Every time I take a break from writing, whether it’s planned or not I always feel completely selfish when I come back. It’s not like I have hundreds of readers who hang on my every word, or that I’m saying so many revolutionary things that you need me. But I have always felt like I am supposed to be doing this and until I hear something different then I have to keep going.

The past few months have been so crazy that I can’t even believe I had enough time to sit her and do this right now. It’s like a basketball player who catches a pass and turns around to find that on one is actually guarding them. There’s a split second there when they are caught off guard because there’s always someone in your face when you’re on the court. After that it’s all about the execution. You have to stand there and deliver. So that’s what I’m attempting to do now. After all the time off, Christmas, Easter planning, directing and producing a drama, conducting a choir, planning a dance routine and a worship retreat, I THINK I’m back to being able to write regularly again. My hope is that over the course of this next season I can create a system that allows me to continue to do what I do even during the extremely busy seasons. I’m trying to refocus.

And with a ridiculous segue, maybe there’s something that has pulled you away from something that you need to be doing. Maybe you’ve allowed life to turn you all around to the point that you aren’t even sure which direction you’re headed. It might be time for you to refocus. Don’t judge me too harshly, I haven’t done this in awhile. I’ll get better as I get back to writing. Happy end of April!

I know it has been awhile since I’ve posted, but I’ve been busy. Without going into too much detail right now, I’m wrapping up the recording of this music for our Good Friday program so we can have it for rehearsal this weekend. I wanted to take a break from that and write about this show I went to last night.

I was blessed with an opportunity to go see Jesus Culture last night at the Warfield Theatre in San Francisco. The Tech Director here at the church ended up with an extra ticket and let me tag along with him. First of all, the Warfield is a gorgeous venue if you’ve never been there before. Such history and the design on the inside reminded me of the Fox Theatre in Saint Louis, but not as big or gorgeous (sorry, I’m biased). Anyway, we had great seats at the first row of the loge section. We could sit if we wanted to with no worries of anyone standing in front of us. But let’s face it, no one sits at a Jesus Culture concert.

First was Derek Johns0n. I’ve been listening to some of his stuff recently and have been impressed. The impressiveness continued during his set. With an acoustic, an electric, and a set up that included a kick drum, a tambourine on a stand and a shaker, they completely rocked the house. His voice is solid singing high or low. His love for God and his love for leading worship was so evident even in that big room. He made it look effortless. As a worship leader I’m always looking to see how other worship leaders manage a situation and connect with the room they are in. You could have closed your eyes and thought you were in a church. It was that awesome. They absolutely killed “One Thing Remains”. You’re used to hearing that song done with a wall of sound, except for on the Bethel Loft Sessions CD. But this was just perfect.

After he was done they went to a video of Kim Walker-Smith sharing her heart for this project and sort of her vision for the concert. It was awesome to hear that done and the video was pretty cool. I know it’s hard to recreate that sentiment night in and night out, but it would have been cool to have her share some of that live on the stage. Again, I totally understand and was actually impressed with the use of video. The band came out and started in with “Alive” from the new “Still Believe” CD. THAT was a wall of sound. Even with all of the sound they were producing, they were really only hitting about 110db in the room (yes I checked. What do you expect?). Anyway, the worship was steady and it was solid. As much as it was a performance, it was that much if not more a worship experience. Each and every song was just a vehicle and opportunity to fill that room with praise. I wonder if the people at the strip club that’s connected to the Warfield could hear us. It was crazy loud in there. When they got to the title track of the CD, you could easily see why she named the CD after this song. The passion in which that song was written and sung was far and above everything else. The words of the chorus are simple, but powerful. In a world where everything is changing and people are choosing their own ways like never before, we need to keep in mind that God is still God.

And I still believe you’re the same yesterday, today and forever

And I still believe your blood is sufficient for me

If you haven’t heard this song, go check it out. It’s worth it.

Now you can’t go to a Jesus Culture concert where Kim is on the stage without a couple things. 1, you’ll get your money’s worth with EVERY song. They won’t end a song until they feel is exactly time to let it go. I appreciated this way more in concert form than on a CD. You don’t quite get the same feel listening to it in your car. 2, you’re going to get the Kim Walker-Smith laugh. Outside of her heart for worship and the lyrics and music she so intricately weaves together, this is one of my favorite things about her. I counted 4 times, but I could have been off. She ended up cutting the set short because she ran out of voice. Then she told us why. I won’t spoil her secret just in case someone reads this that is planning to go to one of their upcoming shows. Also, if this post finds its way to someone on their team then I don’t want to be the one who spilled before it was time.

Overall, great show. B+ for sure. It would have easily been an A had we not had to shut it down early. I will definitely go see them again when they come to town. If they are going to be close to you in the near future I would suggest you find yourself there.

