It's been a while and I need to make an edit RE: Core Values

So Pastor Mike and I have started talking about what a "win" looks like here at WLA on Sunday mornings. Today was our first pointed chat about this and in starting the dialogue it came to my attention that one of my core values could be wildly misunderstood so let me clarify that. When I said that the ARTS have a vital role in the church and said that they can communicate things that preaching simply can't what I mean was this: spoken word speaks to a different part of us than art does. The preaching of God's word is vital and is the primary focus of any good church service - as such the arts should always be pointing the way to the word and it's preaching. However, I also contend that the arts strike chords in us and our emotions that spoken word does not. There are emotions that get stirred by music or drama that don't by word alone. The gospel can say anything it wants to say - undoubtedly - but it seems to me that in practical terms God has designed the human soul to respond differently to singing than preaching and so on.

I hope that clears up any misunderstandings someone might have regarding what I said.

I should do this more often...blog that is....not make mistakes to be corrected...

Core Values

I've recently been thinking a lot about my core values and what they are. I believe that everyone has a set of core values that informs everything they do and every decision they make. As a leader I know that I need to be aware of what my core values are and that they people I am leading need to know what those core values are, in practice if not in word. So I'm going to write down here what I know my core values to be here today. This is the beginning of my list and may get added to or edited later but for now here it goes:

1) The local church is the hope of the world - By the power of the Holy Spirit and through Jesus Christ, the local Christian church is the medium through which God has chosen to change hearts, lives and destinys. As such, the work of the local church is the most important work done on earth and so the work of the church should be that work which is done with the most care because the stakes are so high.

2) Everything thing the church does should be done with as much Excellence as it can muster - if the local church is the hope of the world and the work we do is of such high stakes then I believe it should be done with more excellence than any other agency on the planet. Excellence, in my opinion, is doing the best you can with what you have. So our goal should always be to spur one another on to give our absolute best, even when it's tough or stretching.

3) The ARTS have a unique and vital role in the church - The arts can convey stories, stir emotions and engage the mind in ways that preaching simply can't. These days, the arts need to be playing a hugely significant role in the telling of the story of God and artists need to take risks in order to reach and increasingly distant culture.

4) People matter to God - There is a fine balance between pushing and loving but we need to walk it. We shouldn't be so focused on getting better that we are unduly hurting each other on the way. We also shouldn't be so fragile that we get hurt WAY to easily and thus never get better because we can't take criticism. As I said, it's a fine line.

5) Lost people matter to God - way too many churches ignore the lost and become insular. God started the church by saying "Go...make disciples". We can't be happy with who is in the fold...we must leave, find the lost, and bring them back with us.

6) The church needs to be culturally relevant - This might get me into trouble but the church must communicate on a level that the common man can understand. Just as the apostle Paul used teachings from Greek culture so must we use examples from everyday life to bring the never changing truth of God into the 21st Century. (See core value 3 for more)

Like I said, there's more but this is a good start. If you want to know what gets me fired up, here it is. I'd invite people to dialogue with me regarding these things so I can refine them and help others to understand them and to learn from them about their core values.

Cirque du Soleil - a night to inspire

So for our 5th anniversary Melissa and I went to Cirque du Soleil's Kooza in Toronto. I highly reccomend to anyone that hasn't been to a Cirque show to go! They are amazing. It seems like a lot of people have a particular image of what it will be...like my mom. She asked me "Is there any hay in the tent". I somwhat impatiently told her that no, there was not any hay in the tent. There are no smelly mistreated elephants either. The whole show is kind of like a fusion between theatre and acrobatics.
Kooza tells the story of a boy who seems to have no joy in life. All of that changes however when he recieves a large jack-in-the-box who's "Jack" has extraordinary powers and brings all kinds of fun and entertainment into the boy's life.
I left the show totally inspired and ready to take my art and that of my friends to a whole other level. I pray that God would empower us with passion and dedication and His Spirit so that the art we portray is far more impacting that that of a circus.

