What happens in your mind when you hear or read this phrase? Well, you would probably say nothing happens unless I know what I’m getting ready for. I would agree with you. But this phrase can provoke so many different emotions based on what comes after it. If you’re getting ready for a date, there’s the excitement of what is planned for the evening. You are finding the right outfit and taking care of the hair and/or makeup. If you are getting ready for a surgical procedure there’s nervousness. There’s also medicine that will knock you out completely so you don’t feel any incisions. If you’re getting ready for a job interview, you are making sure that you can answer questions appropriately. You are making sure that you have left yourself enough time to where you need to be. All of these different emotions are tagged to the phrase ‘getting ready’.

The Bible uses the word prepare. And it gets used quite a bit from front cover to back. There is a lot of preparation that takes place in the Bible. In the early going the preparation centers quite a bit around sacrifices and preparing the animals for all the different sacrifices that took place in the early Bible times. In the beginning of the New Testament there was a lot of preparation for Jesus to be born and for him to die. After that there’s is talk of preparation as we wait for His return. After you read this, go to a Bible website (I would offer youversion.com) and type the word ‘prepare’ in the search bar. You’ll get quite the list.

So I’ve mentioned all of this to say that there is quite an emphasis in our world on being prepared. Yet, so many times we find ourselves unprepared for the things in our lives. How does that work? I spent some time as a Boy Scout when I was little and the main phrase of the Boy Scouts is ‘Be Prepared’. They then proceed to tell you how being prepared is the key to being a good boy scout and in turn, a good citizen. It seems like there’s great value in this concept of preparation. And again, I don’t think it’s just a worldly concept because it’s all throughout the Bible.

There is such great, almost painstaking detail taken in Scripture to talk about preparation for spending time with the Lord. In the Old Testament, only certain people could make sacrifices and only at certain times. Things had to be done in particular ways otherwise the sacrifices wouldn’t count. Then when Jesus was speaking about His impending fate then return to the Father (John 14) he said that he would go and prepare a place for us in Heaven. He went back to get things ready for the party that will occur when we get to be with Him.

How serious do you take preparation? Do you throw things together when you have the time? Or do you take the time to get yourself ready for whatever is coming up in your life? If you are a leader, do you take the time to prepare yourself to lead the people that are following you? I have rehearsals tonight with my vocalists and my band for church on Sunday. If I am not prepared to lead them, then that rehearsal won’t be very effective or efficient. But when I take the time to go through music and know what I want to hear, I have a better chance of relaying that message to them when the time comes. On Sunday morning a lot of time we pray that the Lord would prepare the hearts of the people for worship. We want people to come in and be ready for what’s going to happen when they walk in the door. That’s why we have things like prayers to help us clear our minds and get focused on the task at hand.

I don’t know what you do to get ready for things that happen in your life, but I realized that I might not be taking enough time to prepare my heart and mind for the things that I encounter. I will have to look into this some more and see what God has to say to me. This topic may get revisited before the week is out. Here’s the question: How do you prepare for the things you encounter in your daily life? And part B: How do you prepare for the things that are coming up? Answer at will.

I’ve been thinking about this for a little while, but I couldn’t figure out the approach I wanted to take. This is an interesting topic in my own mind. And I also wonder what others think about this. I know that in the end this may be a matter of semantics, but maybe it will be more than that.

So here’s the question to ponder. How many worship pastors feel like they are truly shepherding people? How many church goers feel that they are being shepherded by the worship guy? I would hope that there is spiritual truth being presented in the songs that are being sung in your churches. That is definitely a huge part of people led. But do you know how much or how little that worship pastor is putting into that music? Do you think they are just picking songs? Or do you believe that they are praying over and through worship sets to make sure that what they sing on Sundays brings truth about our Savior? How accessible is the worship leader/pastor at your church? Now I know that some of us attend some pretty big churches and it’s hard to get to some of them. So I guess then this question really is for you as well. Are you being shepherded by them? Or are they just leading the music? Do you attend a church where the worship pastor teaches a class or leads a study? Do you know what books he or she is reading? Do you even care?

So that turned out to be a lot of questions. These are all questions I have as a worship leader. When I was in school I went through all of these classes that talked about where the role of worship leader is today and where it is going from here. It was very insightful for me to see that I should be well versed and read and know my Bible. The question I always come back to is “Does anyone else care about this but us?” That wasn’t to say that we were going through stuff in vain. I just wonder how much people who aren’t worship leaders care about what we know? I guess these are the questions I pose today. Answer at will.

