Three Things I love in One Video

"Christ is Risen" by Matt Maher

Performed by Joel Limpic and Marcy Priest. Spoken word by David Bowden.

Happy Monday everyone. Don't roll your eyes. 

Before reading, please watch this video by Life Church.

I like this video for 3 reasons:

1. I love this Matt Maher song. I heard it for the first time this week, and the lyrics have completely devastated my understanding of the God I serve and the cross that has freed me. The final bridge sings about a a victory over sin and death that I honestly rarely think upon. Amazing how a song can redraw attention to a truth you think you've known forever.
2. I thoroughly enjoy spoken word poetry when used in the context of music. As a tag, or filler between choruses and bridge like David Bowden did here. He has a pretty solid style and his affection for Jesus is really challenging and encouraging. 
3. Worship in the round, everybody. Worship in the round. I've done this a handful of times in the past, and while some may argue that it is not affective in leading new believers through new songs in a weekly setting, when Definition did it together it was a great experience. No one was able to just stare and be entertained, because the worship leaders weren't facing them. It really removed the performance tendency AND the performance expectation from the congregation. Definitely consider it.

STUFF TO CHECK OUT:

1 Corinthians 15:50-58 (ESV)

⁵⁰ I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. ⁵¹ Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, ⁵² in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. ⁵³ For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and ^(BQ)this mortal body must put on immortality. ⁵⁴ When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:

“Death is swallowed up in victory.”
⁵⁵ “O death, where is your victory?
    O death, where is your sting?”

⁵⁶ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. ⁵⁷ But thanks be to God,who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁵⁸ Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.