Music Ministry October 18, 2020

On October 18,  2020 Grace Baptist Church celebrated its music ministry.  This year was difficult to imagine as most years during our Music Sunday each of our music ministry programs is part of the Sunday program.  However due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are not meeting as usual (mostly on Zoom, but a handful of limited, safely-spaced indoor and outdoor services).  Instead, members of each of the programs spoke, and a short video from the past was shown.  Although much different from our typical Music Sunday, many found this particular Music Sunday especially touching and a great praise to God for helping us use the gifts he's given us.

Children's Ministry

Gene Stremme

"Music is an important part of worship at Grace Baptist.  And, kids are an important part so music and kids just kind of go together.  We accomplish this through singing, ringing tone chimes, dancing.  Yes, we have dance--the Dobrovolec girls are really good!  We also clap, we jump up and down, shake things, we hit things, we have boom whackers.  And the purpose is not to perform.  It's never about a performance.  It's a sharing of our faith with joy.  That's what we aim for; I hope that everybody in church, and I have enough feedback to know this is true, sees this.  We love kids, and we love to see them profess their faith and love of God through music.  The names that were mentioned weren't quite accurate, we were missing Mia, and the Flack boys aren't with us any longer, they moved away.  I apologize if I missed others.  Penelope was with us.  Please enjoy these two clips from the past.

Bell Choir

Carolyn Paullin

Good morning.  Thirty-four years ago our bell choir was formed, and there was a lot of excitement about this new music ministry at Grace Baptist.  We had enough interest in learning to play the bells that we were able to have two groups of ringers, Team A and Team B.  Today, there are three of the original ringers who are still part of the group:  Bob Allmond, Amy Bocklet, and myself.  Of course, Barbara Green is still the director and she started this ministry.  I enjoyed learning a new musical skill.  I quickly discovered performing the handbells is a little different than singing in a choir.  If you sing in a choir and happen to sing the wrong note, most people won't even notice.  However, if you play in a bell choir, it's important to play your assigned bells at the right time and the right notes.  If you play the wrong note everyone knows.  If you don't play, it can impact the other ringers.  It's really about teamwork.  You may notice when we get ready to play the bells, I carefully check my bells to see if I have the correct bell in the correct hand.  We've been challenged by the pandemic, we normally stand close together to perform.  In fact, turning the pages of a song requires teamwork as well.  However, Barbara came up with a solution.  We came together in September to record a few numbers.  Barbara found music that did not require page turning.  We stood socially distanced and with masks on.  God has been good to our music for 45 years.  Amazing!  He's also reminded us of his love with dedicated bell choir and sanctuary choir members.  I'm reminded of Psalm 100 verse 5.  "For the Lord is good and his love endures forever.  His faithfulness continues through all generations."  As you listen to our recorded selection for today, think about how God is so good to you.  

Praise Team

Bob Allmond

Pastor George handled the bulk of the Praise Team responsibilities when he was here at Grace, including singing and playing lead guitar.  When he retired, almost three years ago, I was asked if I would consider being the Praise Team Coordinator.  After prayerful consideration I agreed.  My responsibilities as coordinator are choosing the songs, providing Trish with the necessary information for the bulletin each week, emailing the music and lyrics to the team as well as calling weekly warm-ups and rehearsals.  Once thing I stressed when I took the position was that I am not the leader.  I am the coordinator.  We, the entire team, are all praise leaders.  Over time, I got into a coordinating routine, and things went along fairly smoothly--until COVID-19 came along and complicated things a bit--but enough about that.

I started playing music at the age of seven and grew up enjoying and appreciating all kinds of music--from pop and rock, to classical, to show tunes, to country, to Gospel and Southern Gospel, to traditional and contemporary hymns, and many others--oh, and praise songs.

I am aware that some people don't like praise songs in general.  When they hear the word praise song they hear "same few words repeating over and over and over," and the "same three chord being played over and over."  I admit that there are many of those songs out there--and they aren't particularly my favorites either.  But there are also many that have meaningful stories to tell of the love and faithfulness of Jesus Christ.  Those are the ones that I like best--the ones with a biblical or spiritual message to tell.

So, what is the job, so to speak, of the Praise Team?  I believe it is not to perform for the congregation or bring glory to the team.  You may be familiar with the Eagles quarterback Carson Wentz.  He founded an organization known as "AO-1" which stands for "Audience of One."  I believe that our job as a praise team is to give honor and praise to that audience of one--our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ--and to lead the people of the congregation as they do the same.  And we should strive to do so to the best of our ability, never losing sight of Who we are singing and playing to and for.

In closing, I want to thank all the faithful members of our praise team:  Gene Stremme, Kate Phillips, Kristin Paluszka, Sue Jenkins, Audrey Paluszka, Ed Paluszka, Nate Fitzgerald, Brady Rennix, Bill Brownlowe and Patrick Rodgers for giving unselfishly of their time and talent to give praises to our Lord.  And also Pastor Steve for leading in worship with us during his term as interim pastor, and I would be remiss if I didn't say a big thank you to those team members responsible for allowing the praise team to continue during these trying months:  Brady Rennix and family, Bill Brownlowe, and the Paluszka family.  Thank you.  

Sanctuary Choir

Val King

Good morning.  I'm honored, first of all, that Barbara Green asked me if I would take this piece.  There are so many people in this choir that have dedicated their life, their music, and their talents to praising God.  It's just incredible.  It's incredible to have been a part of this, to be a part of it.  Music and song, they're the natural development of man's sense of beauty, rhythm and art.  The use of music was formally I guess organized by King David.  You may remember reading that, or some of you can, the pastor probably can.  There were various instruments--the trumpet, the flutes, but most important was the human voice.  It was capable of lifting up and singing, offering the lyrics in the hearts of praise and thanksgiving.  The whole creation was invited to make music to the Lord.  You can see that through the scripture.  It's even connected with the birth of Jesus--the angels sang.  There was song.  In James 5:13 it says, "Is anyone happy?  Let them sing songs of praise!"  In Isaiah 35:10, "Speaking of the joy of the redeemed, they will answer into Zion with singing.  Everlasting joy will crown their heads.  Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee away."  Isn't that what we want today?  We want that sadness and sighing to flee away, we want the pandemic to flee away.  What we can do is to praise God and sing.  Grace has always done that.  I'm even reminded of the fifth verse of Amazing Grace:  "We've no less days to sing God's praise than when we first began."  

So we continue to praise Him.  I'm reminded of the camaraderie of year of fellowship with people I've sing with at Grace.  Some of whom are no longer with us--Elmer and Samantha Allmond, George Spaeth, Janet Davis, Harriet Rentz, Isabel Lehman, Miriam Camlin.  I'm sure there are others I haven't mentioned.  Those who have been in the choir but are no longer to sing with us--Jim Foyle, Louise Markley, and others.  I know I haven't mentioned everyone.  And thn thre are people who just have special gifts:  Barbara Green, Bob Allmond, Sue Jenkins, Gunta Plostnieks, Steve Longenberger, Jeannette Simpson (77 years in the choir!).  I wish I could give all of you today the gift of hearing them again.  I am grateful to those who can't always be with us but have given their gifts--Marcia Slowly, Diane Schwartz, Betty Helpa, Amy Hawthorne, Debra Sharpe, for all of them.  I thank them for what they've given to me and to Grace.  We use our music to praise God.  We lift the hearts of others, and I think we've shown what we can bring to Grace, and what we've done through years of music to praise God.  Let's celebrate that as we watch this music from our tenth anniversary of community concerts.