Emerging Pastor

(Source)

God has been teaching me a big lesson lately and it's not one I think I'm ready to learn. It's all about time.

A few weeks ago our preaching pastor and I were talking about his workload. He is about to finish up his work with our church and has ramped up his ministry in other areas. At the moment there is an overlap and he asked me the question "How do you fit it all in". I stood their and answered him honestly, "You take the time you would devote to your number 1 priority and divide it over all the lower priorities". By that I meant you steal time from your family and spend it on the other jobs we must do.

Doing this is ok in for a short time because there will be times when we must simply finish a task or put food on the table. Doing this for the long haul is not ok, and I've being doing it for the long haul.

These past few weeks, since answering that question honestly I have been physically, mentally and Spiritually exhausted. I need to take a break but every time I find time something else pops up to fill the newly created gap.

I guess I'm asking you quazi-anonymous people to pray for me. For strength, for wisdom and for endurance.

When I was worship leading this Sunday morning it was a real struggle to do it. There was a mini-revolt from some singers because they didn't like the songs, others were pressuring me to make changes. I prayed for God to lead me as I lead the church but midway during the service I lost my grip on Him and never quite recovered.

I feel empty inside, the tank is dry.

At the moment there are two things keeping me going. The love of my wife and Jesus' promise that the well of living water he has caused to spring up inside me doesn't not diminish but rather overflows from me into the lives of others.

The truth is, I'm still seeing that overflow into other peoples lives. I still see God effectively ministering through me to those who He brings across my path even though I am broken and empty inside.

I am a cracked pot still leaking out his love.

Sunday and Tuesday night I brushed off ye olde electric guitar and was involved in a very intimate worship experience with my church.

It happened quite by accident, all the night service crew (except for one) who were rostered on had to bail at the last minute so the drummer (the only original), another worship leader and I just sat on some stools and bashed it out. The drummer was playing a large bongo and the other worship leader and I were playing guitar and singing.

That Sunday night I really felt the presence of God in the worship time, at the end of a couple of songs I engaged in some "free worship" and it was a blessed time with the Word, communion and ministry afterwards.

The three of us were asked to lead worship on Tuesday night during our monthly prayer gathering and we readily agreed, everything was about the same but I just didn't feel it.

So it begs the question, what was different, God or me? And what can I learn from this?

I guess it happens in all churches, some sort of emergency comes up with a key person and that creates a cascading effect in a ministry.

Two Sundays ago I was asked to swap my rostered week for worship leading, I was supposed to be in the 27th but the leader for the 20th couldn't make it so they wanted swap. This worship leader however didn't just want to swap with me, they wanted to swap their entire team. So with a good deal of effort the entire worship team I was rostered on with swapped to this week. So how did it go? It was brilliant!

Not to overstate it, but I usually take a bit of time getting the song selection right for a service. There are many considerations, service length, special events etc but this one had to be actioned with economy of time. So on Tuesday morning I was on the train with a friend who had the "Presenter" software we use for our powerpoints and we just riffed right through a song list.

I know some places like Hillsong put a great deal of production into their services, taking quite deliberate actiosn to make sure the music and message are connected, I believe the term is "building a platform of praise for the speaker". I agree with the approach in general that the two (well all elements of the service) should complement each other but there comes a fine line sometimes between architecting a service and emotional manipulation (not that I'm accusing anyone of that!)

Why do I mention that? Because God really had his hand on the song selection. This weeks and the next two weeks services are based around missions and the song list really captured this theme brilliantly without even trying. The start and finishing song are two very missiony outward focused works and the rest of the songs allowed me to dig deep into what it means to be a Christian when I was meditating on communion.

If your interested, the song list was:

• Tell the world
• Always and Forever
• Salvation belongs to our God
• Nothing but the blood (old hymn)
• Create in me (another old hymn)
• Send me

Well, theologian is giving her a little too much credit but I have been a BIG fan of hers since she released Jagged Little Pill all those years ago. She has been exploring spirituality for a long time and is on a journey to find God in her life and I can connect with a lot of her searching.

On the train this morning I decided to listen to one of her later albums called Under Rug Swept. The second last song on that is Surrendering and as I was listening to it I heard a love song between God and myself. Now I am crazy, but discounting that, it was wonderful to hear a duet between God and myself emerge from the lyrics. I officially repeated the song 9 times on the way to work and just revelled in it.

I've reprinted the lyrics below for you to read but you really need to listen to the song to get the full effect. Two pieces particularly that stand out for me are:

   You were taken with me to a point 
   A case of careful what you wish for 
   But what you knew was enough to begin

   And so you called and courted fiercely 
   So you reached out, entirely fearless 
   And yet you knew of reservation and how it serves

Which describes the first steps I took in my relationship with God, cautious and careful, not wanting to be fully exposed or hurt. But he called me and courted me fiercely, not letting my fear stand in the way. He built a relationship with me and showed that he was trustworthy and that I could surrender myself to him without fear.

