Tag Archives: worship

‘Because He Lives’

Posted on November 26, 2021 by maradanto

Me: I always hated this song growing up in a church where it droned on like a funeral dirge wrung from a mortally wounded organ trapped in its death rattle. Well maybe it wasn’t that bad, but Lord knows it … Continue reading →

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The evening heavenly fire descended once more

Posted on January 11, 2021 by maradanto

It was on a summer evening about 17 years ago, when a congregation that no longer existed had gathered in the American Legion Hall. Why that congregation no longer met doesn’t matter. And the circumstances that brought us there that … Continue reading →

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The coming worship earthquake

Posted on October 31, 2016 by maradanto

This. Seriously. This, or a variant of it, is what I have been saying for the past 18 years. We have a vast heritage of music that is well known, even among those without a church background, a heritage that … Continue reading →

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Thirsting for water that lives

Posted on March 6, 2016 by maradanto

I want you to think about the thirstiest you’ve ever been. In March 2010 I returned to Haiti to assist at the Quisqueya Crisis Relief Center with its efforts following the earthquake. I’d been up all night the night before, … Continue reading →

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My love letter to worship music

Posted on May 12, 2014 by maradanto

I’ve become increasingly disappointed in the worship music in contemporary American Christianity, or at least Protestant Christianity — I’m less familiar with what goes on in Orthodox and Catholic services. It seems at times less like four words, three chords, … Continue reading →

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Haiti Christmas memory

Posted on December 25, 2011 by maradanto

My favorite Christmas memory comes from a staff party at the school I taught at in Haiti. It was December 1993, and I was more than two thousand miles from home, in a land where most December temperatures were around … Continue reading →

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The decline in Christmas carols

Posted on December 15, 2011 by maradanto

Thinking today about “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.” Not the best melody, I’ll admit, but it still beats the socks off most of the newer Christmas songs that get trotted out at churches these days in our bid to be … Continue reading →

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‘O Holy Night’: A Christmas remembered

Posted on December 19, 2010 by maradanto

The mythic Christmas is a white one, but one of my greatest Christmas memories involves weather that was easily fifty degrees above freezing. In December 1993, I was teaching middle school English at Cradle of Life Christian School midway between … Continue reading →

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