Upwards, Inwards and Outwards

I'm working my way through a study on worship. I found it mentioned on www.worship.com and so ordered it and have been pleased with it so far. It's a 9 week study which gives thoughts for 5 of the 7 days of the week. On day 3 the author suggest we praise in all directions: Upwards, Inwards and Outwards. I thought this was just a great way to articulate the totality of the worship God is looking for. In case it's not already apparent what he meant let me give you a paraphrased version of the study:

Upwards: This is the traditional definition of worship - like Sunday corporate worship where we lift up the name of God in song or speech.

Inwards: to work on the state of our hearts and souls is an act of worship.

Outwards: Loving our fellow man as Christ has commanded is also worship.

I'm all over this kind of stuff. Worship is more than music...I'll say that until it becomes the standard definition that the majority of Christians embrace...and live!

Trust...the result of Love?

So I'm always reading books on working with people and leadership trying to improve those portions of my self that I feel weak in. Recently I read through Patrick Lencioni's books "The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team" and am now wrestling with the implications it carrys into my job as a church leader. See Patrick's first and most important function or dysfunction is for a team to trust one another. I won't get into all of the things I'm thinking right now but I'll just throw this out there...can Christians have trust without love?

I find often that my thoughts don't translate into things people can see. There is a disconnect between my speech and my thought life. In my mind I am always considering how much I love the people I get to work and serve with...my actions betray me in conveying that to them. Most of the decisions I make are made with others in mind...at least they are in my mind. Then I fail to communicate that and end up hurting people. This kind of stuff just tears me up.

I want us to be a team that trusts. I want us to be a team of people who knows that they are loved and so when we give feedback or suggestions on how to improve their craft they understand we love them first and so they receive what we say because they know it's with their best interests at heart.

All of this comes back to my ability to translate my thoughts of love to tangible, noticable actions of love. And it's in the hands of each of us to do the same.

Personal Worship

So keeping along with answering the questions posed by the Pages @ www.wonderfulpages.com here is what my personal worship looks like (or at least what I hope it looks like)

wake up 6:30am

things to do: love God in everything I do.

sleep 10:30pm

Honestly I can't think of how to describe personal worship better than that. It's my firm belief that everything I do is an act of worship to something or another. My hope is that it's all for God. In reality it's not. However, every day that God gives me I am trying to do whatever he's called me to do on that day in such a way as to draw attention to the difference God has made in my life and in so doing ascribe worth and value to Him...to bring Him glory through my life. I pray hoestly and earnestly that God will help me do this more and more each day. I need Him to do the work...I'm not able to on my own.

What's Love Got to do with it?

Now don't get me wrong...Tina Turner was a musical icon but that doesn't mean she get's everything right (and I guess she rarely gets things right...I mean who marries Ike? But she did do that killer duet with Bryan Adams...). When she sang that song she obviously didn't have the kind of wisdom that God has given to His children because we know that love has EVERYTHING to do with it. I'm loving 1 John 4:9,10, and 19 right now because it so plainly states that God loves us and they can only love because he loves us. I think worshipers of God ought to understand this as fully as possible...we ought to be meditating on it constantly because it's only through and by God's great love for us that we can truly worship Him.

We are called by the power of His love which has been for us since the dawning of time. The more deeply we love God the more we are able to worship Him rightly and accurately. A deep love for God springs from a deep knowledge of God and a deep relationship with Him. It's kind of like human love in one way (imago Dei anyone?). You know when you meet someone and you fall head over heals for them? Doesn't that feel amazing? But at some point you run out of reasons why you love that person...most of it is superficial and as great as it feels it's not very deep. But those of us who are married know that as time goes on our love deepens and the reasons we love are better and deeper and we know how to express that love and recieve it in ways that benefit both people in the relationship. It's so awesome!

Our ability to worship God springs from this kind of relationship with Him. The more we spend time with Him and invest in that loving relationship the more things we have to praise Him for and the more He envelops our very thoughts and actions.