I’ll be the first to admit it, I’m not as young as I used to be. Now, for those of you that are older than me and will read that statment and laugh at the 32 year old, hear me out. I know that as far as the world stands right now I’m pretty much right there in the middle of everything that’s going on. I’m a social networker. I obviously blog. I keep up pretty well with current events. There’s pretty much a “prime of my life” mentality overall. But I’m noticing a distinct change happening in my brain and it reminds me of my dad.

As I listen to music today I’m realizing that there’s just a lot of it that I’m either not getting or it’s just not my thing anymore. I find myself splitting my time musically between listening to new stuff and then reverting back to old music that I listened to when I was younger. I haven’t yet determined if that is because I’m getting older and “the stuff these kids are listening to today” isn’t really my cup of tea, or if it’s just a matter of fact that the music that is out today is just not really as good as it used to be. I find myself musically underwhelmed and verbally bored. And before you ask, yes, this pertains to both “Christian” and “secular” musical genres. I’ve listened to a few CDs already in this young year that will probably be up for some sort of musical awards this time next year that will either win because of the name associated with it or because of the lack of competition in their category.

Why am I saying this? Well, from a secular standpoint this totally makes sense. The world that we are living is currently and constantly deteriorating and so it the music reflects that. However, from a Christian standpoint we serve an ever-living, ever-loving God that is continuing to do a mighty work in our lives and the lives of His people. Shouldn’t our music reflect that as well? I know I’ve mentioned this before, but I will ask the question again. Should we be setting new trends or just following the ones laid out by the world? I think now more than ever the Church is poised to take a huge stand in creating music that is cutting edge, at the forefront of a movement that speaks truth. There are some out there doing it and doing it well that are FINALLY starting to get some recognition, but I believe that now needs to translate to the mainstream CCM that we listen to and use in our churches.

I speak from the heart of a worship pastor whose job it is to lead the people that set foot in our church in a relevant, authentic worship experience and is finding it a little bit harder than normal to pull that off lately. Maybe I’m a little jaded and cynical, but that’s why I present these arguments to you and ask you to share your thoughts. I’d love to hear what you have to say. I think that maybe I’ll have a Google+ hangout or a video chat or something about this. Let me see what I can do about that. In the mean time, this is my medium and I ask you to share your thoughts about it.

A few months ago I wrote about something that I called Conditional Relationalism: the idea of people, especially in the church, relating to each other on their own terms when they feel like it. It’s the thing that allows us to keep people at arms length and only letting them see what we approve. We keep a comfortable distance so people can’t see us and we can’t see them. Everyone has seemed to be okay with this and no one has challenged it too much and it became a norm. But what happens when you are “forced” to relate to others? What happens when you can’t get away and have no other choice but to allow people into the inner sanctum, that personal bubble that we have created? What happens when it all leaves the hypothetical and becomes real?

So many times we look at the Ecclesiastes 4 passage through the eyes of the joy of being close and how we can help each other. Sometimes we don’t look as much at the NECESSITY of having people around. We have our own personal silos that we build just far enough away from others that they can’t see in, but what we don’t take into consideration is the fact that when our silos fall over they aren’t close enough to someone else for them to see it leaning. From a philosophical standpoint, I think it’s safe to say that when the silo falls someone does see it when it finally crashes at their feet. Generally at that point it’s too late to help.

I keep coming back to this because it seems that it might be more work to create these silos all by ourselves, fighting our natural urge to be community beings. I wonder what would happen if some of us were drawn together. Not like that horribly inappropriate, short lived cartoon show, but in a real life sense. I wonder how we would react if something brought us into a place where we had to face ourselves and how we interact with others? I’m thinking about this because I’m in a situation where I see this getting ready to happen soon and I’m going to have to manage it with a few people. I’m excited to see what God is going to do to promote growth, but I promise you that it won’t be easy.

Are we willing to be forced out of our comfort zones? Even as I type that question I realize that the answer is no, because if we were comfortable with it there would be no reason to force us to do anything. Can you see a way in your life right now where God is calling you to take a step out of the comfortable? Is there a coworker that seems to be connecting with you even when you don’t want connection? Are you kids friends with the kids of a church member that you have a disagreement with? What are you doing about it?

There are some great cover bands out there. Some of them are touring around the country doing shows. There are actually multiple cover bands doing shows based on the same band. People will actually go and pay money to go see a cover band if it is done well. So forgive me if I laugh a little when church worship teams contend that they aren’t just some cover band and want to do things their own way. I’m not sure why we have overlooked this, but in reality worship bands ARE in fact cover bands. And that is okay. It really is.