“As he walk the streets with lepers, prostitutes and lonely beggars…”

This song (written by a friend) has been popping up in my head as I’ve been doing some work lately. This may feel like a long way to make a point, but it works. We have a ministry in our church called connectors. This ministry is designed make sure that everyone that walks in the doors of our church receive a welcome and that it’s more than just a hello and thanks for coming. I believe that the people doing this are doing a good job because every week we have tons of stories about first time people. Why? It’s because we take things a step further and try to take time to really get to know the people that walk in the doors of our church. At the point you have set foot into our building, we don’t really care why you are there. The point is that you ARE there and we want to make sure that while you are there you engulfed in Christ’s love. It is one of the things that makes me proud on Sunday mornings.

One of the things that makes me the most proud about this is that it has similarities to what Christ did. During the week our people are talking to whomever they see. So when new people come to the church and I get a chance to meet them and ask them how they found our church a lot of times they are telling me how they met someone during the week and got invited to join our family. We are spending time where people are. We’ve gone past standing at the door screaming at people as they walk past hoping that they come in.

As I write this, I realize that this has not been everyone’s experience with the church. Not everyone has received a welcoming embrace. Some of us have received judgmental words and eyes. Some have experienced gossip and controversy. Some of us have even experienced the abusive misappropriation of scripture. All of these things are in strict contrast to a love that is lived out in scripture. Or at least I think so. Should there be discipline? Definitely. Should we be trying to point people toward truth? Without a doubt. Does every meeting with someone who doesn’t know Christ have to be a deliberate attempt to save them before they unexpectedly die from that thing that’s right around the corner waiting to take them? I don’t think so. If we are truly living lives that bring glory to God, then God, who is ALWAYS at work around us, will do the work that needs to be done in the hearts of those that don’t know him. When we look at the stories in the Bible, Jesus didn’t go into the tax collector’s home and start preaching to everyone (Mark 2:13-17). He went to eat with people who most people didn’t like. When he spared the girl’s life by challenging those with no sin to throw first, he was showing grace and to someone that no one else would give a second chance to (John 8:1-11). Those were examples of us connecting people to people. Once we do that, then we can talk about connecting people to God. Come back tomorrow and we will talk about that. As for today, tell me what you think about this.

When I was a boy, I used to think that my dad was extremely scary. I also knew enough to know that he held he power. This was a terrifying situation for me. If I wanted something I knew that at the end of the day it was probably going to have to go through him and I was totally content with just not having anything. Later I realized that my dad is not as scary as I made him out to be as a little boy. I wonder how much more enjoyable those toddler years would have been had I not thought my dad would kill me? LOL Anyway, once I was able to grasp that he wasn’t just the mean dude that looked for ways to discipline me and tell me where I was wrong I realized that I had a loving father who wanted to give me the world if I would just come to him. Spending time with my dad was and is one of my greatest joys. There is a joy and confidence in knowing that I can go to my dad with anything and he will listen and help and give what he can to help me get what I need. As perfect as I think my dad is, I know he has some flaws. Even in those flaws he does his best to create an environment that allows me to come to him with whatever and know that his desire is to help me.

When I read Hebrews 4, I see that same sort of love from the Father in a completely perfect way. So many times we hear the last scripture in that chapter because it gets manipulated to mean that we can go boldly to the Lord and he’ll give us what we want. The scripture does tell us to approach with a childlike faith, but that’s another portion of scripture. This whole chapter speaks to a loving, all-knowing Father who has the answers. The things that are happening in your life and in this world is nothing new to him. So that’s why he tells us to “draw near with boldness unto the throne of grace” (v. 16 ASV). We should be able to do that knowing that he loves us and is fighting for us. He knows that we will need that mercy and grace that he is offering in a major way. It’s there for you if you go and ask for it.

I’ll never forget the afternoon that became real to me. I was a little kid playing baseball in the driveway with a Wiffle bat. My mom had told me not to play in front of the car cause I might break something. I was in the backyard at first, but after lunch I found myself in front of the car. My friend Derrick through me a fat pitch and I was getting ready to crush it. Instead, I caught the corner of my mom’s Buick Park Avenue and obliterated the tail light (okay, maybe not OBLITERATED, but I was like 8, let me have this). I became completely riddled with fear. My mom came out and was furious. But she didn’t spank me. She did something worse. She said those fateful words that I’m sure all kids hate to hear: “Wait until your father comes home”. I spent the next 3 hours or so in my room waiting for death. If it were today’s world, I would have said goodbye to all my Facebook friends. I would have created a Twitter hashtag that said #Harryslastday. I knew the end was near. When my dad came home my mom was ready for the show to begin. She told him what I had done and how I had pretty much been in my room in terror for hours. Then the time came. He called me to the living room. That was the longest walk EVER! But my father did something that he had never done in a situation like this. He got down on his knee and held me tight and let me cry on his shoulder. He talked to me and showed me great mercy. We talked about how it was wrong that I had disobeyed my mom and how I shouldn’t do that again. But it struck him that I spent the whole afternoon living in fear. He didn’t want to have a child that lived in fear believing that his father was there just to punish him.

