the point of it all.
“Missions is not the ultimate goal of the church. Worship is. Missions exists because worship doesn’t. . . . Worship, therefore, is the fuel and goal in missions.”
–from Let the Nations Be Glad by John Piper
There is a truth ringing in my ears and with each day it gets louder and louder. The truth is that God Almighty is worthy of our worship, and there are places in the world where He is not being worshiped.
And so in response, we fill our minds and our hearts with the Gospel, save our money, buy a plane ticket and go to a strange place where no one speaks our language.
Why? Because God is not worshiped there.
John Piper wrote a book called Don’t Waste Your Life. In the first chapter, if not the first page Piper urges us to realize that we only have one life-that’s it.
“You have made my life no longer than the width of my hand. My entire lifetime is just a moment to you; at best, each of us is but a breath.”
-Psalm 39: 5
Visually, Psalm 39:5 makes me think of a little girl blowing a kiss to her dad. And just like a kiss that is tossed into the wind as soon as it is made, life’s final breath comes before we even realize what we are.
And what are we?
“the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.”
-Genesis 2:7
What does that mean? It means that the only thing that separates us from the ground we are walking on is the breath of life that God breathed into our lungs.
If that doesn’t give you an enormous view of our God, then I urge you to take a day off from your busy life and go lay on the ground and ponder Genesis 2:7.
When I think about where I came from (dust) and how long I’ll be here (seconds) I realize that there is no room for fear in the church. We’re all going to die, people. Let’s do it big. Let’s go to the hard places. Let’s not just say we love- let’s lose our lives for the sake of true love. Let’s take the Gospel to the ends of the world!
Worship+Justice
The chorus of the song “God of Justice” by Tim Hughes has always struck a certain chord with me: “We must go, live to feed the hungry, stand beside the broken, we must go. Stepping forth, keep us from just singing, move us into action, we must go.” I think the words of this song really convict me, because they bring into the light an important Biblical truth that too often remains in the shadows of our American Christian culture (and my heart, for that matter). God is concerned for the hungry, broken, and marginalized people of this world, and we, His chosen people, should be too.
Throughout Scripture we can see this truth come to the surface. In Deuteronomy 15 God’s people are commanded to be “openhanded” and “generous” in their giving and providing for the poor in their land. In the same breath they are told not to be “tightfisted” and “heardhearted.” In Luke 4 Jesus proclaims His earthly intentions in the midst of all those in the synagogue at Nazareth: to “preach good news to the poor,… to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
As I consider the words of Scripture, I am suddenly stricken with the realization that God’s heart breaks for the broken. If our goal in worshiping God is to constantly align the concerns of our hearts with His, then “we must go, live to feed the hungry, stand beside the broken.” My hope for my own Christian generation is that we will not be content with meeting together in comfortable rooms to sing to and about the God of Justice, while living in blatant ignorance of what concerns Him. May the Lord not say of us, “These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.” (Isaiah 29)
As I have been at Brook Hills for only a month and a half, I have already been encouraged by the sense of urgency to provide for the needy that exists in our congregation. I am so thankful to be part of a church where the Gospel, Worship, and Justice are at the forefront of everything we do. It’s also good to know that we aren’t the only ones. Here are some great movements for worship and justice that I’ve seen and been challenged by lately:
“God of Justice” by Tim Hughes
The I-Heart Revolution by Hillsong United
CompassionArt by Martin Smith of Delirious?
Planning Ahead
It is a constant challenge for us to plan upcoming worship services prayerfully, biblically, creatively, and far enough in advance that we are not too constrained by time. We’ve gotten pretty good at looking 4 weeks out to generate ideas, and then we focus the lens a little more each week so that we are pretty much set 1-2 weeks ahead. We work with our pastor to make sure we know where God is leading him in the weeks ahead so that we can support as best we can where he is going to be and what best conveys God’s message each week. However, putting together a 22 minute video piece combined with scripture recitation and live music with a click track in two weeks is not abnormal with our team.