Now that I’ve said that, let me make sure you understand where I’m coming from. It should always be our desire to bring excellence in everything we do. Our music should not be excluded from that. However, there is something about musicians (maybe it’s the idea of how our music is so personal to us) that makes it hard for us to come together in a worship setting and play what we hear. We are always looking to “put our own spin on it” or “create our own groove” which can in turn be harder than just playing the song that’s in front of us. It takes a lot of time to play a song correctly as a BAND. I emphasize the word band because there’s a difference between a band and a group of people playing on a stage. The more we try to do our own thing the less we sound like a band. Rant over. So it is terribly important to the health of your group as well as the flow of a worship service to have a band that can play well together and work within a created system.

One of the best groups I was a part of was at Missouri Baptist University. That group of young kids understood what it meant to be a band and how to present a song. As a result there were some magical moments in that group that we all look back to a good 5 years later. I remember those rehearsal nights when it didn’t always come together and it was frustrating. But I also remember those nights when it clicked and we could’ve stayed there all night making music together. All of that happened under the umbrella of us knowing who we were and what we were trying to accomplish. I am convinced that the same needs to be true for our church bands. We need to understand who we are and what our goal is. Am I sitting here saying that we need to squelch creativity among out people and never branch out? Heck no! Do you not know me at ALL??? What I am saying is create a base and stand on it. The base is that we are cover bands. Once you can confidently play as a band then branch out and make it your own. I’m okay with you disagreeing with me. I don’t write anything so people only agree. That would be lame. I will say this though. I’ve found a website recently where praise teams post their worship sets and have heard some interesting things as people have tried to do their own things with some of today’s popular songs. I’ll leave it there.

What are you thoughts?

Maybe it’s because of the snow they are getting in St. Louis right now. Maybe it’s because I didn’t really want to get out of bed this morning. I don’t know what it is, but a blanket sounds DIVINE right now. That doesn’t really have anything to do with today’s topic, but it did influence the title. In true artist form, my inspiration comes from many different places so that means you have to deal with my brain. But back to the topic…

Something that has caused me to back track the MOST in my life has been making statements that I didn’t think out all the way before I said it. Many times I have said something and once it was out I realized that I should have kept that to myself. Or people’s response to me made me know that I hadn’t thought about all of the aspects of my statement. As a kid that can get you into a fight real quick. As an adult that can get you into a fight real quick as well actually. As a worship pastor, it is easy to get in trouble because we don’t generally have a lot of time to talk. We try to share deep, theological statements in small windows during a worship set and sometimes that doesn’t always work. We end up either messing a scripture up or saying something that needs to be explained and you don’t have the time to do it. Based on your church you either get emails during the week or response cards in your mailbox.

Is there a proper way to handle this? I believe that there is. As leaders we should definitely be sharing our hearts whenever we can, but we have to be very, and I mean VERY strategic with what we say and how we say it. In most cases, we are working within a 15-30 minute window where we have to fix a certain number of songs and maybe a prayer. There isn’t much time to throw out your deep thoughts on dispensationalism or when you believe Jesus is coming back. You do have a perfect opportunity to create a welcoming environment for people who may be in your congregation that have never set foot in a church. You don’t need to say much about that. It’s your goal to be open and real and draw people to the foot of the cross. As I’ve found, it doesn’t actually take many words to pull that off.

I just wanted to share that today. I don’t know if that’s what you needed, but it was on my heart. There it is.

We are officially in the season of Lent and I know that not everyone celebrates or observes Lent for whatever reasons. However I know that a lot of people do, and that’s why I ask the question. It’s a little bit different than the question that most people ask around this time, but I feel like it’s equally important. People always want to know what you gave up for Lent. In the past few years I’ve heard a lot about technology and chocolate. I don’t know if they are related, but those seem to be the perennial top 2. No one ever asks what you add for Lent. Why is that?

SPECULATION PARAGRAPH AHEAD:

I wonder if it’s because we aren’t totally sure what Lent is for. I wonder if it’s because we spend more time looking at what comes before Lent as opposed to what it is leading up to. I wonder if we do it because it seems like the right thing to do. I can’t help but wonder what form Lent would take if we looked at it from the idea of making an even trade in our lives during this time. I learned a long time ago if you take something away but don’t put something else in that place then you’re more likely to put that old thing right back in the place you took it out of. Many times in my own life I have found that to be true. When we take that approach, Lent becomes nothing more than a waiting game.

For Christians, this could very well be a perfect time to really create some laser focus on our walks with Christ. Maybe you wanted to read a new book. Maybe you wanted to learn about a new missionary. Maybe there’s something new that your church is doing that you wanted to get involved in. Maybe someone is really needing prayer or a friend. Maybe someone is going through a transition in life that they aren’t ready for or can’t fund. Well, if you’ve given up something for Lent it probably has to do with time or money in some way. I would step out and say that redistributing our time and resources for something else for us might not be a complete change.