Our Father in heaven feels the same way. We are given the freedom to approach him with everything knowing that mercy and grace flow freely. Are you living in that freedom? Or are you sitting in your room afraid to ask? Think about it…

It’s funny how a scripture or a passage will just speak right to where you are at a time in your life and this is no different. You can have an issue that you are dealing with and then a scripture that you learned and hadn’t thought about in a while will come back to you and speak like it never has before.

Last night I was drawn to the passage of 1 Peter 5:7, which everyone knows it says “Cast all your cares upon Him for He cares for you”. Today I was enlightened by the scripture before and after that one though. The whole section is about being a leader. Peter is giving leadership training in this passage and he lays it out in a perfect manner. I don’t know why I hadn’t picked up on that before, but again, it is totally what I needed to hear right now. See, I was/am dealing with a leadership situation in my own church where I am trying to do some things and I know I have to step out of a box further than I ever have before. To some degree I feel as if there is only one way to get things done and I’m NOT that person. Now, without going into too much psychobabble (love that word), I’ve been struggling to find a way to get my point across and step into this new phase. It has been wearing me out and causing me to lose sleep. But something awesome happened yesterday. I went into a meeting with a plan and laid things out and came away with the support and approval I needed to move forward in what I felt Christ was calling me to do. I then promptly fell asleep in my office. I had been sleeping but I was nowhere close to resting. I woke up today for the first time in a while feeling somewhat refreshed and ready to attack my day.

I was so ready to find a sense of solace in verse 7 that I was blindsided by the hard truth of verses 5 and 6. I was going into this meeting with my own ideas of what would be said and thought that I had worked myself up into a lather. I was stressed about how things wouldn’t go right or how I wouldn’t be understood. But it wasn’t until I was calmed down by a friend and was able to talk through some things that I gained some perspective and was able to share freely and come to a God honoring resolution. So sure, I need to cast my cares on God. And sure, he cares for me unlike anyone else could. That happens when I am able to step out of the way and stop being proud and thinking that I know what’s going to happen. It’s obvious that I have no idea. I had to see that I will be exalted when God says so, but in the mean time I have to sit back and let Him do His job. Once I’m able to do that, I can give Him everything because he will carefully handle my life. Well played, 200 year old book. Well played.

Sometimes you just don’t have it. Sometimes it just doesn’t matter what you do, you’re just tired. You get worn out and exhausted. Life keeps coming at you and it seems like you don’t have the strength to keep going. Nothing seems to work right, but you don’t have the energy to fight it. It’s in times like these that the power of God really shines through. I don’t know about you, but I have the tendency to believe that I’m good enough or smart enough on my own to make some things happen. I try to take the glory and recognition for things when I know it wasn’t me who actually accomplished anything. I have the ability to lead people in worship not because I’m so great at it, but because God has given me the ability. Sometimes I can forget that and then I believe that I was so smart or brilliant that I put things together and made them work out. Then there are times like this past weekend when I was so beat from the week leading up to Sunday that I had no idea how things were going to get worked out. That’s when God steps in a crafts the perfect moments for me to see that He was in control the whole time.

For me, exhaustion is my ‘thorn’ that keeps me from being conceited (look up 2 Corinthians 12). In those times when I just don’t have enough to make it, God steps in and gives me what I need to finish a task. Sometimes that task is spending time with some new members who could very well become friends soon. Sometimes it is leading worship in a hot church. Sometimes it is making it through a weekend filled with terrible news. Whatever it may be for you, God’s perfect strength is always enough to overcome. So like Paul (the apostle and Baloche), I will boast in the Lord who is worthy.

I love this statement that I found as I was researching this idea. It’s so funny I’m just going to put it down in here and let you read it before I go on.

The robber ran from the policeman, still holding the money in his hands.
After being whipped fiercely, the cook boiled the egg.
Flitting gaily from flower to flower, the football player watched the bee.

If you said the last sentence to the football player’s face just the way it’s phrased above, you could end up a bloody lump of pulp lying on the astroturf, because he might conclude you think he “flits gaily,” a thing most people in his profession don’t do, at least in public.

