I was born in 1981. I was born again in 2003. I was married in 2006. I look forward to my home in Heaven but for now am currently serving as the worship leader of Harvest Bible Chapel in Oakville, ON. I love my God, my wife, my church; in that order.
"The Faithful Worship Leader magnifies the Greatness of God, In Jesus Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit, skillfully combining God’s word with music, thereby motivating the gathered church to proclaim the Gospel, to cherish God’s presence and to Live for God’s glory." -Bob Kauflin
My friend Luke came across this. I want to share it with you. Share your thoughts...
I can feel as though the things I say and post on Facebook and Twitter don’t really matter. As if, somehow, the things I say and do online are separate from the real me. Come on, it’s just Facebook, right?
Wrong. In Matthew 15:19 Jesus said:
For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander.
So what does this mean? It means that our status updates, photo uploads, wall posts, and online chats are a visible display of what is taking place in our hearts.
Posting flirtatious comments on someone’s picture isn’t “just what happens on Facebook”. Uploading an inappropriate photo isn’t just for fun. Relentlessly mocking someone isn’t what happens online. It’s the overflow of the heart. And it’s sin. What we do online is the real us. It doesn’t matter that we’re safely behind a computer screen.
And the sobering thing is, every action that takes place online has effects that last into eternity.
My family and I are headed south for the next week! We are looking forward to visiting family, hitting the beach and resting! No email, no internet, no phone. We will also be headed to Harvest Orlando to spend some time with Ryan and his wife which will be the highlight of our trip I am sure. Last time we went to Florida Erin almost God eaten by a shark. No seriously, she did.
Watching this back I still can't believe I am a dad. Weird. It has been the best 10 weeks of our lives! Thankful for a church and family that supports us in our efforts to raise our little one to honor Christ. You can join us praying for London, that he will one day know Jesus as his Lord!
I get really excited when I start thinking what God could do with a piece of dirt. I took this picture/s last night and pieced it together this morning. Exciting times!
I read this article this morning but this post is not in response to it. It's a different kind of "do".
I think that the majority of worship leaders who serve with volunteers in ministry believe they have the best volunteers ever! With that being said, I think that about our team at Harvest Oakville. God has truly drawn very gifted and humble musicians and artists to our music ministry. They give their entire weekend to serve our church congregation. It is a real blessing to server along side all of them.
Is your worship ministry the same?
Do you find a lot of what you do a joy and enjoyable?
Do members of your ministry get along, laugh, hang out together and enjoy it?
Is your team, for the most part, responsible, humble and loyal to your ministry?
Can you rely on many of your volunteers to learn the songs, pull off riffs or beats?
If the answer is yes to any of these then don’t think you are doing a great job. You are just blessed to have such sweet and competent people around you that make you look good.
This past weekend I was challenged and challenged some of our worship ministry to look at 1 Thessalonians 4:1-12. Paul writes and encourages the believers of Thessalonica and I think we can apply this to our worship ministries.
Let’s say for example that some of the above scenario’s are true and you truly are blessed to serve with mature, Christ followers that seldom let you down when you hit the stage for a worship weekend. You give yourself a pat on the back because little went wrong.
Paul writes in Chapter 4 to a group of people who are a lot like our worship ministries. Believers who were taught the truth, knew the truth, and for the most part lived out that truth and were known for it. But notice Paul doesn’t pat them on the back and leave it. He “urges” them to….”do more”. He then ties in that urging with the statement “For this is the will of God, your sanctification.”
As worship leaders, directors or pastors over our worship ministries, it is key that we are doing them same as Paul in order to see our ministries progressing rather than staying remaining neutral. The old saying “If it’s not broken, don’t fix it” should not apply to our worship ministries in the sense of where God wants us to go and be for his glory.
It is easy to focus on the programming, songs, charts, and creative aspects because a lot of the time that is where our gift settings are as worship leaders. What’s hard is seeing where God has brought your ministry and then believing God for more and then knowing what to do to get it there.
Our “worship environment” isn’t probably going to look a lot different in the next 5 years. We might sing different songs, our music style might change a little bit or we might implement a new sound or lighting effect that enhances our services but I doubt we will ever add a moving stage, smoke machine, glow in the dark guitar strings or matching worship team costumes. What I do pray happens is that our “worship” changes tons! I want our team to be even more on fire, passionate, God fearing, men and women of integrity worshipers then today and I believe that will happen because that’s what God does in the sanctification process. He makes us more like Christ.
What I am learning is the best way for me to care for my volunteers and pastor them is to provide them with prayer, encouragement and a focused vision to the task at hand. They already know who Jesus is, they love Jesus and they want to serve Jesus. Our goal as worship leaders is to encourage them, like Paul, to do more. And by God’s grace, they will!
