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worship and music conference
During Thursday morning’s worship service at the Presbyterian Association of Musicians’ Worship and Music Conference, the Rev. Cecilia (Ce Ce) Armstrong told those gathered in person and online that she was not going to preach a devotional sermon.
To prove his assertion that, in music and in other life pursuits, words matter, Tom Trenney led off his Routley lecture Wednesday with examples of paraprosedokians — sentences that begin innocently enough, then veer off in unexpected directions.
During worship Wednesday at the Presbyterian Association of Musicians’ Music and Worship Conference, it was Ash Wednesday.
One Sunday morning, Tom Trenney, the Routley Lecturer this week for the Presbyterian Association of Musicians’ Worship and Music Conference and the minister of music at First-Plymouth Church in Lincoln, Nebraska, invited the choir and whoever wanted to in the congregation to whistle during the hymn “Lord of the Dance,” except during the somber fourth verse. He tried the same thing Tuesday, inviting class participants to pucker up behind their masks and whistle.
“Just being here, being here together is what I’m most looking forward to,” said Eric Wall.
It’s Tom Trenney’s job to deliver the Routley Lecture each day this week during the Presbyterian Association of Musicians’ Worship and Music Conference. Rather than lecture students meeting both in person at Montreat Conference Center and online during his opening talk on Monday, Trenney told them a story from a few years back about a college student of his named Summer.
Preaching on John the Baptist, whose ministry centered on preparing people for one more powerful than he and who would baptize with fire and the Holy Spirit, the Rev. CeCe Armstrong began her sermon on Luke 3:15-17, 21-22, with these words: “You belong to God.”
When he portrayed Private Gomer Pyle during the mid-1960s, actor Jim Nabors employed a number of catch phrases, including “gall-lee” and “Shazam.” But Pyle, who hailed from fictional Mayberry, North Carolina, which is in the same state as the very real Montreat Conference Center, the setting the Presbyterian Association of Musicians’ Worship and Music Conference, was best known for recounting mixed-up stories punctuated by this phrase: “Surprise, surprise, surprise!”
The first-ever hybrid version of the Presbyterian Association of Musicians’ Worship and Music Conference began in person Sunday from Montreat Conference Center and includes an entirely online offering June 27 through July 2. View the conference livestream schedule here. Register for the online conference here.
The Rev. Jessica Tate, director of NEXT Church and a worship leader for the 2020 Presbyterian Association of Musicians Worship & Music Conference, told a telling story about life during COVID-19 with 2-year-old son, Huw, during opening worship Sunday. As PAM turns 50, it’s holding its golden year celebration online , with live broadcasts originating from Montreat Conference Center.
