Crossing Community Church

In our Sunday morning session of our Worship Summit, Dr. Master answered the question, "How do I sing praise while I am in great suffering?" He teaches us from Job 42 and helps us to understand how Job came to the place of praising God in his suffering and we can do likewise. 

Our final session of the day for the 2020 Worship Summit featured our speakers for the day, Dr. Master and Graeme Burgan plus three worship leaders -- Dan Loch, Jarred Cain and Deion Payton. Ben Best served as our moderator. The questions were submitted by those in attendance at the Summit. 

Graeme Burgan also served as a speaker for the Worship Summit. Graeme is a professor at Cairn University as well as the Executive Director of Csehy Summer School of Music. His topic was "What We Sing." He gave a great overview of different aspects of a worship service and how they determine the song choices we make for our church services. 

Dr. John Master joined us as one of our speakers for our 2020 Worship Summit. His topic was "Why We Sing." Going through the Bible beginning with Cain & Abel's offerings, Dr. Master taught from several biblical examples of worship and how we can understand them for ourselves. 

To appraise something means to define its value or to evaluate its worth. So when we 'appraise' God we consider His qualities and promises and deeds and the only response is --  to praise Him. But consider this thought, CS Lewis suggests that the epitome, the consummation of praise is to share what is praiseworthy. That's what we do we come together in our church. We gather to share God's qualities, promises and deeds. We take praise to its ultimate level by sharing all that is wonderful and beautiful about God when we participate in corporate worship in our churches. 

Growing up in a home where religion was not prominent, Kelly Plexico was first introduced to Christ when she was 19 years old. Eventually she trusted Christ and states that she experienced peace for the first time. Kelly shares her story of how God has led her through obstacles and how the Holy Spirit has guided her in tangible ways during those times. Enjoy Kelly's story as she shares about relying on God through all seasons of life. 

This week, in preparation of our upcoming Worship Conference, Pastor Tim directs our attention to the origin of worship in our lives -- it only happens when we've experienced God in a personal and impactful manner. Worship is our response to the revelation of who God is, of His character or His deeds. It comes from the inside of us and overflows ourwardly through our words, attitudes, thoughts and actions. 

This week our guest speaker was Peter Berzin. Given that it was the first Sunday of 2020 Peter addressed the resolutions people typically make at the beginning of the year and asked us to consider making resolutions that would count more for eternity and benefit our spiritual life in the year to come. 

It's been said that the gospel is shallow enough for a child to play in, yet vast enough for an elephant to swim in. Too many of us have a limited understanding of the vastness of the gospel. It is more than our means to salvation, it is the means to our daily life in Christ. We need to daily remind ourselves of the grace God has bestowed on us and learn to live in that truth!

Immanuel, God is with us. We sing about it. We read about it. The angels proclaim -- and it's TRUE! We needed Jesus to come and take on flesh in order for Him to make a way back to God. At the same time, we need Jesus to be more than human! We need him to be God in flesh! The only way man can be redeemed to God was for God to come as man in the form of Jesus!