From The Writing Guide 2002

Anyway, dangling participles are all about placing action in the wrong place. You see what happens to a sentence when you place the verb in the wrong place, you could end up beaten by a football player. What happens when we direct our actions in the wrong place? People are always searching for that thing. The thing that will make us famous. That thing that will make us a lot of money and create security. We direct our actions towards the things that look, feel and smell good. These motivations more times than not will lead us somewhere we had not set out to go.

That’s why it’s so important have our actions pointed in the right direction. When we place or actions in things that please us first, we tend to lose focus and head the wrong way. “You may think you’re on the right road and still end up dead.” Proverbs 14:12 CEV Our sights should be set on the cross. When Christ is our motivation then things around us can go every which way, but we have a steady focus point. In Philippians 3, Paul writes that he was forgetting the things that had already happened and pressing toward that mark of Christ. When Christ is our motivation, there is no way that we can get misguided. Christ wants to draw us to himself. He wants to bring us in to a place where we can live in freedom with him. When our motivations begin to dangle in other places chaos is created.

What motivates you each day? What is it that gets you out of bed? Is it money or your career? Or is it Christ? You may want to check that out. Your motivation could be misguided.

I am continually amazed at how brilliantly written the Bible is! One of my favorite brilliantly written passages is found in John. It looks a little something like this:

I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh it away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he cleanseth it, that it may bear more fruit. Already ye are clean because of the word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; so neither can ye, except ye abide in me

John 15:1-4

There is so much truth in this entire passage, but I like to focus on one particular point, especially when I’m feeling really extra good about myself. I remember when this concept first made sense to me. It actually wasn’t that long ago, but it has been pretty life changing ever since. It’s there in verse 2. The first part makes total sense. The branches that aren’t producing get cut off. But it’s the next part that got me. Branches that bear fruit get cut so they can bear MORE fruit. One day I was reading this and it hit me; no matter what I do or how good I am or how well I sing or play piano, I’m gonna get cut, too. That was a big revelation for me. Once I thought about it in the context of being a gardener it made total sense. Even when a plant is doing well and growing, a gardener has to come in a cut some of the plant back to help it flourish and be the most fruitful. Pruning helps a plant get out of its own way. The same thing happens with us. We could be doing well and feel like things are moving right along. Our marriage is great. Our kids are behaving. Our job is good. We are going to church. We might even give a little money. But maybe in all of that we have filled our time up so well that we aren’t really spending time in the Word. We may think we are doing great by fulfilling our weekly duty to attend church. But then something happens that rocks us off the happy boat that we’re on. All of that good stuff is getting in the way of some real growth and even though it all looks good to our eyes, something has to be cut away.

It’s easy to look at a situation where things are going wrong and be able to say what needs to change. That’s way easy. The more difficult cuts happen when things seem to be all good. That’s when the master gardener has to come in and look at things and diagnose what cuts are going to be most beneficial for the plant to continue its growth pattern. For me, it is quite humbling to think about the fact that no matter what happens I’m not above being cut to make room for something even better. I’m never going to be so holy or so righteous to where God will decide that I’m good enough to let grow on my own. However, it helps me to understand my whole place in this situation. I’m not the one in control. And that is totally okay with me. I think about what would happen if I worked at the Missouri Botanical Garden doing this job. Even I can spot something bad and get rid of it when the time comes. But when I go and see something that looks pretty and is growing well, I’m not going to know which ones need to be pruned. I just see pretty colors. But the people who work there know those plants intimately and know exactly what they need to grow and flourish.

The same thing goes for our Father in heaven. He knows exactly what we need to grow. He knows when it’s time to make a cut that will weed out the decaying parts of our lives as well as the parts that are growing well but need some help to be more productive and fruitful. In the end, the thing that meant the most to me manifested itself in this way. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you do, you’re going to get cut. Sometimes it will be meant to root out some of the difficult and useless things in your life. Sometimes it will be meant to help better direct the fruit that you are bearing. But no one is above the shears. No one. And I like it that way.

Bethany Dillon said it this way. “You are all I need when I’m surrounded. You are all I need when I’m by myself…” The constant in that line of the song was all she needed was Jesus. The situation didn’t matter. Just the fact that she was with Him. This song sort of fits with this post more than I thought when I was thinking about it in my head. I suggest you go and at least read the lyrics. Anyway, back to the story at hand…

Over the past few weeks at The Word at Shaw there have been a lot of cool things happening. We have new people coming. People are getting involved in many different ways. Women’s ministry had their first meeting this past weekend. Lots of good stuff. One of the things that is still just waiting to take off is a dynamic worship experience. I sit during the week like a head coach or an offensive coordinator trying to draw up the best scheme for the week that will fit with the rest of the service and help people worship the Creator. I’m reading a book right now by Ron Jaworski that looks at seven pivotal moments in football history that changed the game. If you love football, you MUST read this book. But I like it because it takes you into the minds of these football innovators. As I was reading this morning I thought how much I feel like that during the week. It also made me think of how frustrated I get when all that planning happens and the execution fails in my mind based on all the prep work.

