Today I am up to my ears in preparations for Sunday's Remembrance service. In a moment of rash stupidity, I decided to do a booklet (rather than just a song sheet for those who can't see the screen) that we'll sit in a circle with monitors for visuals rather than a screen and, as I've only had five requests for candles and bought 4 dozen of the things, I'd find a suitable to text so that everyone could have a 'labelled' candle to take away.
In the trusty open source software that is E-Sword, Iwas looking at various translations of John1:5 and found this in the Message which I really like...
The Life-Light blazed out of the darkness; the darkness could not put it out
I'm not a great fan of the Message, but this seemed ideal for Sunday, and I love the word 'blaze' used in this context, suggesting almost that the light consumes the darkness rather than merely that the darkness can't extinguish the light.
I hope the service works - we are using some three-handkerchief weepy hymns/tunes because I feel some of our folk need some release of pent-up emotion, some poetry (not too mawkish) and some images (when I decide which!). Time will tell - but hopefully the Life-Light will indeed blaze through and the candles find their way into the homes of those who need the hope of the words.
Comments
Your service sounds excellent and indeed should serve the emotional needs of your various parishioners. I am sure your hardwork will be appreciated.
Like you, I struggle with the Message but then sometimes it offers just the right word or phrase. For our own Remembrance Sunday service we are projecting the names of all of our villagers killed in the two world wars (plus other more recent conflicts) super-imposed over an image of a battlefield. Then I thought it would be good to add some suitable music. Then I realised this was becoming too much like a television commercial so decided that we will have the names of the 15 or so people simply super-imposed, one after the other against the battlefield back drop, but instead of background music, we would watch this during our two minute silence. I have just watched a run through and it makes the loss of these lives so much more real when you see the names displayed individually, one after the other.
Sounds really powerful. One of the things at Baptist Assembly that always feels very profound is the In memoriam bit, when the names of ministers and missionaries who've died in the last twelve months appear on screen. In recent years this has had the 'Benedictus' from Jenkins' 'Armed Man' as the background music which works well, but sometimes silence is far more profound. 15-ish people in 2 minutes, ~8 seconds each - that's quite profound isn't it, when you try to imagine the real people behind the names? Hope it goes well, I'm sure it will.
e-Sword is _NOT_ open source.
It is a closed source, proprietary, Bible Study Program. That it is distributed gratis does not change it to libre software.
_The Sword Project_ (http://www.crosswire.org/sword/index.jsp) offers several open source Bible Study Programs. These programs are both libre, and gratis.
jonathon
Apologies, my mistake re: E-Sword. It is a really useful resource, and I am grateful to those who make it available free for non-commercial use.