We’re in week three of Mission, working through our new mission statement and its meaning. This week, we’ll focus on the first of our three disciple rhythms: Gospel-Centered Worship.
1. Read through our texts, Matthew 13:44 and Jeremiah 2:11–13.
A disciple—one who has been made alive by the God of grace—is learning to run to God to receive all that they long for. God provides freely, without price. He beckons us to repent again and again, to enjoy Him above all else, and to enjoy His gifts secondarily, in their proper place. As we pursue true and rightly-ordered worship, we become more fully human.
2. Read, pray and sing through the service:
CALL TO WORSHIP: Psalm 27:1–4
Come Thou Fount (Robert Robinson, John Wyeth)
Jesus We Love You (Hannah McClure, Paul McClure, Kalley Heiligenthal)
CONFESSION OF SIN: Jeremiah 2:11–13
Come Ye Sinners (Joseph Hart, arr. Robbie Seay)
Be Thou My Vision (Mary Elizabeth Byrne, Eleanor Henrietta Hull arr. by Ascend The Hill)
ASSURANCE OF PARDON: Colossians 1:13–14
GREETING, SERMON, COMMUNION
RESPONSE: Song & Prayer
Extravagant (Cook, Feucht, Gretzinger, Jackson)
Jesus Is Better (Aaron Ivey, Brett Land)
BENEDICTION
Learn more about Christ in the Psalms artwork and download artwork guides here.
Person: Jeremy Grant
Jeremy Grant is an emerging artist and award-winning graphic designer. He was born in California in 1985. He studied Graphic Design and Illustration at John Brown University. Grant has exhibited his collage and assemblage work regularly across Colorado since 2008. An active member of local arts communities, Jeremy has been invited to participate in numerous group shows, donated art to charity, and been awarded a PPAC micro-grant. His work explores themes of destruction and creation, death and resurrection, and chaos and familiarity. Jeremy Grant currently lives and works in Denver, Colorado.
Piece
Collage
PROCESS
You will drown. Fall headlong into the tempest. Arms reach, strain. There is nothing to grasp. You will drown. Your last sputtering breaths will be witnessed by no one. Your eyes water against the rush of wind. And pain. Drown.
Hot crackle of lightening snakes around your body.
A cradle of fire that stunts your fall.
Return the embrace of pain. Your salvation.
Feeling abandoned by God, and achingly alone, the writer of the 77th Psalm is lead to consider God’s “miracles of long ago.” Israel was pursued by Pharaoh, and their slaughter was eminent, when God performed a dramatic miracle and parted the sea, unveiling an unlikely escape route.
And yet that provision was immensely terrifying—the sea a symbol of chaos and terror in the ancient world. “Walk through the terror,” it seems God told them. But where was God in the middle, when the sea could, seemingly, crash down at any moment, crushing all beneath? God’s footprints were not seen, yet it was His hand at work.
This Sunday at Park Church, we’re in week two of Mission, working through our new mission statement and its meaning. We’ll focus on a key identitfier of Jesus’ disciples: people who have been Made Alive by the God of Grace.
1. Read through our text, Ephesians 2:1–10.
A disciple of Jesus is one who has first been made alive by Jesus. We need this new life precisely because sin—our “sickness unto death”—has rotted the joyful and abundant life for which we were designed. “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved” (Ephesians 2:4–5).
2. Read, pray and sing through the service:
CALL TO WORSHIP: Psalm 34:1–3
Grace Alone (Dustin Kensrue)
Build My Life (Barrett, Kaple, Martin, Redman, Younker)
CONFESSION OF SIN: Ephesians 2:1–3
Lord I Need You (Carson, Maher, Nockles, Reeves, Stanfill)
No Longer Slaves (Joel Case, Jonathan David Hesler, Brian Johnson)
ASSURANCE OF PARDON: Ephesians 2:4–10
GREETING, SERMON, COMMUNION
RESPONSE: Song & Prayer
In Tenderness (Garvey, Gordon, Walton arr. Brian Eichelberger)
Jesus Paid It All (Elvina Hall, Kristian Stanfill)
BENEDICTION
Learn more about Christ in the Psalms artwork and download artwork guides here.
Person: Taylor Powers
I’m a portrait photographer who grew up in Colorado. I live in Denver with my husband Alex.
Piece
Photography
PROCESS
As I read through Psalm 76, two words stuck with me every time: humbled and stunned. The people mentioned in the Psalm seem to be the greatest of mankind: kings, princes, and men of war. The greatest of men, the greatest of us, were humbled and stunned, unable to stand in the presence of God. I really wanted to create an image that captured the feeling of being both fearful and reverent at once. I could relate to being humbled and stunned, because it reminded me of spending time in prayer while in the mountains. Whenever I spend time in the mountains, I feel small. Not small in a bad or insignificant way, but in a way that puts me in my place, so to speak. It’s scary and comforting. It reminds me of how incredible and wonderful God’s creation is, and it’s always given me clarity and perspective.
The title of Psalm 76, “Who Can Stand Before You,” became the literal idea behind this image. With my image, I wanted to capture that feeling of being stunned and humbled by something much greater than yourself, to the point that you can’t even stand before it. I wanted to capture a surrender. My goal was to put a physical sense of scale of the mountains being that much greater than man, and God being that much greater than “the mountains of prey”. I hope that this image is seen as a man not praying to or worshiping a mountain, but instead being overcome by his smallness in its midst. If the mountains are this much greater than the greatest of mankind, and God is that much greater than the mountains, how can we not be humbled? How can we even stand before Him?
