This week was Christ the King Sunday, so our songs were gathered around the theme of kingship. Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.
Songs
Revelation Song by Jennie Lee Riddle
All Creatures of Our God and King by David Crowder* Band
How They Fit In:
There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme.
Revelation Song: We sang this song to begin our time together singing about God's holiness/power/all of those things we might associate with God being above and beyond us all. While this is not the primary image of God given in the Christian story, it is important to remind ourselves that God is indeed mysterious, powerful, elusive, holy, etc, so that we will realize how scandalous and amazing it is that this same God cares to have a relationship with us.
All Creatures of Our God and King: We sang this song to contemplate and proclaim the significance of God's kingship for the whole of the created order--not just humans. To say that Christ is King impacts more than humans--it impacts the way stars explode, the way animals go on about their lives, and the way plants climb out of the dirt.
Be Thou My Vision: We sang this song for a couple of reasons. First, we sang it to find language to offer along with the people of our congregation who shared their stories with us this week, asking for God's wisdom and presence with us. Second, we sang it to offer the words of the final stanza in light of Christ the King Sunday.
How Great Thou Art: We sang this song in the middle of our service to proclaim the glory of God in creation (both past and present), the life and death of Jesus, and the future hope of redemption, in the midst of stories that were marked both by tears and bold faith. In some way, we raised this language to remind ourselves of the story in the midst of which we are living--one where God is putting the pieces back together, not spreading them apart.
Crown Him With Many Crowns: I occasionally ask Josh if there are any songs he wants me to include in a set. This week was one of the few times he had a suggestion, so I jumped on it. I had not thought about this song since I was a small child, so I had to go look up the lyrics. It took all of 10 seconds for me to be convinced that this song needed to be in our Christ the King service. In many ways, Christ the King Sunday is about speaking the truth of Jesus' Kingship into a world where such an idea seems like nonsense (because of how broken things are). A thing I love about this song is the way it weaves together God's transcendence and immanence, and God's suffering and victory. These tensions provide a window into a deeper truth about God and God's story.
Doxology: We close our time together each week with this proclamation that God is worthy of praise from every inch of the cosmos.
-JM