Personal vs. Corporate

So the second question at WonderfulWorship was "In light of your response to the first question, how do you view personal and corporate worship" or something like that :) In my mind, there isn't a huge separation of the two in principal although realistically there is in practice. Both still involve being wholeheartedly engaged in both attidtude and action. Corporate worship is just another phase of this continuous worship that we're all doing all the time. True, I normally don't get a band together and sing at the top of my lungs on a weekday but the spirit behind my interactions with people at Starbucks ought to be no different than the attitude with which I sing to God on Sunday morning. The goal of each should be to bring glory to God and to point people towards the cross of Christ. And more to the point, personal worship ought to get a whole lot more of my attention since I spend a whole lot more time worshiping alone :)

When you Strip everything away what is worship?

My friend Barb recently sent me a link to this http://www.wonderfulpages.com/wonderfulworship/ blog where they are participating in a discussion on worship. I found it very interesting and so decided to join the discussion and share my thoughts.

The best way I can think of to answer this question is to share my definition of worship. Recently I've done some fantastic reading which has helped me to come to grips with what I think worship is. So, in Heerebout's Dictionary, Worship is "The act and attitude of wholeheartedly and continuously giving yourself to something - body, soul, mind and spirit".

The first thing you may ask is something? Yes...everyone worships but not everyone worships God. Everyone has something that envelops the greater majority of their attention but for most of the world that thing is not God. Sometimes it's our career, or a favorite celebrity or our hobby. For Christians, I hope, it's God but by biblical standards someone who is not a Christian and not worship God.

Also of note is this idea of continuously...we are always worshiping something. Again, often it's not God and even in the life of the believer it's sometimes not God...when we choose to disobey God we've shifted our focus of worship, if only for a moment, towards something else. We've given ourselves to that thing instead of to God.

When I say act and attitude it's to point out that worship is not complete without both. When God asks for worship in the bible he ALWAYS asks for action to be involved. I believe that when we understand something to the point that we are truly worshiping it not only to we think or say we worship that thing but our actions come along side our speech to prove we are worshiping.

And linked to this is the wholehearted and body, soul, mind and strenght. I know when I get interested in something it can often envelope my whole being. I want a new amp or guitar and I surf the 'net endlessly until I find it. When we are truly gripped and worshiping God this is what it's like...our whole attention is gladly and fully given to God. Truly, when I am worshiping, everything else is stripped down and only God's love for me and my love for Him remains.

texts: Romans 12:1, Mark 12:30, The Adventure of Worship by Gerrit Gustafson, and Unceasing Worship by Harold M. Best.

Sacrificing human lives?

Romans 12:1 says: Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship.

The word “sacrifice” might illicit any number of thoughts for you. Maybe you think about the Old Testament system of sacrifice, or maybe you’re like a member of our worship team and think immediately of Isaac. Perhaps you’re like me and have recently seen Apocolypto and so have a very vivid image of sacrifice in your mind. Whatever we think of when we hear the word “sacrifice” it’s probably not this – a unit of worship. Think about it. When God is calling for sacrifice he’s calling for worship. The Law set out the kinds of sacrifices that God wanted to see from His people in order to come into right relationship with Him and although we are not under that same Law, acceptable worship still involves sacrifice. In fact it involves 2 sacrifices now. The first being the blood of Jesus making it possible for us to commune with God. However, it also involves sacrifice on our part. We need to pour ourselves out to God as sacrifices on an ongoing basis, living in such a way that we give up those things we desire for the things God is giving us. This is worship. This is how we worship God. It’s not just the songs we sing on Sunday’s but a life style – a sacrifice of our whole being to the purposes and plans of God so that we might make His greatness known in every sector of our lives. So to be a worship leader (as all of us are) is to live this way – to be an example to those around us of the true and acceptable worship God is calling us to. It’s a scary and exciting challenge that I hope each of you is willing to embark on with me.

A place to connect

So I'll try this again. I've started a few blogs over time and have been thinking about this one for quite some time so here I go! I'm going to be posting some of the things I feel God is teaching me about worship as well as some other random things I think people might be interested in :) I invite your comments and open, authentic discussion as we try to figure out how to better serve our God in worship and the arts.