly even buy an album or two to support the artists.

Can’t wait to worship with you this Sunday!

~chris

I have been pretty absent from posting here lately.  It has been a crazy few weeks of travels, events, and mucho other stuff.

I can’t take too much time here right now, but I did want to post the most epic setlist ever.

This Saturday night is capitalC, an event that I am lucky enough to be a part of.  Essentially it is a worship night.  The cool thing about it is that it involves multiple churches from all over Des Moines coming together and saying “WE are the Church.” Big “c” church.  Get it? capitalC?

Anyhoo, for more info you can check out the website.

So here is the set list. Six different worship teams with a mixture of originals and not.  But I guarantee it will be a night to remember.  We are expecting God to move in just an epic way.

So. Pumped. Right. Now.

Sing Alleluia
Agnus Dei
Worthy
I love you lord
Nothing but the Blood of Jesus
He Was There
Only You
Grace that is greater
Tell the World
Blessed be your name
From the inside out
I’m not ashamed
Beautiful one
Lead me to the cross
God of wonders
Because Of Your Love
Glory To God Forever
Beautiful The Blood
Your Love is Everything
Sweetly Broken
Awesome In This Place
Peace Like A River
Where Would I Go
Break Our Hearts
With A Loud Shout
Overflow
Enter In
Can You Hear Us
From the Rising of the Sun
Love Came Down
Beautiful Jesus
Savior King
Came to My Rescue
Carrier
We Are Hungry
Your Love Never Fails
Hosanna
Hallelujah To My King
You Are God
Closer
Come Thou Fount
All Creatures Of Our God And King
Our God Reigns
Lord, You have my heart
God of This City
How He Loves
With Everything

Will you be there?

Even if you can’t be there in person, if all goes as planned we should have a live internet feed.

Follow @capitalC10 on Twitter to keep up to date on the happenings!

~chris

This past Sunday was really fun for me.  I was able to finally do a couple songs I’d been wanting to introduce to The Gateway Church for a while, and I had an incredibly talented guitarist alongside me.

Brandon Findlay of the group Bella Soul (and a few others) came out to play with me Sunday morning.  He did a great job and it was nice to have him sit in.  We both played acoustic, but he was able to change things up from the typical.  He ended up playing slide guitar on a few of the songs and it just sounded awesome.  I’m a huge sucker for this whole alt-country thing though, so that probably helped.

The set was:

O Praise Him – David Crowder Band
Your Love Is Everything – Chris McClarney
Mighty To Save – Hillsong
Closer – Charlie Hall

Your Love is Everything just has a great feel and is a super versatile song.  It works great broken down and slower, as a medium tempo groove, or as a full sounding rock song (like the Jesus Culture version.)  The lyrics are powerful and easy to catch on, like most the Chris McClarney songs (i.e. Your Love Never Fails and others.)

I also was able to bring in Closer, which is one of my all time favorite Charlie Hall songs.  I have always been a huge fan of his stuff and I think lyrically he brings something to the table that no other well-known worship leaders do.  I am also leaning into his stuff a bit more because it seems like it really resonates well with Gateway and where we are at as a church right now.

So until next time…

~chris

It was a good Sunday for the worship team at The Gateway Church with two acoustics and a new vocalist.

I am still trying to build a bridge between the stage and the seats.  We tried setting up the chairs differently, which did help in a few ways, but it’s a work in progress.

The set was:

Hosannah (Praise Is Rising) – Paul Baloche
Your Love Never Fails – Chris McClarney
You Never Let Go – Matt Redman
Your Grace Is Enough – Matt Maher
Invitacion Fountain – Michael Pritzl

I am still using the Ellis Stompbox, and actually getting a lot more comfortable with it.  I’ve also been able to connect with a few more local musicians and hopefully the band will be expanding soon.

One thing I keep having to tell myself is that we are still three weeks in to the launch of this church, so as long as we are sowing the right seed, the harvest will come in due time.  This note is just for myself

~chris

(This post is part of Fred McKinnons Sunday Set List Festivities.)

This week at The Gateway Church there was quite a few of our core team members gone for various reasons.  A lot of the tech team, some of the worship team, and other people from different teams.  The amazing thing is that it still went extremely well and super smoothly.

The set this week was:

Salvation is Here – United
For Who You Are – Hillsong
Mighty to Save – Hillsong
How Great is Our God – Chris Tomlin
Hosanna (Praise Is Rising) – Paul Baloche

Instrumentation this week was pretty stripped back.  It was just myself on acoustic guitar, and a guy that I haven’t been able to play with yet, Ricky, on percussion.  It was so good to play with percussion again, and Ricky is a really talented drummer.

We had him set up with a djembe and I also had him use my Ellis stompbox for that driving bass.  I think that it sounded great, and all gelled together really well.  (I’ll probably write a blog about the stompbox another time.  It’s pretty incredible, and I have a lot of thoughts about it.)

I am still feeling out the room, and also the people that come into the room.  It’s just our second week so a lot of people are still first-timers or relatively new.  I think everyone is getting more comfortable with each other, and I am trying to keep things as simple as possible to avoid giving any reasons to not participate and get involved.

I have some other things coming down the line too, as far as deepening our worship experiences and time together.  I’ll write more about that later though.

~chris

(This post is part of Fred McKinnons Sunday Set List extravaganza.)