9 June 2009 118 views No Comment Print This Post  Email This Post

Hi everyone!  Church on Sunday was… well… it was long!  At Laurelwood we have a 75 minute service and I’m usually pretty good about planning and coordinating so we stay within 75 minutes.  But this Sunday, everything went long!

I take a lot of the blame because I think I was being somewhat naive about how much stuff I could pack into 75 minutes.  We did some scripture readings, a special song, communion, Summer Ministry highlight, a new song… and Pastor Mike began his new sermon series and was giving an overview of the entire series.

So, the whole service ended up being almost an hour and 45 minutes… that’s right: we went almost 30 minutes late.  That’s the kind of stuff that drives me crazy!  Melanie (my wife) had to remind me like 20 times to stop looking at my watch, but it was hard not to!  I was stressed and frustrated about the whole thing.

But on the positive side; it was actually a really great service!  And we’re lucky that we only have the one service so it didn’t interfere with other start times or anything.  People actually stayed engaged the whole time and most people I talked with didn’t even notice we were so late.  So, I feel okay about it, but I still am a little frustrated and want to make sure this week that I don’t plan too much!

• Opening Scripture: Romans 5:15-17
• Your Grace is Enough (Matt Maher, covered by Chris Tomlin… this was a new one for us but a lot of people knew it already)
• Enough (Chris Tomlin)
• Draw Me Close (Kelly Carpenter)
• Communion (with songs in-between elements)
• Jesus Messiah (Chris Tomlin)
• Scripture: Romans 5:7-11
• Mystery (Charlie Hall)
• Your Grace is Enough (we did the whole song again because it was new and also appropriate at the end of communion)
• Caring Board Update
• Summer Ministry Focus
• Offering
• There is a Fountain (very cool arrangement of hymn)
• Message: “You Were Created for Relationship” – Genesis 1 & 2

So, as you can see it was a lot to try and fit in 75 minutes.  There were some things I could have cut, but like I said: it was good service that flowed well.  In fact, one of the gals on my worship team told me this might have been her favorite service to date from start to finish.  So I have really mixed emotions about the whole thing.  I want to stay on time and on track, but I want to be open and allow for God to do big things.  What do you do?

To check out what other people are doing, go on over to Fred’s blog and join in on the conversation.  Have a great week!