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Observation 7
Church Seven Observation Report
18th September 2005
Church Seven is an independent evangelical charismatic church. It is different from all the other churches observed in that it does not have its own building, instead meeting in the village school hall. It is also the only church observed where communion was not celebrated as part of normal Sunday worship.
The music was provided by a worship band comprised of five musicians, led by the pastor on guitar. Other instruments were variously played, including fiddle, keyboard, flute, penny whistle, accordion, and trombone. Lead vocals were provided throughout. The musical repertoire is taken from Songs of Fellowship vols. 1 & 2 and Spring Harvest. Additionally, about one hundred songs have been written by members of the congregation, approximately twenty of which are in current use.
The service began by the pastor asking how many of the adults remembered this song from childhood, and proceeded with the unaccompanied singing of 'Zacchaeus was a very little man' 1. Though no words were provided, many adults (no young people) joined in. Another very real illustration of how songs learnt in childhood stay in our hearts and minds.
The first song intended to be congregational, 'My Jesus, My Saviour', was the only song in the service that the majority of young people had the opportunity to participate in. Only two of the fifteen young people present were observed singing; the rest (we could see) were waving flags at the back of the hall (hence the unusually high figures in the 'responding to the music' category on the observation record sheets). After this song, all but one of the young people left to go to their respective Sunday School groups. The remaining young person was the teenage boy operating the sound desk at the back - he was marked as 'responding to the music' during songs where he was operating the sound desk but not singing.
The words for all the songs were displayed on an Over Head Projector Screen. This was less than satisfactory for the assembly, as the words were constantly being moved up and down to cope with various repeats and jumps between verse and chorus. Two of the congregational songs were composed by members of the church, and another new song (It's OK) written by one of the band, was shared that morning for meditation.
The Sunday School groups do sing together, occasionally using the same material as is used in church services. Though they do not sing every week, efforts are made to teach new songs in Sunday School for use in the monthly family services. The repertoire of between ten and fifteen songs are a mixture of children's songs ( about 75% Lighthouse songs and songs from the Family Zone CD rom) and more standard worship songs (e.g. My Jesus, My Saviour), with the aim that children will learn some 'grown-up' songs and the adults will learn some of the children's material. There is also a Youth Band that periodically plays both at family services and for normal worship services. The Youth Band was not playing on the day we observed, but was favourably mentioned by some of the young people interviewed.
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- Anon Zacchaeus was a very little man no 300 in Burt, P., Horrobin, P. & Leavers, G. (eds.) (1997) Junior Praise. London: Marshall Pickering Back to text
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