Excel has been the easiest program for us to use for planning and creating orders of worship, but lately we’ve been toying with something new. Planningcenteronline.com is a web-based program that allows you to plan and create worship orders for use on Sundays. While this does somewhat re-invent the wheel for us (again, yay Excel), the really cool part is the volunteer coordination tool. We can upload all of our volunteers and then schedule them through the website. Then they can view upcoming worship orders. Band and vocal volunteers can even download music, eliminating the need for us to create rehearsal CDs and packets each week. You can schedule reminder emails for services and rehearsals that are sent out automatically. When someone responds that they are unable to volunteer, the program generates a list of people from your database that have the same skill you’re looking for and whether or not those people are available on the date you need. This program basically integrates aspects of Excel, iCal and iTunes and houses them in one central location.
Although we are not quite ready to launch this with our volunteers, we should be up and running soon. I’ll keep you posted on how it works. In the meantime, check it out and see if it could work for you.
my family
OK—if you are spending time reading this, I think it would be good to begin by introducing you to my family. First, my wife, Amy–she is a perfect help-mate for me as we raise our family and constantly strive for God to be glorified in our home. She graduated from Samford University in Birmingham and is about 6 months younger than I am. We met just after her high-school graduation on a mission trip to Kenya. Hope to add a photo later, once I learn how to do it. We dated on and off through college and married shortly after her graduation. She is mom and teacher to our 4 boys. She is also my favorite singer when I can talk her into it. She stays really busy, so it’s not that easy.
The Boys—Fisher (13), Jude (8), Tripp (7) and Levi (4) are our children. They are a source of tremendous joy to Amy and I and we have a great time being together as a family. Our family is our primary hobby and we spend a lot of time around the table together. They all have various interests, but we all share a common love of music. The two older boys play instruments and we all like to sing.
choir
Choir at Brook Hills is a bit different. We don’t have choir year round—we normally do it in two semesters (Fall and Spring). We rehearse once a week and sing about once per month. We just finished the semester of choir this week. WOW—what an incredible group. This past Fall, we shifted our focus away from 2 hours of intense rehearsal to more Bible study, prayer/worship and then rehearsal. I was initially a bit nervous about this transition, but I know that God led us this way.
For those who know me, I am a BIG rehearser. Our rehearsal times ended up being about 1 hour of rehearsal and about 30 minutes in the word and prayer. What a difference a year makes. The transformation of this group has been beautiful to see over the past year. We have all grown in understanding more about our role in our worship gatherings and God used this ministry in a huge way to lead our church in celebration of who He is. What a blessing they are to the local body of believers gathered here each week.
praise teams
I get a lot of questions about the types of vocal ministries we have at Brook Hills. So, I thought it would be a good idea to give you a little bit of info here. We have three primary vocal configurations we use on a rotation at Brook Hills. Praise Team, Solo Background Vocalist and Choir. Our Praise Team ministry consists of 30 singers who are divided into 5 teams. We typically have 2 singers per part. These singers are auditioned musicians and sing parts by ear and read music. Many of them are strong soloists, too. These singers serve in a deacon role at Brook Hills and are considered leading servants within worship ministry. They are a part of our larger choir ministry and have additional rehearsals as a Praise Team singer. We memorize scripture and study the Word together weekly. Many people in this ministry have been a part of it for a long time. I have deep relationships and have shared ministry for a long time with several of these folks.
Another small vocal group we have a Brook Hills is Solo Background Vocalists. This is 3-4 female singers who will lead with myself and my associate, Steven, as a single voice. These singers have strong gifts of worship leading and good ad lib instincts as well.
new blog
Well, Brook Hills is launching a new website this month, hopefully. We have been busy gathering all of the info we want on the web, etc. I’m pumped about this as a more interactive way to communicate and share what God is doing individually in our lives and within our ministry. One of the new aspects of the website is blogging. I think I am technically too old to be a blogger, but I’m going to give it a whirl anyway. The staff and interns will also be contributing to the blog. I hope this blog will be informative and will help you with study, with resources, with your ministry and with life . . .