My Worship Revolution

For those of you who read this blog who may be connected to the entertainment industry or know people who work in entertainment, there is an organization I was recently told about by a new friend called Inter-Mission. It is one of several ministries in the greater LA area that purposes to bring together Christians who work in all aspects of entertainment.

This Tuesday night, October 24th, they are having a screening of an upcoming movie called End of the Spear. Click here for more details. It is the re telling of a well known story of missionary Jim Elliot. At the screening they will have interviews afterward with the writer, director, and one of the actors. I can’t wait to check the movie out. I’m kinda bummed cause I’d love to go to this screening, but it just so happens to fall on my life group night. But for those of you who are free, it could be a great chance to see a good movie, hear from those who made it, and meet some other Cristian artists in our area!

The last of the group just left our place from our second game night since our life group started. Tonight, 15 people packed inot our little apartment for games and lots of laughing! We also had a potluck with lots of food, including lumpia, pansit (is that how you spell it?), jumbalaya, lasagna, chicken, salad and chocolate satin pie.

One of the highlights for me was running into our next door neighbor while letting people in and then her coming next door to hang with us for about an hour or so. Rachel and I have just been getting to know her over the past month or so and she has come to Revolution three times now. I hope tonight was a great way for her to get to know some people around Revolution and feel a bit connected.

After eating and hangin it was time to get our game on! We started by splitting up the room between guys and girls for a little Battle of the Sexes, where the guys did win might I add, but it was close the whole way through.

Then we split up into teams for a game of Trivial Pursuit Pop Culture DVD edition. Again we had a great time and Bridget, Christina and Randy came out on top.

As the crowd thinned out, the die hards kept going…first with some good ole Apples to Apples and then finishing up with a homemade game of Salad Bowl.

We finally called it quits after 2 in the morning, and hopefully the neighbors don’t hate us with all the noise we were making. In the end, it was another awesome night of connecting with our life group. It was great to have everyone over and we definately missed those who couldn’t make it. It’s nice to get together as a group outside of our Tuesday format and get to know each other better. Thanks to all y’all who joined us. Anyone out there who doesn’t attend a life group yet, there’s a lot of great one’s at Revolution with open doors…ours included!

Being the avid Lost fan’s that Rachel and I are, we had a few friends from our life group over to have dinner and watch Lost last night. It also happened to be Will’s birthday, and he didn’t want us to make any big deal about it, so we threw him a "little" celebration for the evening. Before he showed up we threw up some streamers and a happy birthday sign and Chris Koble joined us later to watch Lost and sing Happy birthday before we ate Boston Cream Pie from Marie Callenders (I love that pie!). It was a lot of fun and it has been so great getting to know and spend time with the people in our life group. Hope you had a happy birthday Will!!

My cousin and his wife rolled into town from the Laughlin area yesterday to spend three days at disneyland for their son’s fourth birthday.  So I had my homework done earlier than I ever have before…done by 11:30 a.m.!  Usually I’m running late to class so I can finish homework!
I got to the park around 2:00 and was able to spend about 3 hours hangin with them.  Their sons name is Zach and it is so great every time I get to see him.  He is a handful and then some, but he is pretty stinkin cute!  We had lunch and then took Zach on Splash Mountain.  We were afraid he’d freak out after the drop but he loved it.  Then, I finished my time with them by joining them for some Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters.  Unfortunately, Zach didn’t get quite high enough in the picture, so you can’t quite see how cute he is.  But as you can see I kicked his butt in points!!  OK, so that score is wrong…I think he did have like 17,000 or something.  But either way I still beat him!

This weekend, Rachel and I went down to Canyon Lake to visit her family.  Well, I love to visit other churches whenever I can and I know some people in the area, so I left her with her mom while I went to check out Life Church in Temecula.  I found out about them through some friends who started going there several years back and have since had the opportunity to get to know their worship pastor, Eric Beeman.
It’s always nice as a worship leader to have the opportunity to be led in worship, and Eric did a great job at leading.  I know he felt like it was an off night, but I couldn’t tell and God was doing great stuff. 

In addition to the worship itself, I always find myself getting caught up in checking out the decor, setup, and technical equipment of any church I go to.  Being that we still don’t know what kind of building we could be in a year from now (or sooner), I was interested to see how they worked in a weekly setup/teardown situation at an elementary school.  They are currently in a series called "I Don’t", a relationship series.  As you walk in the front door there were two dummies there, like the bodies you’d see in storefront windows (no heads…kinda creepy).  One had on a tux and the other a wedding dress.  Next to it was a wedding arch that you walked under, covered in Christmas lights, and a white lamp post near it.  It was a really nice touch that gave you a feel for what was going on and was manageable for a weekly setup and teardown.

They also had some nice setup with their lights for their worship time.  Finally, one of the highlights for me was probably getting to take communion.  I know it sounds odd, but communion has always been a really significant and meaningful sacrament for me, and it’s not very often that I take it at Revolution since I’m leading worship when most people take it.  they happen to do it the first weekend of the month and it was just a great time of reflection and intimacy with Jesus.
Overall it was a great experience and I came away with some refreshment as well as some idea’s to store away.  The thing that I love the most about the church is their vision and passion for church planting.  The church has been in existance for 3 years, has planted 4 other successful churches in that time (one being two blocks from where they meeting), and according to their bulletin are currently averaging about 600 people a weekend.  This obviously resonates a lot with me considering the passion God has given me for church multiplication.  It’s been fun getting to hear about how God is working there and to be in relationship with them in some way.  Great job guys…keep up the good work!

Yes, it has been a very long time since I’ve blogged. I guess I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus without much to say. But I figured it was about time to throw something up here. So I’ll start with something kind of random.

