I wrote this development of Revelation 7:9-12 for the Engage Worship Day 2014. It is designed to give us some extra time to reflect on the 'everyone was there' aspect of the worship before the throne in John's revelation of heaven, rather than racing through the text and missing the beauty of it. The bits in bold type is for the congregation to read together. When we did it for the day, Jo Squires taught the sign language for the response, which added another layer of participation. If you want to do the same then find someone who can teach you the sign language!

Richard Lyall then took him it a stage further by making a Prezi presentation. If you haven't used one of these before, it is a cool-looking way of presenting words and images, where you zoom around a canvas. You can download this as a zip file from the attachments above, or go to the Prezi website and download it from there. Don't take things out of the folder - open the thing marked Prezi and it will work from there - you will need to drag it over to your extended desktop if you use one with your projector. If that is all a bit technical, we've made a static PowerPoint version which can also be downloaded from the link above - or you could print the words out on good old paper!

In the great celebration in heaven,
John - the apostle - looked and saw this:
He saw a huge crowd - too huge to count. Everyone was there!
All nations!
All the nations coming out of Africa, South America, North America, Asia, Australia and Oceania, Europe and Antarctica - all heartily singing:
Salvation comes from our God on his Throne!
And from Jesus, the Lamb.
John saw a huge crowd - too huge to count. Everyone was there!
All tribes!
Indigenous tribes like the Maori, Kazakh, Himba, Huli and Goroka tribes, and urban tribes like Punks, Hippies, Emos, Hipsters - people who are into pop music, hip hop, jazz and classical - all expressing in their own way:
Salvation comes from our God on his Throne!
And from Jesus, the Lamb.
John saw a huge crowd - too huge to count. Everyone was there!
All ethnic groups!
People of all skin-colours, hairstyles, height and width and bodyshapes - crying out with one voice:
Salvation comes from our God on his Throne!
And from Jesus, the Lamb.
John saw a huge crowd - too huge to count. Everyone was there!
All languages!
Mandarin, Spanish, English, Hindi, Arabic, Portuguese, Bengali, Russian, Japanese and every single smaller language. Those that communicate with speaking, with writing, with pictures and in action - all making it clear that:
Salvation comes from our God on his Throne!
And from Jesus, the Lamb.
John saw a huge crowd - too huge to count. Everyone was there!
If everyone is there, they must be both:
Old and young,
Famous and unsung,
Theoretical and practical
Creative and mathematical,
Touchy-feely and reflectives,
Sleepy-heads and actives
All who were standing around the Throne, fell on their faces before the Throne and worshipped God, calling out with loud voices:
Amen!
Praise and glory and wisdom and thanks
and honour and power and strength
be to our God for ever and ever.
Amen!