As we’ve done before, have a separate video for each element of the celebration. Two videos were pre-recorded last week at church, and the rest come from the houses of church members and staff, some come from friends’ recommendations around the web, and one was filmed by the side of the road in Arvin, California.
View March 22nd Celebration online
March 22nd Celebration includes:
- For the prelude Marcia will play “Prelude and Fughetta” by GF Handel, which was recorded in the sanctuary last week.
- Words of welcome are spoken by Talitha.
- The call to celebration is provided by Claire and Shelly Kelly.
- Kim leads us in the opening hymn, which is “Down in the River to Pray”
- The prayer for peace comes from St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Ventura, California. Put your coffee cup down for this one, so you can learn to pray for peace in American Sign Language.
- Talitha and Dolores (recorded last week) told the story of the Mystery of Easter (Godly Play, Lent 4)
- The anthem this week was recommended by Kim: a lovely banjo-picking song, “You’re not alone.”
- Bill Neely will be reading Psalm 63.
- Ben’s sermon was recorded on the back of a flatbed trailer, in a wide spot on the road near Arvin, CA. Ben was driving home from Long Beach, where he went to move his daughter and one of her friends out of their dorm rooms. They did the sermon in one take, so it’s a little rough, and they had to suffer trucks honking at them, but it was fun for them to find a new pulpit in an unfamiliar sanctuary.
- After the sermon Talitha will be leading us in a hymn that also is a prayer: “Rain Down Your Love on Your People.”
- From his back yard, Ben will be calling for the offering, leading you in the charge and giving you a benediction. If you’d like to give online, please visit our PayPal page
- The Postlude is a song by Ben’s favorite Dominican musician, Juan Luis Guerra. The words of the song reflect a desire that God would send a rain of coffee and other good things on the poorest of the poor in the Dominican Republic. Ben posted this song as a postlude because it is a prayer for abundance from a place of deep poverty and as such it feels like an articulation of Psalm 63. The official video is in the playlist. The video was filmed in the Dominican Republic in 1989. It’s a little grainy but the audio is good. We’ll extend the postlude by including two other versions — a jazz version of the song performed by Juan Luis Guerra more recently at a concert in Santo Domingo and a Mariachi Version played in Texas.
Thank you all for joining us on YouTube, and for remaining a part of the MPC family. If you’d like to help make videos over the next few weeks, do reach out. Please us know if there is any way we can pray with you or for you. And if you have any needs, let us know and we’ll see what we can do. Many people are eager to help out.
Stay well, and be healthy.
God’s Peace and Every Blessing,
Ben and Talitha