i am an offering

What I Blog About - From Wordle

Since Billy Chia just confessed that he is a “church addict” after entering his blog into wordle, I wanted to see what would come about if I did the same thing.  Here it is:

The best thing about it - every time I refreshed, the words “worship” and “happened” always showed up prominently.  Thank You, Lord, for reassuring me that “worship happened” every time we have gathered!

Blog Love - Some Links You Should Check Out

Shannon shares a great series on Maturity in Christ.  I’d highly encourage reading all parts.  Part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, a bit more, and a bit more!

Brad Loser (loh-ser, not loo-zer!) is going through Worship Matters. If you want some detailed thoughts from some folks going through the book, definitely check it out.  He shares quite a bit, so be prepared for some reading, but it’s worth it.

Billy shares a really fantastic post on complaining and feedback to follow up his humorous post that he posted in response to Ragamuffin Soul’s “you-asked-for-it” question. I think I’m one of the few people that actually recommends not reading Ragamuffin soul, but I thought Billy eventually turned this around quite positively. *EDIT* Los contacted me directly with a very positive comment asking why I said this in the comments.  I really appreciate it and explained why I said this below.  I shouldn’t have said it and should have let people come to their own decision about his blog.  I do apologize for that and hope we can all be at peace.  The power of words are quite incredible at times.

Russ has a fantastic story about his privilege to be Fred’s guest at National Worship Leader Conference and hang out with some of the more famous worship folks.

Lorie King has a featured article on The Worship Community on how to enhance stage presence. I think her perspective is right on with all of these tips.

Finally, Fred has a wonderful post about making sure we focus on good things happening and celebrate victories.

Have a fantastic weekend, everyone!  More thoughts from my teaching this Sunday will come next week.

I hope you’re all enjoying a lovely Tuesday morning!  I wanted to point you to a few resources today:

From the Rebelution: Brett Harris just posted this great article on worship. Very cool to see the younger generation stepping up.

National Worship Leader Conference: If you’re like me and have a hard time getting to any worship conferences lately, you can “go there without going there” in a couple of different ways.  A couple worship leaders I’ve connected with are currently attending the National Worship Leader Conference in Austin, TX.  Jim Drake is keeping a pretty regularly updated twitter feed. And Fred McKinnon will be blogging and posting to his twitter feed as well.  Slake, Worship Leader magazine’s new blog, will be blogging from the conference as well.

Also, I will be preaching at our church this week.  For the rest of the week, I’ll blog on thougths that God leads me to as I prepare for the message.

Fred McKinnon just shared a link to his answers to five questions on worship he was asked by The Worship Journals and asked that we comment on his post with the answers to our questions.  I thought this would make a better blog post than a comment so here we go:

Five Questions on Worship

1. What does Worship Mean to You?

Worship means exalting something greater than we currently or previously have exalted it in our own mind.  We could worship a situation.  We could worship an experience.  We could worship a thing.  To me, I try above all else to worship God.  This means surrending myself, my thoughts, whatever I might be exalting at any given moment in time and exalting Him above it all.  This means letting myself decrease and Him increase.  This means letting God be the object of my worship every minute of each day.

2. What Causes You to Worship?

Ultimately - the Holy Spirit.  I can’t worship without the power of God prompting me to do so.  It’s impossible, so the Holy Spirit is what causes me to worship.  But as far as what the Holy Spirit uses to prompt me to worship:  music is a given for me.  So many types of music are used to prompt me to worship.  It helps immensely if the music directs my thoughts toward God and who He is, but I can also be prompted by the beauty and design of orchestral music or the spontaneity and skill of jazz music.  I can see the Creator’s hand in the creativity and complexity of both of these types of music.  I am also prompted by seeing people honor and glorify God in decisions they make and situations they’re in.  Mountains also prompt me to worship.  They show me how puny I am and how amazingly huge God is.  If the mountains are that majestic - how much more the One who Created them!

3. How is Worship Displayed in Your Life?

I hope that it is displayed in the way I live it.  I desire to live a life that exalts God every day and puts to death everything that doesn’t.  I want to offer my life as a living sacrifice to Him.  I hope that worship is displayed in my marriage, my relationship with my daughter, my relationship with my church and pastor, my relationship with my co-workers and through every interaction I have with people.

4. What is Your Favorite Song and Why?

Can it be the top 50? :-)  I think at the moment the song that the Holy Spirit is using most to speak to me would be “Let Your Kingdom Come” by Sovereign Grace Music off of the Valley of Vision album. I keep coming back to it and it keeps replaying in my mind.  It is such a good declaration to lift God’s cause higher than our own and to get my priorities out of the way and make my life about His priorites.

How would you answer these four questions?  (You can be brief, if you like!)

One of the things that can keep a congregation from worshiping God is being distracted by unprepared musicians or teachers. What are some things that keep us from getting more skillful at our instrument or voice technique?

• Lack of desire to get better. This can come from thinking that you’re already good enough or it can come from believing that it doesn’t matter to do things with skill and that “God accepts us just the way we are.” While that is true, it is a Biblical concept to play with skill and also a Biblical concept to do things to the best of our abilities, doing everything we do for the Glory of Jesus. There is always room for improvement and it is so important that we are life long learners. If you are struggling with a lack of desire to get better, you might want to take a listen to this great message from Ken Boer and Pat Sczebel.
• Not practicing. So many worship team members think that it’s okay to just show up for rehearsal without preparation and then show up for the service without practicing. Why do we expect the pastor to spend literally hours upon hours preparing for the message but we’re fine with the musicians putting in only practice with the team but not any personal preparation? Not only does practicing make you a better player or singer, it’s makes you less of a distraction during a meeting because you are confident at what you’re doing and can look like you’re enjoying yourself and worshiping God instead of being buried in the music.
• Not listening to a variety of styles and genres, or just plain not listening to anything. It is so important that we constantly listen to music for inspiration and examples. Listen to new songs, listen to old songs, listen to rock songs, listen to jazz songs, listen to chant, listen to everything you can listen to (as long as it does not focus your mind away from God with its message.) Pick out your specific instrument or listen closely to how the vocals blend.
• Along with that, we limit our skill by declaring that we only like a particular style of worship. It is just as dangerous to proclaim that we can only worship “contemporary” music as well as proclaiming that we can only worship with hymns. Take in both and take in a lot of both.

Can you think of any more skill lids?

The verse that this blog and ultimately my own life is based on is Romans 12:1-2. These verses are a great summary of how we are to offer our lives as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. Luther sums it up this way:

Where the true obedience of faith toward God is to be found, there everything one’s calling requires to be done is a holy and God-pleasing act of worship.”

Whatever your calling requires you to do, do it with your whole heart, as though working for Jesus and not man, and this is a holy and God-pleasing act of worship. What a way to live life!