But then a service like this past one happens and kicks me back into reality. I was really frustrated after Wednesday’s rehearsal and promptly changed the whole set Thursday morning. It hadn’t worked. Sunday morning’s run through was marginal at best in my mind. So I was ready to just push through and chalk this one up to a busted day for me. But before the service started I took some time alone and thought about what I was really there for. Worshiping God. This wasn’t my show or an audition. This was me doing what I love to do. Inviting people to worship with me. The beauty of that concept is this. I should already be worshiping. Meaning that if no one else shows up I’m already doing what I need to do. I thought back to some of my most memorable personal worship experiences-the ones in my living room when I’m by myself just me and God. I look up and I have been sitting there just playing for an hour when I only meant to sit there for 3 minutes to work something out in my head. I couldn’t care less who came into the room or stood there to watch me. I was celebrating with my creator. It reminds me of the passage in 2 Samuel when the Ark was brought back to the city of David. Verse 14 says “And David danced with all his might…” As you read further you read about how he didn’t care who was watching or what he was wearing. He even got criticized for the whole thing. But that didn’t stop him.

I believe that we as a people get so image conscious and people focused that we forget to truly engage with God. “What if someone hears me sing?” “What if I don’t know this song?” “Can I raise my hands?” “Why is he raising his hands?” It takes you 12 minutes to fight through these thoughts in your head and then you’ve basically thought away the whole song portion of a worship service. I think we have to have what I like to call a “shower mentality” to worship. We always talk about how people sing in the shower mostly because no one is there to hear us. How awesome would it be if we worshiped full out like that on a regular basis? Do you think that it might even enhance the worship service? One of my favorite worship leaders and “mentors from a distance”, Paul Baloche said at a conference I attended last year that it’s so easy to lead worship in a room full of worship leaders. They get it. They sing and they hold nothing back. One reason is because we generally know the songs. Also, there’s something amazing about being in a room where EVERYONE can sing. But I believe ultimately it’s because we know what we are hoping to have during a worship service and we can finally do that when we’re all together. It’s refreshing. So I wonder what would happen if this week you went into your worship experience and “danced with all your might” and worship like no one is watching…

I’ve had a couple weird blog days this past week. There was also the fact that my posts were posting later than I actually posted them. Weird times…anyway I hope that we’ll get back on track this week. I’m starting the week off with a doozy! Yesterday, I was reading my Bible (it was Sunday) and ran across this gem of a chapter in the Psalms. For those of you that don’t know, I have been dealing with quite a lot lately in life. I feel as if I’m in a constant state of transition, not knowing what the next step is going to be. I have been praying that God would show me what I’m supposed to be doing. I feel like I should know something because we have been walking this same road for so long. I’ve almost felt entitled. “Why won’t God just answer me? He knows this situation and He knows what we need. SERIOUSLY!” That was a statement of mine from an actual conversation. All that to say that I’ve been quite frustrated with life as of late.  There are some things that I want to do, and some things that I don’t want to do. There are some things that I’m hoping God will work through and my brain has been through a million scenarios.

In getting ready for the SpiritWing 25th Anniversary Reunion (more on that later), I was listening to the song Psalm 40 by Newsong. This was one of the songs that I led during the year I was in SpiritWing and we are singing it again. That song and passage came to my mind yesterday morning before service because I was a little discouraged about things. The chapter starts out talking about how David waited patiently for the Lord to do what He was going to do. That immediately struck home. But I think took a glance at a passage I had marked from chapter 39. It simply floored me.

You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before you. Each man’s life is but a breath. Man is a mere phantom as he goes to and fro…

Psalm 39:5-6a

The thought that I’m just a breath, a phantom completely blew me away. I’ve been sitting here wondering what God is waiting on and then I saw that He doesn’t have to tell me anything and that in a blink I could be gone. That was a quick pick me up before service started. This world is NOT about me or you. It’s about God working in and through us. I got completely and utterly blasted by this passage. I immediately started writing a song based on this passage. It’s coming soon and I will do my best to bring the fire that the words speak. However, (you should read this chapter, btw), the rest of this chapter is beautiful. I can’t wait to weave this thing into a song. I’m excited about it!!!

Did you need to know this week that you’re a phantom man? I know I did…