He Loves Us - Immeasurable

Here's a great song to add to your praise team's repertoire. I love their voices!

The conference phenomenon

Today we are gonna talk about something that I'll call the conference phenomenon. You know what I'm talking about...

There is a sense of expectancy when we meet at a conference. We are looking for a great word, a great worship experience, a refreshing, anointing, vibrancy, a move of the Holy Ghost. We come on time. Shoot, we even come early for pre-service prayer. We sing in the audience like we're part of the choir. We take notes. We come up for prayer. We are ready, even anxious or excited for God to speak directly to us. We can't wait to hear from Dr./Bishop/Prophet/Apostle ________. We buy the cd, dvd, download the podcast. We replay it hoping to keep the fire kindled.

But when we go to our individual church on a typical Sunday - dead.

What does it mean when we can praise collectively at another venue, but not at our individual churches?

As a praise leader, we are part cheerleader, part minister, part entertainment. But as congregants, we need to stop expecting the praise leader to be all things every Sunday. Are you coming to church on Sunday with the same expectancy, excitement, and praise that you came to that conference/women's retreat/concert with? If not, you are part of the problem.

What I think I know about worship is that God desires us to experience His presence at our regular Sunday services. (And even beyond that!) A move of God is not just for special events. Not just when that major recording artists performs. Not just when the bishop is in town. We need to bring that same expectancy and readiness with us each Sunday, otherwise what's the point?

Blessings

All Of My Help - Geoffrey Golden

Here's a nice, simple, mid-tempo song suitable for praise teams everywhere. I plan to check out more from Geoffrey Golden.

Great Expectations

We had an awesome service the last Sunday in December. I expected that the first service of 2016 would be great as well... Well, that didn't happen.

• We started church ~ 15 minutes late. Strike one. 
• I ended up leading praise and worship (P&W) by myself, unless you count the 30 seconds my dad, the deacon, was up there before he realized he had other stuff to do and left. Strike 2. 
• People were really late and kind of dead despite my best cheer-leading effort. Strike 3. 
• The kids (including mine) weren't on their best behavior. Strike 4 - This isn't baseball; I have more strikes.
• I didn't follow the message well because I had to step out of the sanctuary with my kid and never was able to catch up or because the message wasn't very linear. Strike 5
• Finally, we ended service later than usual due to starting late, long-winded announcements, and having communion. I typically have no problems with a 2 hour service, but because everything seemed so disjointed and flat to me, I was irritated at the time. Strike 6.

So there. 6 strikes = 2 outs. Good grief!

I suppose I shouldn't be shocked. We had a great service the previous week and I attended my monthly women's prayer and it was great too. 2 people want to join the praise team now. I even wrote a song Dec. 31 after a very uninspired few months. I guess the devil couldn't wait to discourage me.

If I were new to Christ, Sunday might have been my last day at my church for a while, but I understand that we cannot be moved by what we see or even what is. I declare that what happened this Sunday is not going to be indicative of the rest of the year. As Tasha Cobbs reminded us last night on the iLead escape, according to Mark 11:23-24, "We shall have whatever we say."