Spanish English Hymnals

Almost a year since my last post! Ugh! Well, since that time we've continued working in our bilingual congregation, but there are many hurdles to overcome. One of them is how to sing together.

Since our Spanish hymnal is quite a bit smaller than our English hymnal, the challenge is first of all how to give the song leaders enough songs to maintain variety and follow the theme of the lessons. We recently purchased a set of our hymnal for use on our newly installed overhead projection system. Unfortunately, not all the files have arrived. The blessing we have is that our building has two screens, so we can project English on one side and Spanish on the other.

However, I'm always looking for ways to improve this system. Eventually we'd like to be able to have the entire worship in both languages, but currently we only do the first part (through the Lord's Supper) together, then break off into English and Spanish.

I wonder if anyone out there has experience in ways of bringing two languages together in worship? What's the best Spanish hymnal out there? Is it good for singing with English speakers?

Encouraging signs

I've been encouraged lately seeing some folks begin to participate in the activities of our congregation. One of the ladies will begin teaching the Wednesday night ladies' class, and someone will translate into English what she's saying! Awesome!

I attribute this to a few of things:

1. She has always been an active member of our Spanish-speaking group, but until now really hadn't done much since our move to the English-speaking congregation.
2. One of the ladies from the English-speaking group has asked her to help in a few other things.
3. We have had several visitors from our computer lab (which has been an excellent source of Spanish-speaking visitors, by the way. More on this later.) They have been attending some of the different classes, asking for translators (especially for the ladies' class), etc.

May the Lord continue providing us opportunities here to serve the community the gospel and providing for their earthly needs.