We don't sing choruses very often at church...mainly because a lot of them are just fluff. But last night we sang "I Will Call Upon the Lord", which I hadn't ever heard before. Our regular music leader takes a Sunday off every once in a while and our elder leads the singing instead. So he had us sing this, and he explained how when he was up in Maryland at John Reisinger's church, Pastor Reisinger had them clap after the line "the Lord liveth" and managed to shock all the Reformed Baptists by doing that...and holding his hands up! :p
So he had us clap (remember I said we don't sing choruses very often?) and what an anemic clap we all came up with! I've got nothing against clapping, but you can't just clap once like that, especially if you're not used to it! We need to be clapping more like in this recording where they're clapping through the whole refrain (wow, what cheesy graphics!):
I Will Call Upon the Lord
So anyway...we apparently need to clap more. As I said, I've got nothing against clapping, we've been at other churches where clapping during choruses was quite common (although the sermon was fluff which is why we're not going to those churches), and I've clapped at camp...very badly...because I can't clap in time to the music very well. :(
Last year at camp I drove one girl crazy with my clapping. This girl apparently decided she wanted to be my buddy all week and wouldn't leave me alone! I mean, it's nice that she liked me, and I generally get along fine with people, but she was rather annoying. Anyway, during one of the chapel meetings she was standing next to me and finally grabbed my hands and made me start clapping in time, after which I tried to just keep clapping at the "proper" rhythm she'd set for me...and the guy on the other side of me decided he'd just try to follow my clapping because he had been struggling as much as I had. Ha, camp memories...and one reason I didn't go this year, but if I'm not busy I want to go to the "Extreme Weekend" in the fall. The Extreme Weekend is for 18 and up...so adults...which will hopefully mean there won't be all the "drama" of the high-school camps. :p Not the clapping, that wasn't drama...I meant all the other silly stuff that usually was going on.
Wow, that got off-topic! Okay, that's my rambling for Monday. I was trying to read about some tax stuff while drinking my tea, but it wasn't making sense, so I thought I'd blog while I waited for the caffeine to kick in.
I'm also wondering how long I can keep my room nice and clean like it is now...
Back to work!
15 comments:
Our church has two services--the first is supposed to be "contemporary" and is all fluffy (not the sermon, though) and the second is more traditional. I suppose it isn't very cool, but I would much rather sing hymns that have meaning. But the second service is at the same time as youth group and Sunday school...
Yeah, I prefer hymns too, although there are choruses that have meaning as well.
A lot of churches seem to do that, have the contemporary service early, and then the traditional one during Sunday school...I guess assuming that if you would want to go to Sunday school you would want to go to the contemporary service?
Or maybe it's more like, you just go to the traditional one, but if you're the type to go to the contemporary service, you can get it done with early, and only go to Sunday school if you really want to.
I think it's because they think that the youth group would rather go to a "contemporary" service...I think there are a couple classes going on at the same time, but they are mostly for people who are about 70 years old :)
Wow that is an old song, I remember singing it as a kid! :p And I can't comment without asking, what is this about choruses mainly being fluff?
The copywrite is 1981 I think.
I didn't say that ALL choruses are fluff, Will! I just said that a lot of them are. Obviously there are the "seven-eleven" choruses (seven words sung eleven times) that are for the most part nothingness.
But there are also good ones as well...like the chorus that I never have succeeded in finding the words for. We sang it at one of the churches we visited for a while...
"You're the Lion of Judah,
the lamb that was slain,
You ascended to Heaven and evermore shall reign..." and that's about all I can remember of it. :(
Anyway, I'm going off-topic again, but there are, in my opinion, good choruses and fluffy ones.
I hate we missed the clapping. Hopefully we will clap again in the near future!
Ha-ha, actually I hadn't looked for that chorus recently...I found it this time:
Lion of Judah
And a video of a church singing it:
Video
I don't think you missed much, mandolinartist. ;)
Will...I was about to say we used to sing it a lot at home church!
Anyways, I can't believe you've never heard that song before, Natalie! But now you can appreciate it. And I guess one bit of "clapping drama" you will escape by going to "adult camp" is that certain people think it's "cool" to clap at some parts and "uncool" at some other parts, and worry much more about that, never really bothering about what the song really means. It's really so much more than that, good grief!
Nope, never heard it before, Jessica! :) And the clapping wasn't really too much of a problem, as long as other people don't mind me clapping slightly out of time! :D
Hey, when do you turn 18? You should come to camp with me, if I go! I probably won't know anyone there. :( Or are you going to be busy this fall?
Oh, and I forgot to say earlier that this used to be one of my and John's favorite songs (by Petra!) about 12 years ago...
I turn 18 on August 18 (golden birthday!!). When is the camp, and how much? I'd like to come!
I'm not sure when it is this year, I haven't gotten a brochure yet...you can download the brochure for last year on this page: MTYC
Page down on that page. It's usually late September though, I think. I think it was $30 last year? Plus more if you wanted to go canoeing...I doubt there's going to be enough water for good canoeing this year!
Do you want someone to come visit you at camp? I wonder if they will sell actual 'bacon' and 'lip gloss' candy to adults? :) :)
Hotdogs, not bacon; Zoe and Lauren thought those fruit snacks tasted like hotdogs...I think they were a bit low on sleep perhaps...the fruit snacks tasted like fruit. Those other thing did taste like lip gloss though! :D
You could go to camp even, mandolinartist!
i was not low on sleep! hehe! and they totally had a kind of "smoked or almost burned" icky aftertaste. mmm gotta luv em!
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