It's not uncommon for God to speak to me through music in this way. I've always felt that the whole "Christian music" scene divorces Christian culture from the mainstream in an unhelpful way. I believe that there would be a tone of music on God's iPod that comes from the mainstream and quite a bit he would exclude from the Christian stream.

I believe that we need to go through a process of redeeming music, supporting and holding up music that examines life honestly and not box it as unhelpful just because a Christian didn't write it.

Here's the lyrics...

You were full and fully capable
You were self sufficient and needless
Your house was fully decorated in that sense

You were taken with me to a point
A case of careful what you wish for
But what you knew was enough to begin

And so you called and courted fiercely
So you reached out, entirely fearless
And yet you knew of reservation and how it serves

And I salute you for your courage
And I applaud your perseverance
And I embrace you for your faith in the face of adversarial forces
That I represent

So you were in but not entirely
You were up for this but not totally
You knew how arms length-ing can maintain doubt

And so you fell and you're intact
So you dove in and you're still breathing
And So you jumped and you're still flying if not shocked
And I support you in your trusting
And I commend you for your wisdom
And I'm amazed by your surrender in the face of threatening forces
That I represent

You found creative ways to distance
You hid away from much through humor
Your choice of armor was your intellect

And so you felt and you're still here
And so you died and you're still standing
And so you softened and still safely in command

And I salute you for your courage
And I applaud your perseverance
And I embrace you for your faith in the face of adversarial forces
That I represent

Self protection was in times of true danger
Your best defense to mistrust and be wary
Surrendering a feat of unequaled measure
And I'm thrilled to let you in
Overjoyed to be let in in kind

I salute you for your courage
And I commend you for your wisdom
And I embrace you for your faith in the face of adversarial forces
And I support you in your trusting
And I applaud your perseverance
And I'm amazed by your surrender in the face of threatening forces
That I represent

Source

Sometimes life and ministry just throws you a curveball and this Sunday I caught it (although it nearly broke my hand).

I'm one of the Worship Leaders at our church and this week it was my turn to lead the morning service. I really enjoy worship leading, I feel particularly close to God when I'm doing it. It's a wonderful responsibility and I would do it quite a bit more if I had the time.

In our church we break out the responsibility of leading a service into two roles, worship leading and service leading recognising that not all worship leaders are gifted in leading the other parts of the service and vice - versa. I am one of the few who do both, that's not a blowing my own trumpet thing, I really enjoy doing both but it wasn't always that way. I used to be fine leading communion and the offering, short prayers and announcements but I really never felt comfortable performing the general prayer portion of the service. I used to defer to an Elder but when I was brought on as an Elder in training over a year ago I knew it was time to lift my game, press in with God and trust him to grow me. He had after all trusted me with a little, and now he had given me more.

That is actually off topic for this post, I really wanted to share about how God can bless something when we trust him.

When I put my Order of Service out to the members of the worship team for this week I knew that one of my three singers would not be able to come (I also sing with the team). Wonderfully someone heard about this and sent me an email saying if I need an extra singer then she was available. Thanks Janelle!

Everything seemed on track, God was giving me Scripture to share during the service, I was praying about the service and those who would be there. I arrived Sunday morning about 10 minutes before practice and prayed with our intersessors to be used by God.

After the prayer I had a call from one of my singers, she couldn't make it. She was quite apologetic and I told her it was ok, and it was, life happens sometimes. I had a quick word with the husband of the other singer, he told me that she wouldn't be their either, that was a little annoying, she had opportunity to give me notice. Just after that my fill in singer arrived and told me the drummer wouldn't be there.

The keyboard player arrived shortly after and it was just the three of us during practice. I rang around to some other drummers and no one was available (read: awake), but God had other things in mind. One of the intersessors volenteered to play the other keyboard, adding some depth. He then rang his son and he agreed to play drums for us.

The drummer arrived just before the service, we prayed and then worshiped with our church family.

It was one of the best worship times I have experienced and quite a few others have made the comment as well.

Sometimes we really have to just let go of our plans, our rosters and let God have total control. I think plans and rosters are a good thing generally and don't limit God, but sometimes He just has other ideas and it's wonderful to be able to go with them and experience the blessing.

If your interested, my song list was:

• King of Majesty

• All things are possible

• Salvation belongs to our God

• Amazes Me (On my knees I bow down)

• Complete

• Agnus Dei

• How great is our God