I knew I wanted to get as close to the mountains as possible, preferably at sunrise. My husband (the man in the photo, who was a trooper) and I camped in Rocky Mountain National Park so we would get to this spot for the sunrise. The color and the light of sunrise in the mountains always seems much more jarring and harsh than the softness of a sunset. We hiked around and tried a few different spots, which didn’t work as well. On our way back to the car I found this spot and this was the last photo I took of the series.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Our guest is Jemar Tisby. He’s the cofounder of the Reformed African American Network and the cohost of Pass the Mic.Listen
Listen to the show Subscribe in iTunesShow Notes
2:25 – Who Jemar Tisby is 5:00 – What he learned while doing Teach For America in the Mississippi Delta 7:35 – Why he decided to go from being a teacher to a seminary student 9:45 – Why he decided to get his PhD in History 12:35 – Why the confederate statues went up (and why they must come down) 14:20 – The history of white supremacy in American churches 17:30 – Recommended resources on the history of segregation in the American church 21:50 – Lessons he learned from being in a multi-ethnic church 26:10 – The best way for a church to respond after an event like Charlottesville 30:15 – Longer term steps to becoming multi-ethnic 35:40 – His issue with Malcom Gladwell’s podcast about Brown vs. Board 37:45 – Why it’s so important for teachers to invest in their students (and why we need more minority teachers) 40:50 – Three books by African American authors that everyone should read 43:15 – If he could put a billboard anywhere, where it would go and what it would sayLinks
- Vice Charlottesville Documentary
- The Fierce Urgency of the Now
- The Image of God and the African American Experience
- After Charlottesville, will white pastors finally take racism seriously?
- Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America
- Jude 3 Project
- Malcom Gladwell Podcast
- Jesus and the Disinherited
- The Coming Race War in America: A Wake Up Call
- Let Justice Roll Down
Learn more about Christ in the Psalms artwork and download artwork guides here.
Person: LouAnn Summers
My name is LouAnn Summers. I grew up in Littleton, Colorado and have since lived in Missouri, Texas, New Mexico, and Utah. I have now been in Arvada, Colorado for five years. I’ve been married to Brent going on 38 years and am a mother of four and a grandmother of six. I come from a very artistic family, a few of whom are professionals. It was not until adulthood that I discovered a knack for painting. I am an amateur artist and make art for the sheer joy of it. I was fortunate to have the chance to teach art to 6th graders for five years in public school.
Piece
Watercolor
PROCESS
This piece was inspired by Psalm 75:8 (NIV):
In the hand of the Lord is a cup full of foaming wine mixed with spices; He pours it out, and all the wicked of the earth drink it down to its very dregs.
(Psalm 75:8 NIV)
Upon my first reading of this scripture, I immediately saw an image of this foaming cup of wine spilling over the earth—liquid and crimson like blood. I imagined God “lavishing” grace upon us (Ephesians 1:8) because “He so loved the world…” (John 3:16). These images reminded me of Jesus saying about the cup of wine, “This is my blood…which is poured out for many…” (Matt 26:28). I then imagined this precious, crimson flow and its effects on our world. I see in this picture the blood cleansing the earth (turning from red to yellow) and from that cleansing life grows (green and blue).
Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.
(From John 7:37–38 NIV)
As I formed the stars I was reminded of Psalm 8:3–4 (NIV):
When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have set in place, what is mankind that You are mindful of them, human beings that You care for them?
(Psalm 8:3–4 NIV)
I experienced a most awesome time of worship feeling God’s joy as He created the heavens! Praise be to the majesty and glory of His name!
This project is watercolor on Yupo, a special kind of paper that is synthetic and does not absorb liquid. This is what enabled such a glowing effect. It also came with great challenges which emphasized my tendencies to struggle. God graciously saw me through with the patience to continue. Then He did this most surprising thing! This “lightning burst” was a completely unintended surprise. I watched wide eyed as the paint and paper formed this awesome display of its own accord! I now view it as God’s motion.
Learn more about Christ in the Psalms artwork and download artwork guides here.
Person: Benjamin Rogers
Benjamin is an art instructor at Red Rocks Community College in Lakewood, Colorado. His work has been exhibited across the country and been featured on the covers of New American Paintings, Fresh Paint Magazine and ArtVoices Magazine. He studied painting at Northern Kentucky University, Louisiana State University and finally Arizona State University, where he received his MFA. He lives in Arvada with his wife Emma and son Everett.
Piece
Oil
PROCESS
Psalm 74 is a cry of anguish that questions why God would allow His enemies to destroy the sanctuary and His people’s home. To communicate this, I made a copy of Thomas Cole’s “Destruction of the Empire,” which I obfuscated through transparent layers of paint. Then I painted a toy hippopotamus as a “viewer,” examining the destruction depicted in the painting. The hippopotamus is representative of God’s people lamenting His once great empire, though distinctly separated from it.This painting was created using an indirect oil painting method, which begins with a burnt umber value painting and gradually builds up color through transparent glazes of paint.