Some of you know that I own a cat which my wife talked me into bringing home from a pet blessing event (not a joke) we were at last August with the street team. I must say I’ve never liked cats much – in fact I’ve hated them – but I just couldn’t say no with her giving me the pouty lip, the Bambricks all helping her out (thanks a lot Rick!), and it was a kinda cute baby kitten. I’ve always been a dog person and can’t wait til I can actually own one. But I must say, over the past year I’ve actually come to like Tigerlily (our cat’s name) maybe a little bit.

Point is, I saw this post on another blog, and I thought it was kind of fun, and most of it even has quie a bit of truth to it. So here’s a list of reasons that you might rather have a cat than a dog as posted by Billy Cox:

• Cats are cleaner than I am – My cat is an indoor cat, takes care of himself, and he hasn’t needed a bath since the first Clinton presidency.
  
• Having a cat prepares you for dealing with self-absorbed people – Dogs are man’s best friend because they are natural liars. You could be the BTK killer, and a dog will still act like your return home is the greatest thing since Kibbles and Bits. Cats on the other hand will wait for you to get with ‘their’ program even if you’re the Queen of England. What better way to prepare you to deal self-centered people than to own a cat?
  
• Cats come in basically one size – There is only a small size variance in all the cat breeds. This means that you don’t have to settle for bad temperament just to get a small pet, and a cat will never leave ‘surprises’ the size of a toaster in the yard nor will a cat ever crowd you out of your favorite recliner (although they may try to take it while you’re up for 1-2 minutes).
  
• Cats are low maintenance pets – If you can manage to keep food in a food dish, water in a water dish, and keep the ratio of litter to excrement moderately high, then you can take care of the average cat. I have taken weekend trips before and simply left plenty of food and water…and the cat did great. As smart as dogs supposedly are, they can’t do anything for themselves, unless it is figuring out how to get food trash out of a sealed trash bag.
  
• Cats respect boundaries – You never see a cat tied to the side of a house or locked in a chain link enclosure. Maybe an outdoor cat will do bad things to wildlife or to a neighbors garden, but you never hear of a cat having to be put to sleep for chasing down and biting a kid. It’s also pretty easy to train an indoor cat which furniture is off limits for them. All you need is a water gun and the self-control to only use it when the cat is about to do something you don’t want it to do.
  
• Cats remind us that we the world doesn’t revolve around us – If you want a reasonably intelligent pet that will keep your feet on the ground without making unreasonable demands, then a cat is the way to go.

Here’s a great website for online resources for worshippers. It’s got links to some great blogs, articles, videos, etc. Check it out:
insideworship.com
[thanks Eric!]

Here’s a funny video on how not to share your faith put out by Igniter Media Group. Fits in great with the “Be A Link” series we recently finished up at Revolution.

Watch “Real Christians Of Genius”

Tonight we had a great discussion as a team at the beginning of worship practice. It came out of the days reading and question from the iWORSHIP Daily Journal. The discussion centered on Matthew 15:7-9. The question attached asked what sort of things you do in worship – personal and/or corporate – that comes more from man made rules than it does a response to God.

The prominant point of our discussion dealt with clapping. Clapping during songs. Clapping after songs. Clapping after prayer as a team before the service. For many people several of these are more of a conditioned response than something that is a genuine expression of worship to God. I have to admit that as a worship leader I often wonder people’s motivation for clapping after an upbeat song. I always hope that it is a clapping for God out of a heart of worship and not clapping for the skills of the musician. I hope that it is an overflow of a joyful heart and not simply something to fill otherwise empty space between the second song and announcements.

The whole discussion was a good reminder to me to always evaluate my own motivation in my expressions of worship. I realized that I too sometimes clap out of conditioning rather than genuine worship. Next time I clap, I will be aware of why I am clapping and be intentional about it, whether it is a creator of energy and excitement in my worship or an expression of appreciation to God.

What are the things that you tend to do in worship that stems more out of man made rules or tradition rather than a genuine heart of worship? I’d love to hear your thoughts. How does God want you to respond to that realization? Does it look like changing your actions or your motivation?

Well, I think I spoke a little too quick on trying to bypass that jetlag.  After getting home I don’t think I really slept well for about a week.  Life is finally kinda back to normal…at least as normal as it gets.  I’m really not one to spend a lot of time processing something after the fact, so I’ve made a conscious effort to try and spend some time reflecting on India.  I guess it helps when lots of people are interested to hear about the trip and ask about it.  I tend to do most of my processing in the midst of an experience, so most of my learnings are what I heard from God during those two weeks in India.  During that time, it was the closest I’ve felt to God for a long time.  I said in my last post that I was going to post those learnings, so here they are (in no real particular order):

• Plant a church built on a foundation of a heart for missions
• There are lots of poor and needy in the city of Long Beach where I can make a difference daily
• Slow down a bit…enjoy life more
• There is a lot of work still to be done in India
• Start exercising and take better care of myself
• Set aside more intentional time to be close to God
• Set aside more time to spend with Rachel
• The name of Jesus has a lot of power…use that power and live in it’s fullness more often
• God has blessed you with a lot materially compared to most of the world…now use it to bless others
• Keep God’s call and vision for my life in front of me constantly in order to stay on course

Interesting that only a few of those are really directly related to India.  A lot of them are things that I believe God has been wanting me to hear, but getting away and being more sensitive to His Spirit allowed me to hear it more clearly.  Tonight I got to share those learnings with my life group and it was a blast.  Sharing them with others has helped me to remember them and be more focused on them.  It was just fun to be able to share some of my experiences with people I care about.  I didn’t realize till I started sharing that I could probably sit and share about my experiences in India for hours on end.  Any volunteers?