Why am I saying all this? Well I believe that we should always be looking for opportunities to make God known and this is as good a time as any to do that. You’re purposely taking things away from your life for this period of time, so what are you adding that will bring God more glory than the thing you took away?

Oooooooooooooooh…..I just used the ‘D’ word. Can I even say worship and discipline together? Isn’t there some sort of continuum that just got blown up as a result of that phrase? Okay, I’m done being silly now. But I know that a lot of people get turned off by the idea of the word discipline in either form that it is used. For clarity sake, I’m not asking you to beat anyone and make them come to church.

I am speaking to a definite, qualitative property of worship that we may or may not think about on a regular basis. And when I say we I mean me as well. There are so many different things today that talk about having discipline, but we rarely look at worship that way. Worship isn’t something that we are inclined to just do. I know that goes against what’s being said (and what I’ve said in the past) that we are all designed to worship and will worship something. Both of these are true at the same time. What starts out as an interest becomes something more as we dedicate time and resources to it. I believe worship is the same way. Our worship grows as we give more to it. We continue to feed it and it becomes stronger. If we only feed that worship on Sunday mornings for 20 minutes then it isn’t getting much of us and we aren’t getting as much as we can from it.

What is your worship discipline? Are you a weekend warrior? Is it more than that? Do you think I’m totally off base? You can disagree with me, it’s okay. What say you…

For those of you who clicked on this from Google thinking that this may have been a video or special site about the band, I’m sorry you have been misled. You can click away if you want, but you’ve already been counted in the stats so you might as sit and stay a spell.

Today I’m writing about something that is unfortunately a little foreign to me over the past few years. I am mere HOURS away from taking a full week of vacation. I can’t even believe that I just wrote that. But it’s true and I am terribly excited! I have realized in the past 2 days or so that I am so very tired. I have been running ever since I hit the ground here in Fremont, California and it has been a complete joy. I haven’t taken any time away since I’ve been here, and really haven’t taken much time away from work besides being sick in a few years. I’m wondering if that is a pattern of some sort…

As I am approaching this time I see how important it is to breathe. As pastors we jump into the forest and try to make sense of everything and rarely do we step back to see what it is we are really doing. Sometimes we just don’t take the time to rest and enjoy what God has made. I went to a conference a few years ago where Dan Allender was the speaker. He spoke about enjoying the Sabbath and taking time to push back the fall. I don’t think we do that enough. That is why I’m excited about spending time with my wife, kids and my parents for the next week.

My encouragement to anyone out there is to make sure that you take time to step away from it all and refresh. If you don’t you’ll turn around and realize that you may have missed something that God wanted you to see. I’ve got some catching up to do.

Sometimes I am totally amazed at how many times I can read through the Bible and always get something new out of a story that I’ve read so many times before. This was proven true once again with a story at the end of Acts 19. In short (because I want you to go and read it for yourself), dude got mad at Paul and his team for preaching the gospel and putting it up against the god of the Ephesians and caused a riot. What was crazy was that at one point in this whole exchange the people were screaming the same thing for 2 hours. Some of the people that were there weren’t even sure why they were participating, other than they walked by and saw other people doing it. That, my friends, is how you start a riot. If you can be infections enough to get passers-by to join in then you’re doing it big.

That got me to thinking. What would it look like for our worship to be THAT infectious? I mean, could we really worship with that intensity for that long? Sure, periodically we have concerts that we attend that we simulate an experience close to that, but what if our “regularly scheduled programming” looked like that as well? I tend to feel the constraints of worship on Sunday mornings, having to let go of a possible God moment for the sake of the clock. There are times where I’d love to just let God do His thing, but I feel like I have to work against Him so that we can stay on task.

Have we become too systematic in our approach to the worship experience? Are we giving ourselves enough time to let God do His thing? Sure, God can work in 20 minutes just as well as he could work in 3 minutes or an hour and a half. That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about giving ourselves the freedom to go where He really wants to take us at any given moment. The Super Bowl is coming up this Sunday and I have the privilege (or something like that) to be living in the Bay Area right now and it is Niners crazy!!! It’s exciting to be around as everyone is preparing for what could be an epic celebration. I mean, the Giants won the World Series just a couple months ago, and now the Lombardi trophy could be coming here as well. It’s electric around here right now. I’m not even a full out Niners fan (go Rams!!), but I’m totally excited about cheering on the home team this weekend in hopes of bringing a championship here for the 6th time. I’m like them people who got sucked in to the riot just by virtue of being close. Are you engaging in worship that works that way? Are you hiding it under a bushel (NO!), or are living a life of infectious worship that causes people to want to just join in?