In my previous post I mentioned that 3 other staff member and their wives, along with Erin and I dedicated our baby boys to the Lord in front of the church. One of my greatest desires is to see my own love for Christ somehow communicated in both action and speech to my little guy. But when is a good age to actually begin? One of the other staff members pointed me to a new book out called "Pastor Dad" by Mark Driscoll. You can visit the website, even read chapters online. I am going to begin reading, prepping and trying to soak in all I can. Here is a blurb from the book.
"Therefore, the father's duty is to cultivate all aspects of his child to maturity in the Lord. Practically, this means that everything in the life of the child is ultimately the responsibility of the father. This is a particularly radical idea in our day, when more than one in three births are to unmarried women and more than one in three children do not live with their biological father. Because of the sins of failed fathers, the responsibility for raising children has increasingly fallen on government institutions."
What are some cool "teaching opportunities" you have found memorable with your kids?
I said this past Sunday "I have not blogged or even had the desire to in days" It's 10:33pm, London has had a rough night showing off his sweet lung-age and how loud he can sing. Erin and I are learning so much in this new chapter of life. Mainly how to love our son and then love one another and never forget to do one, and all the while looking to God for wisdom, patience and love. It's difficult, not because there is a lack of love, (because I think I am the luckiest husband and father in the world!) but because I am selfish. I am human and my flesh so badly wants my ways. This past weekend we got to stand up in front of our Harvest family and watch as London was dedicated (which means nothing in terms of his salvation) but rather for us as parents to say before our church we dedicate our child to whatever the Lord wills for his life, and to publicly confess we need help! A. From God and B. From our church family. We stood up with 3 other couples, all of which work full-time at Harvest and have had their first child (all boys) in the past 6 months. My parents, aunt and sister we there so it made it even sweeter. To top it all off, it was father's day and my first! It was a sweet day to spend with my son and family, and even though London is too young to remember it, I will never forget it and how amazing it feels to know how have this little one truly as a gift from the Lord to raise, love, teach and lead by example the ways of our amazing Savior.
More to Come: I found a sweet scripture that floored me this week and I will share more on it later this week. I will also post an amazing message to men from my pastor which will make you feel like crap in the best way possible. (conviction is an amazing thing)
For the summer I have had Greg McKay as our worship ministries intern. He is a very gifted guitar player and aspiring worship leader. Greg is studying music and theology at Heritage College. His passion for song writing stems from his passion for music and today he brought a sweet song to the table. We worked on it a bit together and then he sat down in front of the mic and played and sang it. A first for Greg I might add. Why do I boast? Because Greg would be the first to say his voice might not be the best or even that his guitar skills are the best, but what he desires far more than being known for being good at something is loving Jesus and showing Christ through his actions. We are so thankful as a staff to have had him around for the summer thus far and look forward to what's to come.
You can follow Greg by visiting his blog and you can listen to the song here
Here is another video from our Toronto night with Crowns.
"Savior" was written while I was just playing guitar in London's nursery. Celebrating the fact that Jesus Christ is all I need. In him, there is no extra's, no upgrades, no options required. He alone is everything and the best part, he is for me and not against me.
Even with a Saturday night service and about a 20 minute drive to downtown Toronto we made it just in time for Hillsong United concert at the Molson Amphitheater. I knew it was going to rock because of last years concert but went this year with 2 goals.
To Worship God with a unhindered, undignified and sold out passion.
To take in and learn from some of the best worship leaders / song writers in our circle of modern worship leaders
Here is what I took away from the night....
I love the song "You Hold Me Know" and can not wait to get to Heaven!
Heaven will be so amazing. Worshiping with all those people was like nothing I've ever seen or felt.
I admire Joel Houston's ability to be "rock" yet carry a attitude of humility through out the night
I like how many Triplets he can fit into 1 song on his acoustic
Many of HBC's young adults were there and it is always so fulfilling to see them connecting with God and singing in an environment outside of our church walls.
Brooke Fraser wears her guitar lower than I do.
Singing "Whoa Whoa" is genius during the song "with everything". Here is why - The amount of passion it requires to sing it and then hear it sung in unison could be compared to a army marching into battle. I think It falls under the category of claping, which is a great tool to get people joining in as 1. When it has a purpose, it takes on a new meaning.
None of the band had scarf's on...they lost points in my books for that ;)
They didn't play anything with a click or sequence > sheer live music.
They ended the concert in prayer, not a big light show. Big ups for keeping the main thing the main thing.
Thanks to Angel Dean for sending me some of the footage from the 2 dates this past Winter where my band and I got to open for Casting Crowns. I shared with the crowd in Windsor a little bit about where God has brought me and highlighted the awesome truth of Romans 5.
Found this song by Death Cab for Cutie. The guy used stop animation for it and it looks really sweet. A lot of work but very creative. Speaking of Creative, I am having lunch today with a animation guy who recently started attending our church. I am hoping he will be able to help in our efforts to use media in our services, and use it well.
